Last Wednesday I received an email from the granddaughter of Everett Flagg, a famous announcer at WREC back in the '60s and early '70s. She had run across my name while looking to find some history of her granddad. She asked me to tell her anything I could remember about him. Below is most of what I wrote her. It's a pretty fair look at a certain type of radio back in the '60s and '70s that I'm very proud to have been involved with.
During my high school years, 1960-1963, I lived in Clarksdale, MS. I listened to your grandfather many nights while doing my homework. The program, "Music Till Midnight," was hosted by Everett Mondays through Fridays; Mac Todd, who was with WREC from the late 40s till his death, ran it on the weekends. I was not a big rock 'n roll fan at the time and really came to love the "Easy Listening" format that WREC-AM ran until the late 70s. I wish I had some tape of your grandfather, particularly his show opening where he said something about, "Music by which you can read or relax or tap a toe to a tune or two too." His warm, melodious voice - for my money the best I ever worked with, was popular over the Mid-South all through the 60s.
I began working at WREC in July of 1969 after beginning in Jackson, MS, in 1967. WREC was my ultimate goal and I was hired to do morning drive after two years in the business. You couldn't tell me anything - I was hot stuff! One of the first people I met was Everett Flagg as Fred Cook, the program director, had a wonderful policy of putting new announcers in the control room for every shift, just to observe. So, even though I never worked nights, I sat in with Everett that first week. I was awe-struck. First of all, he looked like William Holden and had that voice I had listened to for nearly ten years. Then I came to learn some of the weird and wonderful things about the man.
The first thing was a shocker! Your granddad owned a maroon '51 Buick, a Harley AND an airplane!!! He pulled up to the curb on 2nd Street at the Peabody Hotel one day in that Buick and asked me if I could tell if the motor was running or not. It was so quiet I couldn't hear it! He took a lot of pride in his vehicles. The next time I saw him during the day he was dressed in leathers with a motorcycle helmet under his arm, coming down the stairs from the 2nd Street side entrance of the Peabody (our studios were in the basement in those years). That's when I learned two big facts about your grandfather and radio. He worked as a funeral home motorcycle driver, leading corteges through intersections, stopping traffic, and doing those duties associated with ensuring a safe trip from the funeral home or church to the cemetery! That was why he had the Harley, besides the fact he loved motorcycle riding. He did this to supplement his income because radio paid churlishly little to its on-air talent in those days. I doubt Ev ever made more than $215/wk in his best year at WREC. (I was making $135/wk running the morning show and pulling down ratings of 34% in 1970!)
The airplane? Actually he had two during the time I knew him. He trained himself while working on the air and bought a small plane, used, when he qualified. A couple of years later he traded that one in on a Moody, a real fine plane in those days. He would fly most weekends for pleasure. I remember him talking about flying up to Reelfoot Lake for breakfast at the Air Park Inn, a state run air strip and motel/restaurant facility my wife and I stayed at many times in later years. He really loved machines! I remember hearing he had a riding lawnmower and accidentally ran over his wallet in his yard after it had dropped out of his pants! Shredded leather, money and papers flew all over the yard.
On another subject, Everett was VERY popular with the ladies who listened to him. He pulled a drawer out once in the WREC-FM control room and showed me a number of photographs of ladies stashed there. None were risqué, but several were fading tintypes!!! It seems little old ladies were constantly calling him, writing him, sending pictures of themselves from their glory days, and occasionally sending him money just because they wanted to. He sent back the money...at first, then decided to keep it since it gave them so much pleasure to do so...and all those motors needed fuel, donchano!
In running his show, Ev was often on the phone in the control room, chatting with those ladies. We had two turntables in that control room, big 16" RCA tables for playing albums. Ev would lay the phone down when a song ended, open the mic and say something smooth about the song just played, lifting the tonearm from the turntable as it spun. Then he would reach behind him for another album, glance at the album, slide the vinyl lp from the sleeve and STACK it on top of the lp still on the spinning turntable. He'd lift the manual tonearm and drop the needle in the lead-in groove of the selection he wanted while rolling up the "pot" (volume potentiometer) to play the next song...all the while talking into the microphone! These were single play turntables, not automatic changers, and I've never seen anyone else do that with them. You might walk into the control room and Ev would have 5 or 6 albums stacked on a turntable! Since the spindle, or post in the center, for the hole to align by was only about a inch high, there must have been times when Ev would stack lps without benefit of the spindle...possibly imparting a bit of wow or distortion to the sound. I never heard any, though.
In the four+ years I worked with Ev, Leonard Blakely worked the shift with him. Leonard was the board operator on WREC-AM while Ev ran "Music Till Midnight" from the WREC-FM studio (since it was stereo). We simulcast the show on both stations when there weren't ballgames on WREC-AM or to allow AM to cut away from WREC-FM and run commercials that were exclusively for WREC-AM. Ev would run commercials or, sad to say, public service announcements (no money) on WREC-FM at the same time. As a result, Leonard and Ev became fast friends and worked well together. One of my favorite stories from Leonard involved an evening meal in the Peabody. The Peabody drugstore, upstairs on the corner of Union and 2nd Street, had a soda fountain and sandwich bar. (I loved those corned beef sandwiches!) Sometimes Leonard or Everett would take a break and run upstairs to the soda fountain for a bite. If it was Ev, Leonard would move to the WREC-FM control room and segue a few records without talking till Ev returned. If Leonard went up, Ev would hold off on the next commercial break until he returned. It worked seamlessly until one night when Leonard was seated at the counter eating one of those delicious corned beef sandwiches and a shake when he looked up and saw Ev down the counter also eating! Leonard yelled, "Who's running the station?" Ev replied, "Beats me!" Leonard raced down the stairs, down the long hall, through the big studio and up the steps into the FM control room. The off air monitors were sounding, "Tick,! Tick! Tick!" as the needle on the tonearm clicked against the run-out groove on the inside of the lp...and a little old lady's voice could be heard on the phone lying on the counter saying, "Everett, I don't hear anything. Are you all right, dear?" Leonard grabbed another lp and got things going again. Everett sauntered in a few minutes later and said, "I wasn't going to leave my sandwich alone up there!"
When the stations were being sold to Triangle Broadcasting of Winston-Salem, NC, about 1975, management decided to turn WREC-FM into a country format and Everett, with a few pithy comments, decided to leave radio behind and get into the dirt hauling business. He bought a dump truck or two and managed to get a piece of the contract for hauling away Main Street as the Mid-America Mall was being built in Memphis. By 1976, he was doing pretty well, we heard, though working too hard. By then he had some heavy construction equipment as well as several trucks...and a heart attack. He came by the studios in the Peabody shortly before we moved to Lamar Avenue for a brief visit with some of us. Leonard and I wee shocked at how he looked. He seemed to have wasted away in the time had been gone. Later we heard he took a job on the Mississippi Gulf Coast and died of another heart attack while working down there. Most of this last is not first hand information, just reports I remember hearing about Ev.
WREC and radio in general left Everett and many other "announcers" in the lurch in the mid to late '70s. I always considered myself an announcer, never a "DJ" or "personality," and I know that's how most of us felt at WREC back then. From Al Kenngott with his "Nightsounds" program from 12 to 5a - "Not quite ready to retire? Then join me for 'Nightsounds' now on WREC" was how his show promo sounded at midnight on WREC-TV. I was next from 5-9am with the "Survey" newsblock from 7-8:15am, then Jack Jackson 9-10 and 10:30-12, Arthur Godfrey (via CBS Net) ran 10-10:30, Fred Cook and John Powell with their wonderful "Zero Hour" from 12:30-2pm, Larry Anthony from 2-6pm - including the "Recap" afternoon newsblock from 5:30-6:30p, "Back to the Bible!!!" from 6:30-7 and your grandfather, Everett Flagg, with "Music Till Midnight" from 7p-12a. It was old-fashioned radio, but we loved it and it showed. I never failed to get a kick out of saying the station identification at the top of every hour, "This is Double-U Are Eee Sea, Memphis...with studios in the Peabody Hotel, the South's finest, one of America's best...hotels."
Hope this ramble brings some flavor of your granddad to you. He was quite a guy...I'm proud to have known him and even prouder to have worked with him. Remind me sometime to tell you how he punched out the boss one day...but that's another story for another time!
During my high school years, 1960-1963, I lived in Clarksdale, MS. I listened to your grandfather many nights while doing my homework. The program, "Music Till Midnight," was hosted by Everett Mondays through Fridays; Mac Todd, who was with WREC from the late 40s till his death, ran it on the weekends. I was not a big rock 'n roll fan at the time and really came to love the "Easy Listening" format that WREC-AM ran until the late 70s. I wish I had some tape of your grandfather, particularly his show opening where he said something about, "Music by which you can read or relax or tap a toe to a tune or two too." His warm, melodious voice - for my money the best I ever worked with, was popular over the Mid-South all through the 60s.
I began working at WREC in July of 1969 after beginning in Jackson, MS, in 1967. WREC was my ultimate goal and I was hired to do morning drive after two years in the business. You couldn't tell me anything - I was hot stuff! One of the first people I met was Everett Flagg as Fred Cook, the program director, had a wonderful policy of putting new announcers in the control room for every shift, just to observe. So, even though I never worked nights, I sat in with Everett that first week. I was awe-struck. First of all, he looked like William Holden and had that voice I had listened to for nearly ten years. Then I came to learn some of the weird and wonderful things about the man.
The first thing was a shocker! Your granddad owned a maroon '51 Buick, a Harley AND an airplane!!! He pulled up to the curb on 2nd Street at the Peabody Hotel one day in that Buick and asked me if I could tell if the motor was running or not. It was so quiet I couldn't hear it! He took a lot of pride in his vehicles. The next time I saw him during the day he was dressed in leathers with a motorcycle helmet under his arm, coming down the stairs from the 2nd Street side entrance of the Peabody (our studios were in the basement in those years). That's when I learned two big facts about your grandfather and radio. He worked as a funeral home motorcycle driver, leading corteges through intersections, stopping traffic, and doing those duties associated with ensuring a safe trip from the funeral home or church to the cemetery! That was why he had the Harley, besides the fact he loved motorcycle riding. He did this to supplement his income because radio paid churlishly little to its on-air talent in those days. I doubt Ev ever made more than $215/wk in his best year at WREC. (I was making $135/wk running the morning show and pulling down ratings of 34% in 1970!)
The airplane? Actually he had two during the time I knew him. He trained himself while working on the air and bought a small plane, used, when he qualified. A couple of years later he traded that one in on a Moody, a real fine plane in those days. He would fly most weekends for pleasure. I remember him talking about flying up to Reelfoot Lake for breakfast at the Air Park Inn, a state run air strip and motel/restaurant facility my wife and I stayed at many times in later years. He really loved machines! I remember hearing he had a riding lawnmower and accidentally ran over his wallet in his yard after it had dropped out of his pants! Shredded leather, money and papers flew all over the yard.
On another subject, Everett was VERY popular with the ladies who listened to him. He pulled a drawer out once in the WREC-FM control room and showed me a number of photographs of ladies stashed there. None were risqué, but several were fading tintypes!!! It seems little old ladies were constantly calling him, writing him, sending pictures of themselves from their glory days, and occasionally sending him money just because they wanted to. He sent back the money...at first, then decided to keep it since it gave them so much pleasure to do so...and all those motors needed fuel, donchano!
In running his show, Ev was often on the phone in the control room, chatting with those ladies. We had two turntables in that control room, big 16" RCA tables for playing albums. Ev would lay the phone down when a song ended, open the mic and say something smooth about the song just played, lifting the tonearm from the turntable as it spun. Then he would reach behind him for another album, glance at the album, slide the vinyl lp from the sleeve and STACK it on top of the lp still on the spinning turntable. He'd lift the manual tonearm and drop the needle in the lead-in groove of the selection he wanted while rolling up the "pot" (volume potentiometer) to play the next song...all the while talking into the microphone! These were single play turntables, not automatic changers, and I've never seen anyone else do that with them. You might walk into the control room and Ev would have 5 or 6 albums stacked on a turntable! Since the spindle, or post in the center, for the hole to align by was only about a inch high, there must have been times when Ev would stack lps without benefit of the spindle...possibly imparting a bit of wow or distortion to the sound. I never heard any, though.
In the four+ years I worked with Ev, Leonard Blakely worked the shift with him. Leonard was the board operator on WREC-AM while Ev ran "Music Till Midnight" from the WREC-FM studio (since it was stereo). We simulcast the show on both stations when there weren't ballgames on WREC-AM or to allow AM to cut away from WREC-FM and run commercials that were exclusively for WREC-AM. Ev would run commercials or, sad to say, public service announcements (no money) on WREC-FM at the same time. As a result, Leonard and Ev became fast friends and worked well together. One of my favorite stories from Leonard involved an evening meal in the Peabody. The Peabody drugstore, upstairs on the corner of Union and 2nd Street, had a soda fountain and sandwich bar. (I loved those corned beef sandwiches!) Sometimes Leonard or Everett would take a break and run upstairs to the soda fountain for a bite. If it was Ev, Leonard would move to the WREC-FM control room and segue a few records without talking till Ev returned. If Leonard went up, Ev would hold off on the next commercial break until he returned. It worked seamlessly until one night when Leonard was seated at the counter eating one of those delicious corned beef sandwiches and a shake when he looked up and saw Ev down the counter also eating! Leonard yelled, "Who's running the station?" Ev replied, "Beats me!" Leonard raced down the stairs, down the long hall, through the big studio and up the steps into the FM control room. The off air monitors were sounding, "Tick,! Tick! Tick!" as the needle on the tonearm clicked against the run-out groove on the inside of the lp...and a little old lady's voice could be heard on the phone lying on the counter saying, "Everett, I don't hear anything. Are you all right, dear?" Leonard grabbed another lp and got things going again. Everett sauntered in a few minutes later and said, "I wasn't going to leave my sandwich alone up there!"
When the stations were being sold to Triangle Broadcasting of Winston-Salem, NC, about 1975, management decided to turn WREC-FM into a country format and Everett, with a few pithy comments, decided to leave radio behind and get into the dirt hauling business. He bought a dump truck or two and managed to get a piece of the contract for hauling away Main Street as the Mid-America Mall was being built in Memphis. By 1976, he was doing pretty well, we heard, though working too hard. By then he had some heavy construction equipment as well as several trucks...and a heart attack. He came by the studios in the Peabody shortly before we moved to Lamar Avenue for a brief visit with some of us. Leonard and I wee shocked at how he looked. He seemed to have wasted away in the time had been gone. Later we heard he took a job on the Mississippi Gulf Coast and died of another heart attack while working down there. Most of this last is not first hand information, just reports I remember hearing about Ev.
WREC and radio in general left Everett and many other "announcers" in the lurch in the mid to late '70s. I always considered myself an announcer, never a "DJ" or "personality," and I know that's how most of us felt at WREC back then. From Al Kenngott with his "Nightsounds" program from 12 to 5a - "Not quite ready to retire? Then join me for 'Nightsounds' now on WREC" was how his show promo sounded at midnight on WREC-TV. I was next from 5-9am with the "Survey" newsblock from 7-8:15am, then Jack Jackson 9-10 and 10:30-12, Arthur Godfrey (via CBS Net) ran 10-10:30, Fred Cook and John Powell with their wonderful "Zero Hour" from 12:30-2pm, Larry Anthony from 2-6pm - including the "Recap" afternoon newsblock from 5:30-6:30p, "Back to the Bible!!!" from 6:30-7 and your grandfather, Everett Flagg, with "Music Till Midnight" from 7p-12a. It was old-fashioned radio, but we loved it and it showed. I never failed to get a kick out of saying the station identification at the top of every hour, "This is Double-U Are Eee Sea, Memphis...with studios in the Peabody Hotel, the South's finest, one of America's best...hotels."
Hope this ramble brings some flavor of your granddad to you. He was quite a guy...I'm proud to have known him and even prouder to have worked with him. Remind me sometime to tell you how he punched out the boss one day...but that's another story for another time!