AM 1320 broadcasting from CD player??

[Dighton Rockhead]

When Peter Ottmar owned WARA and Dave Kane was PD, they routinely billed $25-30 K per week. That's about $1.4 mil per year-and we're talking 1985 dollars. This was back in the 1 kW days-when they super served Attleboro. In 2010 dollars, that's like billing $3+ million-which very few Providence stations even do today.
The key was that they super served their local audience-who responded by buying from local WARA advertisers. They didn't HAVE any ratings, but they didn't NEED them! What killed them was when they increased power to 5 kilowatts, they abandoned their core audience and tried to be Providence-with a rimshot signal no less.

AMEN ! ! !......and......amen.

 

[N1WVQ]

I love the history of these stations. Please tell MORE! Did they run any teams? Did they cover spelling bees, city council meetings? I heard they played the 3 high schools' games if not live then recorded.

 

[Dighton Rockhead]

From what I remember of WARA-1320 during the Peter Ottmar ownership, the station was always heavily involved in community events and charities of one kind or another. The one which springs to mind first is "Christmas is for Kids", which was a kind of collection drive for toys, clothes, and any other items which could help make Christmas a little brighter for children from less fortunate families. I believe local businesses were also involved as well.

As for things like city council meetings and local high school football, my memory is a lot more fuzzy. I do remember, however, that Dave Kane personally HATED the very idea of high school sports on radio......being of the belief that the only people who would actually LISTEN to the games would be parents and friends of the players.

Rest in Peace WARA-1320......You are sorely missed......

 

[MissAM]

Yes, but those parents and friends of the players of the team being broadcast would go to the sponsors who supported the air time. Kane was a fool.

 

[MissAM]

Killer Kane was the one behind the 5000K rush to doom too...

 

[N1WVQ]

This is all so sad. What was Dave Kane's problem with H.S.F.B.? It's been the breadbasket of many a southern A.M. station. Plus it's kinda fun tuning around on Thanksgiving & hearing all of those games!

 

[MissAM]

Kane was against anything he didn't understand or like. Period.

 

[iyiyi]

SKIMSHOT: A local radio station unable to provide a usable signal to an adjacent larger market.

Haven't heard anyone use the term before but I throw the word out there. Much more accurately describes 1320 and 1480 relationships to the Providence market. Rimshot better describes 103.7 and 98.1 which both pack a lot of wallop signal (and ratings) wise there.

Can't think of one skimshot that ever made it trying to serve the larger market. Can remember what happened to WHIM after they took their 30 year established format to 1450 clear enough, though.

Was at 1400 when Col. Milton owned it. Obits was a sponsored show and everyone was professional doing the program. We used to broadcast one HS football game while taping another local game to air immediately following. We played softball with various community teams and aired them live. Lost dog and cat reports, council meetings and remotes, remotes and more remotes. We aired every community event we could sell or provide as a public service. The logs were full of spots and no one worried about a bouncing pay check. Talk shows always had callers. We only cared about Fall River local area and concentrated on serving as best we could. Local radio is, was and ever will be a hard sell. The station had a newsperson always on duty. They had George King come in overnights and prepare and deliver a morning news sheet for the patrons of various diners, coffee shops, etc. That's the only way I've ever seen local radio work. Dedication to the common good of the community. It is something that can't be VT'd or phoned in.

Someone mentioned a 10PM signoff for 1320. I seem to remember them signing off about that time even when they were the Local Lion of Attleboro broadcasting from the plush 2nd floor of the bank.

If somebody gave you every AM and FM listener within 1320's 2Mv/M night contour between 10PM and 6AM -- with your choice of format -- could anyone actually sell enough spots to just pay the electric bill for that time period?

_

 

[VelvetR]

Was at 1400 when Col. Milton owned it. Obits was a sponsored show and everyone was professional doing the program. We used to broadcast one HS football game while taping another local game to air immediately following. We played softball with various community teams and aired them live. Lost dog and cat reports, council meetings and remotes, remotes and more remotes. We aired every community event we could sell or provide as a public service. The logs were full of spots and no one worried about a bouncing pay check. Talk shows always had callers. We only cared about Fall River local area and concentrated on serving as best we could.

Not to take anything away from Milt Mittler....

When he bought WALE (1400) he did the smartest thing he had ever done with a radio station. He didn't mess with success. The "local" format was the work of George L. Sisson, Jr. and his brother, J. Roger. They built the station, first as WFRM, a 250-Watt FM, and ran that with exactly the same format starting in about 1948. They worked like dogs to get an AM license - opposed by The Fall River Herald-News which then had an advertising monoply in Fall River with their ownership of WSAR. The original studios were in the basement of The Durfee Theater Building next door to a pool hall. The transmitters, when I worked there, were side-by-side in the control room though the FM was shut down by that time (1958). The antenna was on an approximately 180-foot Wincharger tower on the roof of the theater. They had the foresight, when building to put a base insulator under the tower though it was exclusively for FM (the old low-band variety) at the time. Yes, even when the FM went silent, the radiator remained atop the tower and may have been bonded to it so as to become an active part of the AM antenna. When originally built as an FM there was NO ground system. Radials were later laid on the theater roof with a 20-foot square copper ground screen that was later augmented with chicken wire (yes, steel chicken wire) soldered to the radials. The transmission line was the 4-conductor open-wire variety which worked OK at 250 Watts. Part of the duty of the weekend board-op/announcer was, during taped religious programming, to go up through the theater; into the balcony; through a concealed door into the projection booth then up a vertical wooden ladder onto the roof. Then, take an antenna base current reading and get back down before the tape ended. Wise ops learned NEVER to do it during a so-called "Electrically Transcribed" religious program (16-inch vinyl) as a needle-skip played hell. It was during one such that the legendary repetition of "And Our Lord Jesus Christ.....Jesus Christ.....Jesus Christ.....Jesus Christ...J....." happened.

It was common, particularly on Thanksgiving - the BIG FOOTBALL day - to do as you described with the games. Durfee/New Bedford broadcast live (Chris Barnes in the 50's) and the Case/Somerset game on tape. But the tape was recorded at the field on an old Presto machine (huge sucker) which ran off a generator behind the stands. Thing is, it was a cheap generator and the frequency was unstable so the playback was hilarious with Pete Mandel's (aka "Paul Mills") voice changing pitch constantly.

Hey, there was money in football! Basketball, too....but none in high school baseball or softball in those days.

The obits were always done, as you put it "professionally" - those that were faked were not done to be funny. Rather to have enough to fill the fifteen minutes the funeral homes were paying for.

It was Interstate 195 that changed everything. The theater was torn down; transmitter moved over near the housing project where vandalism was a constant problem. The old Raytheon transmitter was retired and it wasn't long before the power boost helped the signal. The studio moved up onto Rock Street though I never saw the new location. I'm not sure at what point in terms of location Mittler bought WALE but he sure was smart in keeping the original format.

 

[iyiyi]

Not to take anything away from Milt Mittler....

When he bought WALE (1400) he did the smartest thing he had ever done with a radio station. He didn't mess with success. The "local" format was the work of George L. Sisson, Jr. and his brother, J. Roger. They built the station, first as WFRM, a 250-Watt FM, and ran that with exactly the same format starting in about 1948. They worked like dogs to get an AM license - opposed by The Fall River Herald-News which then had an advertising monoply in Fall River with their ownership of WSAR. The original studios were in the basement of The Durfee Theater Building next door to a pool hall. The transmitters, when I worked there, were side-by-side in the control room though the FM was shut down by that time (1958). The antenna was on an approximately 180-foot Wincharger tower on the roof of the theater. They had the foresight, when building to put a base insulator under the tower though it was exclusively for FM (the old low-band variety) at the time. Yes, even when the FM went silent, the radiator remained atop the tower and may have been bonded to it so as to become an active part of the AM antenna. When originally built as an FM there was NO ground system. Radials were later laid on the theater roof with a 20-foot square copper ground screen that was later augmented with chicken wire (yes, steel chicken wire) soldered to the radials. The transmission line was the 4-conductor open-wire variety which worked OK at 250 Watts. Part of the duty of the weekend board-op/announcer was, during taped religious programming, to go up through the theater; into the balcony; through a concealed door into the projection booth then up a vertical wooden ladder onto the roof. Then, take an antenna base current reading and get back down before the tape ended. Wise ops learned NEVER to do it during a so-called "Electrically Transcribed" religious program (16-inch vinyl) as a needle-skip played hell. It was during one such that the legendary repetition of "And Our Lord Jesus Christ.....Jesus Christ.....Jesus Christ.....Jesus Christ...J....." happened.

It was common, particularly on Thanksgiving - the BIG FOOTBALL day - to do as you described with the games. Durfee/New Bedford broadcast live (Chris Barnes in the 50's) and the Case/Somerset game on tape. But the tape was recorded at the field on an old Presto machine (huge sucker) which ran off a generator behind the stands. Thing is, it was a cheap generator and the frequency was unstable so the playback was hilarious with Pete Mandel's (aka "Paul Mills") voice changing pitch constantly.

Hey, there was money in football! Basketball, too....but none in high school baseball or softball in those days.

The obits were always done, as you put it "professionally" - those that were faked were not done to be funny. Rather to have enough to fill the fifteen minutes the funeral homes were paying for.

It was Interstate 195 that changed everything. The theater was torn down; transmitter moved over near the housing project where vandalism was a constant problem. The old Raytheon transmitter was retired and it wasn't long before the power boost helped the signal. The studio moved up onto Rock Street though I never saw the new location. I'm not sure at what point in terms of location Mittler bought WALE but he sure was smart in keeping the original format.

Thank you for the history. I realized a head on with Col. Mittler was inadvisable so I got along very well with him. We both were pointed in the same direction (1400 on air and sounding good).


When I checked out the gig at 1400 everyone told me I was crazy. The station was a laughing stock running 250 watts IF they could get on air at all. Transmitter tubes exploding on air during newscasts.
Talk shows unable to delay due to RF ingress. Broken turnbuckle on open wire transmission line "fixed" by much larger masonite spacers on each end to keep them apart in wind... Use your imagination.

But... There were new consoles, turntables, the CBS Max twins, reasonably new xmtr, many Ampex 350s, new cartridge delay machine. management willing to invest in their sound... Also... Announcers watching for the splice to pass before recording on carts, gently and patiently dealing with balky, frustrating equipment -- pros somehow able to do good radio with little going for them. A sizeable pay increase had some effect on my consideration too.

Smartest thing I ever did. The phone never stopped ringing until illness took me out of the game.

I remember who you are! If correct, you are the hotshot with a Journalism degree from BU who handled 1590 "Prestige Radio" way back. I was just a kid occasionally visiting the station trying to learn about radio. Remember "wyngie"?


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[VelvetR]

Smartest thing I ever did. The phone never stopped ringing until illness took me out of the game.

I remember who you are! If correct, you are the hotshot with a Journalism degree from BU who handled 1590 "Prestige Radio" way back. I was just a kid occasionally visiting the station trying to learn about radio. Remember "wyngie"?

I think you're off the mark by a bit. Yes, I was a Journalism major at BU but didn't hang around long enough to get a degree. I started with WYNG, hired as the first news director under the Attleboro Radio Association ownership (can't remember the year - I think it was 1961). Never worked when the term "Prestige Radio" was in use. I actually did start working under weird conditions before the transfer became effective. But never was paid by "The Colonel". What happened was the original PD resigned in a huff with about ten days to go before A.R.A. took over leaving a very short staff. Bill D., who was to become the manager, called me in early to keep it going and, even though the station still officially belonged to the old owner, they paid me, calling it "preparation" for the new news operation.

I was the last to use the "chimes" (they were a set-and-a-half of NBC toy chimes taped together and re-arranged).
The "signature" was B-C-B-N-C, tapped into a mic using a pencil stabbed into a "superball". In the last use I hammered the daylights out of them and they broke.

Wyngie. Yes, I found his cold corpse one morning.

Wyngie was a parakeet. Kept in a cage in the lobby at 19 Luther Avenue, across from Steak and Shake. The heat in the building was a hot water system with an auto-fill valve that occasionally failed. One night it got down to about -20 (seriously, one of the very few times that ever happened in RI). The boiler ran low on water and shut down sometime in early evening and, though it was still warm enough inside that the pipes didn't freeze, the bird was feet-up in the bottom of the cage.

A few days later when I opened up I flicked on the filaments (Gates remote control) and watched the meter go up and fall back. There being only a contract engineer from quite a distance away, I went to the transmitter and found the heat had failed in the shack up on top of the old "oven" that had been part of a factory that made plywood seaplanes. There was condensed mercury vapor in the 8008's (rectifiers) and one had shattered. I took two spares down to my MGA and tented them with a blanket with the heater blowing on them. Then went back up and replaced a blown fuse. Once the tubes were toasty I wrapped 'em up and got 'em in place fast and hit the local filament switch (Gates 1-kW). They caught! When they were glowing nicely purple I hit the plates and drove back to the studio with the dead carrier up until I got there and ran the sign-on. After that, SOP was to LEAVE THE FILAMENTS on all night. Unfortunately, one "star" who is still alive in Johnston, also was given to leaving the (daytimer) plates on all night, too. Oh yeah, I had only a 3rd class license at the time but nobody was looking.....

Now I'm thinking you may the person who later tipped several liter steins with me in Munich a very few years later.

Unless, of course, you're "Freddie, Jr.".......

 

[iyiyi]

Thank you for allowing me and my friends our first opportunity to speak on the radio! You introduced us as guests and let us say our names! We were junior high school kids and any radio person surely can remember the thrills first time on the business end of the mic. Couple of us actually ended up in radio, thanks to the time you and others spent showing us the correct way to do things. I have great appreciation for this.

I probably showed up during that transition. I am trying to reconcile things my child eyes and ears picked up with today's adult thinking. Things were pretty hectic. The above description of you was from Gene Cramer and Bob Cullagh (I think, also unsure of spelling) who also told us the station was fortunate to have you. I now understand the anxiety they were going through with the ownership transfer.

You were still playing the Beautiful Music format. "The Swying is to WYNG" or "In the air everywhere" mean anything at that time? E-C-E-G-E. The look on every announcers face as they bonged out the time tone, yet like the Obits mentioned on the WALE thread, the time checks always sounded professional.
I am certain you endeared yourself to the entire staff when you retired that xylophone. They sounded good on the air, fit the format and gave the station identity. I didn't have to bong them 20 times a hour though. When reading the nx, you'd turn your head and take a breath while gently placing the old copy on the floor so the noises wouldn't go over the air. I'd guess a few sirens from the fire station across the street, per airshift, quickly cured you from that method.

We visited WYNG 2 or possibly 3 times. At least on 2 occasions, the first order of business for the "star" (who would show up for his airshift in swimming trunks) was to throw us out of the station. Our whole intent on visiting the station was always to talk you into playing rock and roll. Maybe 1 or 2 phone calls also came your way, again about the same subject. Forget Wingie's color (blue?). I do recall his passing cast gloom on some. "Where's Wingie?" was quickly shushed on one visit.

Warming 8008s with an MGA's heater must have been fun. The only warm British thing I can think of is beer. Why? Because they use Lucas refrigerators!

I never had opportunity to meet you as an adult. All of us (you literally!) were scattered unto the ends of the world. You pushed the Word over the top of the Earth! I can't come anywhere near that feat. Haven't touched alcohol in decades, but please pour an ice cold for yourself with my toast of blessings!

There are a couple thimbles full of 1590 info I'll post on the 3 towers off 95 thread, before I incur wrath for filling MissAM's thread with OT static.

1961 started with 1110 switching to Beautiful Music when Ken Garland bolted to 920. 990 came on in April with Beautiful Music. 1590 had been in that format since signing on August 1959. Funny how 990 stomped some royal ass all through the 1960s (daytimer no less!) with that same setup on Log road everyone thinks is so hilarious today!

We are trying to trace the downfall of the quintessential hometown 1320 Attleboro. You were there when the tires began leaving the road in a new direction. PLEASE tell us all you can about 1320 because you're one of the very few who knows how things actually went down!


_

 

[VelvetR]

Thank you for allowing me and my friends our first opportunity to speak on the radio!

After all these years....yes, there were several groups that passed through WYNG like that. Freddie, Jr. sort of led one of them; he went on to start up a very low power high-school FM, one of the first of the sort. Freddie, along with two other friends, convinced me to fly them (I was doing a lot of that for fun back then) to New York City for The 1964 World's Fair. The air was rough; Freddie had a bit of a problem and then squeezed the barf-bag which erupted! The contents froze to the inside of the windshield, making for a somewhat challenging landing at the old Flushing (Speed's Flying Service) Airport, just across the river from LaGuardia. I got a lot of my flight training in a plane hired out to WPRO; me flying as a student, mostly "under the hood - on instruments" - while the instructor/traffic reporter did the broadcasts. No, nobody in the business today would remember the name of that pilot; he has been deceased for thirty or more years and worked under an assumed name.

I probably showed up during that transition. I am trying to reconcile things my child eyes and ears picked up with today's adult thinking. Things were pretty hectic. The above description of you was from Gene Cramer and Bob Cullagh (I think, also unsure of spelling) who also told us the station was fortunate to have you. I now understand the anxiety they were going through with the ownership transfer.

Gene "Cramer" was (he's deceased, so I can talk about this) Gene Flynn who was very much ill at ease at the time of the sale but who endured and stayed a number of years afterward. He got out of radio some years later and was involved in a really messy matter which could have put him in prison for a long, long time! We who knew him felt he had been set up and a jury later agreed with that but it changed his life and he stayed out of radio.

Bob was a Brown University student working part time and one summer. Very creative guy; I have no idea where he went when he graduated. Another guy who worked there for a bit was David Stackhouse who had a long history with WJAR. If you "Google" that name you'll find some interesting stuff....he was a Rhode Island radio pioneer, working at WYNG as a sort of retirement/amusement thing well into his 70s.

You were still playing the Beautiful Music format. "The Swying is to WYNG" or "In the air everywhere" mean anything at that time?

Yes, we continued with that until we had the format organized for the extremely local operation. The point was to minimize the Warwick/East Greenwich city of license and play at "rimshot" with the only "Beautiful Music" format at the time. Milt Mittler had to spend a lot of lawyer money to avoid having to have a second studio in EG but one of the first things Attleboro Radio Association did was to open the storefront studio (Don Turner did mornings from there while I did news out of Luther Avenue).

E-C-E-G-E. The look on every announcers face as they bonged out the time tone, yet like the Obits mentioned on the WALE thread, the time checks always sounded professional.

Musically correct but nobody ever thought of it that way. We did it according to the silkscreen markings on the chimes: B-C-B-N-C. Hey, they were perverted from a toy set of NBC chimes! And, yes, all except one individual hated them. He left as soon as the sale was announced and it was his sudden departure that caused A-R-A to get me to start with them sooner than they, or I, had planned.

Forget Wingie's color (blue?). I do recall his passing cast gloom on some. "Where's Wingie?" was quickly shushed on one visit.

Yes, Wyngie was blue. Especially on that morning when I found him frozen, feet-up, in the bottom of the cage. True, a slightly different shade of blue at the moment..... I hated that bird from the day one of the guys chucked him into the across-the-glass studio while I was reading the noon local news and he sat on my shoulder and chattered through the whole thing.

I can't come anywhere near that feat. Haven't touched alcohol in decades, but please pour an ice cold for yourself with my toast of blessings!

Nice thought! I lost my taste for alcohol...inexplicably...a number of years ago. But, in those days, it was standard operating practice to keep a quart of CC in the lower left desk drawer and take a hearty belt before doing the major newscasts. Not just there....it was pretty standard among people who were doing news around the state at that time.

1961 started with 1110 switching to Beautiful Music when Ken Garland bolted to 920. 990 came on in April with Beautiful Music. 1590 had been in that format since signing on August 1959. Funny how 990 stomped some royal ass all through the 1960s (daytimer no less!) with that same setup on Log road everyone thinks is so hilarious today!

Hey, I was there. Weekended for Pete Barstow while working all week at WYNG. Then left WYNG to work with Mel Burns over at WXTR....fulltime at 990 for a year or so....then back to XTR to bring "The Wonderful World of Music" there after Mel suddenly and tragically died.

We are trying to trace the downfall of the quintessential hometown 1320 Attleboro. You were there when the tires began leaving the road in a new direction. PLEASE tell us all you can about 1320 because you're one of the very few who knows how things actually went down!

I wish I could. I never worked at WARA itself. Their sales manager became the GM at WYNG and they continued with the local format until most of the people who had founded the station died of old age and it fell into the hands of the son of one of them who then sold it off. It always was a sort of odd operation though the local format really worked. I spent a bit of time at their transmitter site and an oddity it was, too. Two towers (directional at night) but of different height and cross-section that made keeping the pattern in trim very interesting. That was in the days of first-phone operation when directional. The Chief Engineer had one full time and one part-time engineer on staff to cover all the shifts. The full-time guy was a Lithuanian who immigrated just after WW-II and was an electronic genius. The WARA studio operations ended at 7pm and all programming originated from the transmitter. The engineer on duty tracked albums and ran IDs and occasional commercials off reel-to-reel tape. As I recall, when there was local basketball at night the phone line it came in on was routed directly to the transmitter site so the studio didn't have to be manned. That same engineer hand-built the remote equipment used at the WYNG East Greenwich window-studio. He later went on to do engineering at WLKW (again when the Log Road site had to be manned at all times due to FCC rules). Then, one day, he didn't show up for his shift and was found to have passed away in his little trailer where he always lived alone. By then the changes had begun at WARA but I was long moved off to television and then on to a Western state...ultimately to Alaska which quickly became the place that feels most like home.


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[Dighton Rockhead]

We are trying to trace the downfall of the quintessential hometown 1320 Attleboro. You were there when the tires began leaving the road in a new direction. PLEASE tell us all you can about 1320 because you're one of the very few who knows how things actually went down!

Actually....the person you might consider asking for information about when/where/how the wheels began to fall off at the former 1320 WARA is......the poster who began this thread......"MissAM".

Calling "MissAM"......Calling "MissAM"......

 

[MissAM]

What does anyone want to know about 1320 back in the day... and why do they want to know???

 

[VelvetR]

What does anyone want to know about 1320 back in the day... and why do they want to know???

I didn't have any questions until you so kindly offered.....

This probably goes back too far for you have been there but, here goes.

When Attleboro Radio Association sold WYNG, did Bill Dawson (who had been the WARA sales manager and then was sent to manage WYNG) return to WARA? I lost track of him....interesting character that he was. I recall him as not only a really great character but also as being very good to work for.

And, later in the game, did you have the pleasure of working with Tony R. when he did the morning show for a couple of years? One of the truly nice people ever in Rhode Island radio but never given the recognition he deserved. Yes, he's still alive and collecting antique radios!

 

[MissAM]

YOu are correct. Way before my life in the Attleboro area for sure. Sorry I can't be of any help.

 

[MissAM]

The station was doing pretty well when Mike Merolla bought the station from Peter and hired Kane after mike promised Peter that he would never do that. It was all arranged. Then the station divebombed as Kane was always off womanizing and staffers were running the station in fear of going against Kane. Kaboom!