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Don and Mike in Indy

T

TalkRadioGeek

Guest
I was listening to an old show of Don and Mike, out of Washington, from 2001 and they said they were in Indianapolis for a brief time, but left because the station was chopping up the shows.

Does anyone know what station they were on? It peaked my curiosity. I figured maybe WIBC before Dave the King, but they don't seem a good fit for them. And this was before WXNT's time. So was there another talk station in town?

Seriously WTF, take a listen to the Don & Mike show as opposed to Sporting News Radio. We all know you aren't serious about being a big news station, or you would have had live coverage last night of Saddam. So why don't you go towards a more"hot talk" route. D&M are something new in the market, like Mancow, and could help you build new listeners.
 
So WNDE wasn't always sports? What's the history there?
 
In my youth, I vaguely remember WNDE being an oldies format. Then sometime in the late 80s and early 90s they simulcasted Bob and Tom in the mornings...I don't know if they WERE N/T then and made the transition to sports or what.

Ah, my faulty memory...
 
TalkRadioGeek said:
So WNDE wasn't always sports? What's the history there?
Click to expand...

NDE was news/talk in the late 80's early 90's with Limbaugh, G Gordon Liddy, and others (all satellite with Bob and Tom in the AM). WIBC took Limbaugh away in either early 92 or 93' as they switched from a music format featuring songs like the "wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" and "Kokomo" to full time News/Talk.

Limbaugh wanted the better signal. WNDE soon switched over to sports, and I think they were using Sporting News Radio as WIBC was the ESPN affiliate in the market at the time.

1430 was running Adult Standards as WMYS I think.
 
Re: WNDE history

TalkRadioGeek said:
So WNDE wasn't always sports? What's the history there?
Click to expand...

AM 1260 was originally WFBM. Co-owned by Time-Life - along with FM 94.7 and channel 6. Time-Life left broadcasting in the early 70s. TV was sold to McGraw-Hill and picked up the WRTV calls. Radio remained as WFBM AM and FM.

Through the spring and summer of 1973, most of the WFBM air staff were either fired or reassigned to other duties. Long time WFBM morning man Joe Pickett jumped to WXLW. Newsman Glenn Webber joined the staff of a local beer distributor. Nighttime talk host Lou Sherman moved into sales.

The AM-FM simulcast of the morning show was dropped when 94.7 became oldies formatted WFBQ. AM moved to a more contemporary sound musically through the summer of 1973, and in late August became Top 40 WNDE Windy 1260. The first WNDE air staff included former WTPI morning jock Steve Cooper. Dale Summers later became "The Truckin' Bozo" on WLW Cincinnati. Pat Berry later returned to Cincinnati to work at Q102 and elsewhere.

WNDE had a good run as a top 40 - lasting until the fall of 1979. Don Geronimo first worked at WNDE for a little less than a year - until his move to Kiss 99 in August of '79. As Geronimo jumped ship, WNDE switched to an AC format. Then GM Ken Wolt was quoted in the Indy Star as saying that the biggest mistake made with the station was the change to Top 40 and the dropping of the old WFBM call letters. By then, the WFBM calls were on the AM daytimer at 1110 licensed to Noblesville.

By the early 80s, WNDE had moved even older musically. Once WENS had launched in 1981 with AC on FM, WNDE moved to a big band / pop standards format. One of the most bizarre DJs in the history of Indy radio had to be a guy named Sven who did nights for WNDE during that time. Sven's predecessor at nights was a young Mark Patrick.

With a mid 80s sale to Taft Broadcasting, WNDE moved to an oldies format. Kent Jones, long time PD of oldies KOMA Oklahoma City, was PD. When WKLR evolved to oldies on FM in 1988, WNDE moved in a talk direction, serving as the market's first Rush Limbaugh affiliate. Talk lasted on WNDE into the early 90s and included the return of Don Geronimo, by then syndicated with partner Mike O'Meara from DC.

WNDE did have some local talk hosts - including Dave Wilson. Didn't Paul Poteet do talk there? As mentioned elsewhere, when Rush moved to WIBC, WNDE became full time sports.
 
Thats amazing, how do you get all of this information?
 
TalkRadioGeek said:
Thats amazing, how do you get all of this information?
Click to expand...

Memory mostly. Grew up in Indy and clipped a lot of columns from R. K. Shull - the old radio-TV writer at the News. Worked in the market from '79 to '98. On the other hand, with anecdotes like those, I'm a really boring guest at parties. Just ask Bernie Eagan. ;)
 
If memory serves me correctly, Mike Pence also got his talk start at 'NDE before being "stolen" by Network Indiana for a rather successful statewide show. He did a half hour talk segment on channel 23 TV.

Glenn Webber eventually became the PIO for the Indiana State Police out of Indianapolis and then the news voice on WENS when the station still had to have that presence.
History, did Glenn also do the public affairs show from Shelbyville when they had to broadcast from there to satisfy "community of license" rules and regs of the era?
The way I heard it, when 'ENS needed a younger sound, Glenn offered to retire. However, he continued to be paid full salary in his retirement.

As far as the Oldies on 'NDE are concerned, the station was live oldies with Kent Jones as PD until1987. Jones did mornings live and they were automated the rest of the day. Chuck McGhee became Chick, who stayed to become a production assistant and eventually to stardom with Bob and Tom.

During thier talk days, Don and Mike would be on "live" on 'NDE for the last two hours of their show and then have the first hour played on the air. It was pretty disjointed.
 
If i recall the part of the reason why the last 2 hours were live then the 3rd hour was the taped first hour most of the time was do to Indiana's then reluctance to observe daylight savings time thus WNDE Didnt want to totally change their schedule to move stuff up one hour. WIBC Still Timshifts rush on delay to this date airing rush from 1 to 4 instead of 12-3 for the noon news hour
 
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