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A question about the history of WOND

M

maryis

Hello. I'm doing a research project and wanted to focus on an AM talk station. Someone suggested WOND.

Where would someone go, online, to find a history of the owners of the station as well as when it changed hands, etc. etc.

I've found some historical info, i.e. the names of some of the disk jockeys when it was a music station etc. but I can't seem to find a place to look for ownership history and things like that.

If anyone is familiar with how to do this or knows where there is a history of the station that includes the owners etc. I would be very appreciative of any help you can give me. Thanks in advance.
 
Thanks for your response. Unfortunately, I am not familiar with Tom McNally. Could you elaborate?

Edited to add: I did a search on radio info and found Tom McNally. Thank you. If anyone else has anything that would help, I am particularly interested in WOND in the late 1950s. Thanks in advance.
 
Hi -

I worked at WOND for 15 years, starting when I was 18.

It went on the air in 1950, as a 250 watt "Class IV" station, in
a little building near the tower on Old Turnpike in Pleasantville.
(That building which became just the transmitter shack burned to
the ground about 3 years ago) I'm pretty sure the station was
owned by South Jersey Radio, Inc. from the start. In about
1954, Howard Green, who passed away in 2002, came to work
there as a 20-something guy and quickly became a minor partner
and ultimately worked his way up to 50% owner with Donald Simmons,
from Sayre, PA (who some people say invented panty hose)
The newspaper Ocean City Sentinel Ledger was a 1/3 partner for
a long time also. South Jersey Radio wound up owning the newspaper
in the 80s.

Howard Green also owned WENY AM/FM/TV in Elmira, NY with Simmons
(Elmira is very close to Sayre, PA) and at various times they owned
stations in Maine and Florida. They attempted to put on a TV station
in Atlantic City as early as the 60's ... but abandoned the idea when
they couldn't get a network affiliation. WOND TV-53.

As far as WOND - the programming was always music with live DJ's
and a few specialty shows. The first "talk show" was Pinky Kravitz,
"Pinky's Corner" who came over from 1490 WLDB. Pinky is still
on the air after like 50 years, along with Don Williams, who also
started at WLDB. WOND was a music station until I would say the
late 80's (after I left) when they started to carry more news and
some local and network talk shows.

Ownership was Howard Green's South Jersey Radio, Inc, until his
passing in 2002, when his will passed it to the Salvation Army
(he was always an active supporter - as were his parents who
were heavily involved as officers) The Salvation Army ran it for
about two years, then Access.1 bought it, then sold it to Atlantic Broadcasting
of Linwood in 2008.

There really isn't much written history of WOND in the 50s ... not much
going on ... it was a 250 watt AM playing records in a building in the
swamp. Lots of DJ's got there start there in the 60s and 70s and went
on to big markets.

... tom
 
Tom's recollections have jarred my memories of some of the people who have worked at WOND over the years. Jessica Savitch started her career there. Tom Lamaine worked there before was hired by Philadelphia's WIP [back when Metromedia owned it]...and that led to his job at KYW-TV.

I knew about plans for WOND-TV, but always assumed Howard's ties with ABC Radio [WOND was an affiliate, so were the WENY stations] would help secure an ABC-TV affiliation. I didn't know he couldn't land it.
 
Thanks for the additional info, Neil. I've now realized that I probably need to learn more about the early ownership, i.e. 1950-1952. I believe that I can go through the FCC website somehow to see if the station was always owned by the same person. There was a guy on, very early on, around 1951 who went by the name Freddy I believe but I cannot find any reference to his last name. I believe he worked there during Hurricane Hazel in the early fifties or an earlier hurricane. I very much appreciate your help on the info.
 
The FCC doesn't have any records online prior to the 80's,
a search of newspaper archives of the Atlantic City Press
or maybe the Ocean City Sentinel Ledger may give you
some information, I don't think either are available online though.

Early copies of the Broadcasting Yearbook might be helpful too,
I'm sure there is a collection of them at a library someplace.

Would you be thinking of Fred Haggerty ? (not sure of spelling)

I met him when he was pretty old and working at McCarthy Ford
(now Chapman) in Pleasantville and he told me he had been at
WOND as program director.
 
DEAR MARY ...please check out all of tom's helpful postings
maryis said:
Thanks for the additional info, Neil. I've now realized that I probably need to learn more about the early ownership, i.e. 1950-1952. I believe that I can go through the FCC website somehow to see if the station was always owned by the same person. There was a guy on, very early on, around 1951 who went by the name Freddy I believe but I cannot find any reference to his last name. I believe he worked there during Hurricane Hazel in the early fifties or an earlier hurricane. I very much appreciate your help on the info.
Click to expand...
 
Thank you all. I have been able to check the links and read the full articles that Tom posted from the NYT archives. This station seems to have a little more "history" than I was aware of. I did come across a name of the person who was called "president" of the station in the early fifties before it was sold in 1954. His name was Charles Rupp as cited in the article. But it does not connote him as owner. And in searching that name, I was not able to find much except for a Charles Rupp who was some sort of politician later.

In the articles there was no mention of a Fred or Freddie (I wish I could remember the last name - my relatives listened to this station during Hurricane Hazel (I think that was around 1954, after the articles that Tom linked). My relatives mentioned how this man had practically waded out to the transmitter to keep the station on. The Fred mentioned by an earlier person on this thread is not the same person unfortunately. The Fred (or Freddy) I'm speaking of, I believe, moved out of state rather abruptly because my relatives said that he was there one day and then gone the next. There was some sort of back story to the move but my relatives are old and the story is now fuzzy. I was primarily interested in the 'revolving door' that DJs always have seemed to endure... and nowadays most often that door leads to the street and a different career. It's funny how a radio personality can stick with people all these years.

The links do lead to a rather interesting story of politics, graft, etc. etc. but that wasn't my initial interest. However, I found the articles interesting to say the least. My focus was more on the evolution of a rock radio station to a talk station which WOND was and the long and short lived careers and moves and the "why's".
 
A local radio station back in 1951 probably paid about $ 50 a week, and DJ's
typically travelled around like gypsys looking for work, staying in motels, etc.
"Freddy" could have gotten fired or found a better job and moved on.

To this day, people don't understand that when a DJ leaves, the station isn't
typically going to explain why they left or where they went, unless it was a
big move, say from radio to TV or something "glamorous" most of the time
people get fired for cause, leave for another station, quit the business, etc.
so it's only natural that the station doesn't publicize it. Even if the person
does say "goodbye" it's not not likely that many people heard the final
comments.

Anyway - the transition of WOND from music to talk was a natural
transition most AM stations took when FM took over the music as
far as revenue and ratings. WOND did it in the 80's and 90's - so it's
not ancient history. Don Williams and Pinky Kravitz were part of it,
as was Jeff Whittaker, who are still around and probably available to
chat with. Dick Irland, the former General Manager is still around
and was involved with the station since about 1980 or 1981.

As far as ownership - the news articles seem to indicate a sale
in 1954, and I see that Howard Green's company took over
in 1957. Info is sketchy. I would think the sale prices back
then were $ 50,000 or so ? I know technically speaking, RCA
had a radio station package that included a tower, transmitter,
audio board, turntables, microphone and speaker for about $ 6000
back in that era, so add some land and a building and legal fees
and starting a station wasn't all that expensive. Relatively
speaking, a new Chevrolet was about $ 1000.

... tom
 
Tom McNally said:
I know technically speaking, RCA
had a radio station package that included a tower, transmitter,
audio board, turntables, microphone and speaker for about $ 6000
back in that era, so add some land and a building and legal fees
and starting a station wasn't all that expensive. Relatively
speaking, a new Chevrolet was about $ 1000.

... tom
Click to expand...

Don't forget the teletype! News commitment was mandatory back then.
 
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