Best Tenn. stations of all time

[amfmxm]

Oh, I agree--I only referenced those stations as a point of comparison to what I sincerely believe is the best radio station that has ever been produced--in Tennessee or anywhere: WSIX-FM, during the House/Mayfield era.

Frankly, I wish I remembered the guy they had on 10A-3P bridging the two stars. I remember him as being extremely likeable and personable with a low-key sense of humor. The perfect mid-day jock.

And I'll admit that I have a huge preference for humor. Those of us in radio tend to think of people like Gerry and Carl P. as "jocks," but really they're comedians--or maybe more accurately, humorists. It isn't the guy (or gal) who can read a great weather forecast or PSA that becomes a radio Hall of Famer--it's the one who makes you laugh. In the case of House & Mayfield, they always had Nashville rolling in the aisles.

And that was radio at its best.

 

[romer979fm]

Frankly, I wish I remembered the guy they had on 10A-3P bridging the two stars.

That would be Hoss Burns.

 

[anotherguyTN]

Interesting thoughts, but I wouldn't list out-of-state stations here, unless you could actually pick them up here in Tennessee. I believe WLS got a mention here earlier, and I did indeed listen to them "back in the day" from my home in rural west Tennessee. They were definitely a player here in the volunteer state back then, even if they didn't know it or weren't aware of it. (But I'm sure that that was also true for dozens of other states (and provinces!) back then, too!) It was also cool to be able to travel to East Tennessee and STILL be able to pick them up! (I remember being almost annoyed whenever the weather was bad at night, and I couldn't receive WLS! :'()

Someone must have known that WLS had an audience in Tennessee because of the ads for Pug Vickers Honda in Huntingdon. He advertised as being the "World's largest Honda dealer" because of his weight. :

 

[firepoint525]

Someone must have known that WLS had an audience in Tennessee because of the ads for Pug Vickers Honda in Huntingdon. He advertised as being the "World's largest Honda dealer" because of his weight. :

Am I reading this right? A Honda dealer in Huntingdon advertised on WLS? That had to be expensive, especially given the (lack of) return on his "investment."

 

[secondchoice]

Someone must have known that WLS had an audience in Tennessee because of the ads for Pug Vickers Honda in Huntingdon. He advertised as being the "World's largest Honda dealer" because of his weight. :

Am I reading this right? A Honda dealer in Huntingdon advertised on WLS? That had to be expensive, especially given the (lack of) return on his "investment."

From personal experience: Car dealers sometimes do "strange" things. If the owner himself listens to the station you will get a buy. Also at that time there were not that many Honda dealers. In the 1970's and 1980's a dealer cleared at least $800 to a grand a deal. If he sold any cars not in the coverage of his "local" advertisement (up to 75 or 100 miles) in the dealer's mind that sale was because of WLS. I do not know how much a 10pm or midnight to 5am "package" was on WLS but if you sell a dozen "extra" cars a month this could have been a good thing. Had there been PPM nationwide including all zip codes in the 1960's and 1970's it would have been interesting kind of numbers WLS, WCFL (east of the Mississippi), WOWO, WLAC, and WSM would have had 6pm till midnight. I believe the midnight to 6am numbers would have been huge for a lot of the old 50KW Clears. IIRC there were less than 30 protected 50 KW's, but some of the other 50 KW AM's (WLAC, WOWO,and WCLF for example) had huge night time coverage too.

 

[robgrayson]

FWIW, this was back when Hondas were motorcycles, not cars. I remember hearing those spots back then. In Huntingdon, at night, I am pretty sure with the WLS buy he had 100% of the target audience listening to top 40 radio.

 

[w9wi]

IIRC there were less than 30 protected 50 KW's, but some of the other 50 KW AM's (WLAC, WOWO,and WCLF for example) had huge night time coverage too.

There were 58 Class I clear-channel stations with some protected skywave coverage. That includes all three stations you mentioned. However, those three stations and 32 others were I-B clears with a second I-B clear operating on the same frequency.* There were only 23 I-A clears with the channel fully to themselves.

WLAC had a pretty decent signal in Milwaukee at night in the 1960s & 1970s.

* Spokane, Portland, and Seattle respectively in those three cases.

 

[anotherguyTN]

Vickers was a car dealer in Huntingdon, but the Honda dealership was motorcycles. There's an article on him from when he died in 2006 toward the bottom of the page here: http://www.mckenziebanner.com/2006/2006news/news_dec26.htm

 

[romer979fm]

I clearly remember the Pug Vickers spots on WLS...actually makes sense as WLS was
the top 40 voice of the rural south and midwest (and beyond) : in fact...WLS showed up in the Nashville
Arbitron routinely in the early and mid 70's...right up until that pesky FM took over!

 

[amfmxm]

Frankly, I wish I remembered the guy they had on 10A-3P bridging the two stars.

That would be Hoss Burns.

It was indeed Hoss. Great voice--huge talent. Gerry House, Hoss Burns & Carl P. Mayfield. Scan all the stations, all the markets--satellite, Pandora--wherever. And you won't find a better 6A-7P lineup than The Big 98 in the late eighties and most of the nineties. Best ever, in my book.

 

[firepoint525]

You may not know the answer to this, but what was WSIX-AM doing during that time? ('80s-'90s) I am obviously referring to the time before the station was sold to the Bible Broadcasting Network (BBN). Who were their jocks at that time? What was their format? A former co-worker of mine claimed to be an alumnus of that station, and I just wanted to see if his name comes up. (Of course, he may have been on the air under a pseudonym.)

 

[w9wi]

You may not know the answer to this, but what was WSIX-AM doing during that time? ('80s-'90s) I am obviously referring to the time before the station was sold to the Bible Broadcasting Network (BBN). Who were their jocks at that time? What was their format? A former co-worker of mine claimed to be an alumnus of that station, and I just wanted to see if his name comes up. (Of course, he may have been on the air under a pseudonym.)

When I came to Nashville in late 1990, WSIX-AM was simulcasting the FM. I think I may have heard a bit of NASCAR that wasn't on the FM signal. That didn't last long, didn't the BBN sale happen sometime in 1991?

 

[firepoint525]

You may not know the answer to this, but what was WSIX-AM doing during that time? ('80s-'90s) I am obviously referring to the time before the station was sold to the Bible Broadcasting Network (BBN). Who were their jocks at that time? What was their format? A former co-worker of mine claimed to be an alumnus of that station, and I just wanted to see if his name comes up. (Of course, he may have been on the air under a pseudonym.)

When I came to Nashville in late 1990, WSIX-AM was simulcasting the FM. I think I may have heard a bit of NASCAR that wasn't on the FM signal. That didn't last long, didn't the BBN sale happen sometime in 1991?

I moved here in '92, so I really don't have any memory of WSIX-AM ever being a music-playing station. Of the three entities once bearing the WSIX call letters (AM, FM, and TV), only the FM station still bears the WSIX calls.

 

[Bat Fastard]

You may not know the answer to this, but what was WSIX-AM doing during that time? ('80s-'90s) I am obviously referring to the time before the station was sold to the Bible Broadcasting Network (BBN). Who were their jocks at that time? What was their format? A former co-worker of mine claimed to be an alumnus of that station, and I just wanted to see if his name comes up. (Of course, he may have been on the air under a pseudonym.)

Late '80s, WSIX-AM at one point was a "Music of Your Life" station...automated. It wasn't much to hear EXCEPT for the Sports programming. Before Capstar/Clear Channel dropped trou and gave up the ship, AM-980 was the place that George Plaster, Willy Daunic, et al got their start in Nashville. It was called "Sports Night" and Duncan Stewart was the host. There were many themes and guests. WSIX-AM also had the U.T. Sports contract in Nashville. Much of what Nashville has today in the way of local Sports programming originated on this station at that time.

I've often wondered about the "wisdom" of selling the AM. The FM was being billed as "98 WSIX-FM" long before Gerry House started calling it "the big, fat 98 of love". The AM was at 980. When simulcast, it was rare to find an FM AND and AM at the same "dial positions".

Of course, Steve Hicks couldn't have cared less about such things. It was among the first of many, many things he didn't care about.

 

[romer979fm]

when I started at WSIX-FM in 1990...the AM was almost a total simulcast:
however, there were some talk/public affairs shows on the AM...I'd break the simulcast
at 9am on Saturday morning...one fun part about the simulcast was when the FM would go off the air:
the airstaff was monitoring the FM only...so whatever happened in the FM control room continued ON AIR on
the AM. use your imagination. once the AM was sold, WWTN operated out of the former AM studio as an LMA.
we were not allowed in the WWTN studio...(which was often un-attended for long stretches including overnights), and it was not uncommon for the WWTN board op to pot up the wrong Mutual feed before leaving at midnight, so instead of Mutual talk programming...the only thing on-air between Mutual newscasts was a beeping tone identifying the channel...for a full six hours until a live body returned at 6am.

 

[amfmxm]

In the early seventies WSIX-AM was a very good full-service personality AC--what we would call a Hot AC today. Unfortunately the Big Dog at the time was WSM-AM, also doing a full-service personality AC during daytime hours (yeah, and Country at night)... and doing it better and with a bigger stick. Spring '75 Arbitron: WSM-AM 11.8... WLAC 11.1... WMAK-FM & WSIX-FM 10.3... WKDF 6.0... WSIX-AM 4.9. That was the end. Spring '76 was a 0.0 and there have been few highlights in the intervening 35 years.

 

[firepoint525]

In the early seventies WSIX-AM was a very good full-service personality AC--what we would call a Hot AC today. Unfortunately the Big Dog at the time was WSM-AM, also doing a full-service personality AC during daytime hours (yeah, and Country at night)... and doing it better and with a bigger stick. Spring '75 Arbitron: WSM-AM 11.8... WLAC 11.1... WMAK-FM & WSIX-FM 10.3... WKDF 6.0... WSIX-AM 4.9. That was the end. Spring '76 was a 0.0 and there have been few highlights in the intervening 35 years.

This is interesting! WSIX-AM was in ratings trouble as far back as '75, yet they lumbered on until about 1990? I would think that a "niche" format like the previously mentioned "metropolitan country" (still not sure what that was, but it seems like an oxymoron to me) might have worked well for them, but I suppose that they got that format by default when they simulcast with WSIX-FM.

Too bad that WSIX didn't come up with a competing "barn dance" to go up against the Opry back in the 1920s, or they, too, might be considered a "heritage" station now.

And I'm guessing that "WMAK-FM" might be a mistake, given that WMAK was only an AM station in 1975 (wasn't it?), and that WMAK-FM didn't exist until Oldies 96.3 adopted those call letters back around 2000.

 

[w9wi]

Too bad that WSIX didn't come up with a competing "barn dance" to go up against the Opry back in the 1920s, or they, too, might be considered a "heritage" station now.

I don't think WSIX had the signal to make that work. Until the beginning of World War II, WSIX was a "graveyard" station on 1240 -- they would have had little or no signal outside the immediate Nashville area.

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When simulcast, it was rare to find an FM AND and AM at the same "dial positions".

On the (analog tuned) car radio I had at the time, it was quite literally at the same dial positions. If I tuned in WSIX-FM 97.9 & then slid the selector from FM to AM, I heard the same programming -- AM 980 came in without moving the dial.

 

[romer979fm]

I'm guessing that "WMAK-FM" might be a mistake, given that WMAK was only an AM station in 1975 (wasn't it?), and that WMAK-FM didn't exist until Oldies 96.3 adopted those call letters back around 2000.

actually...92.1 was WMAK-FM from July 1981 until picking up the current WQQK calls ('84?).
In '81...WMAK and 92Q were simulcasting mornings (Steve McCoy and Mary Glen) and afternoons (Doc Damon).
The brain-trust running things couln't comprehend that the perception of WMAK was not positive, and decided
to bank on the WMAK "image" for 92Q. Epic fail. McCoy bolted for Atlanta. 92.1 was sold to Sam Howard
(and was a MOYL knock-off for a while...another epic fail). WMAK became WLUY "Lucky 13"...probably
the most horrible station ever conceived. By it's timely end, it as manned primarily by broadcast school
students...went dark...and sold to Babb to become WNQM. Sorry...tangent mode activated.

 

[amfmxm]

And I'm guessing that "WMAK-FM" might be a mistake, given that WMAK was only an AM station in 1975 (wasn't it?), and that WMAK-FM didn't exist until Oldies 96.3 adopted those call letters back around 2000.

My mistake. The WMAK numbers from '75 were indeed WMAK-AM.

Memory from the seventies is starting to fade with the rest of me, but I seem to recall that when I first hit town around 1972-ish the only stations formatted Country sign-on to sign-off were WKDA-AM and WENO-AM. I was not among the chosen few with an actual FM receiver in my '65 Fairlane, so I don't recall what The Big 98 was doing. Were they Country at that time?

IIRC, WENO was kinda gut-bucket, ridge-runner Country with signal limitations (directional? upper dial-position?)... and KDA was at Graveyard 1240 in a city already too big for it to matter. FWIW, with that 5kw fulltimer at 980, if WSIX-AM had had its bleep together in the late sixties/early seventies they could have owned the town for a decade or so before FM took over for good...