If you could bring back a Central PA station, what station, format and era?

[Beatlesfan64]

Didn't the late Bill Bland own/run GLU in those days?

I believe so...

Back in the 70's - you had WPEZ - Pittsburgh, WDVE - which was a FM spin off of 14 KQV AM and WYDD - all which catered to the top 40 music scene.

Central PA - you basically had one radio station after another - come and go. The 92.1 was one of the longest running stations that made the scene.

The sad day was when WPEZ - Pittsburgh went off the air, only to be followed a short time later by WBZZ or it's counterparts on the 93.7 location.

That too was another loss - since most people in Central PA - will do what ever it takes to receive good music.

I think the people who thinks that Morning Shows are good is smoking crack. Other then Johnboy and Billy - which gets a little long winded - I hate morning shows. When I am on my way to work, the last thing I want to listen to is a bunch of people talking about crap.
What I like to hear is music and no commercials.
Unfortunately - the only way to get that anymore is through the XM / Sirius channels.

Radio will never again be like it was 30 or 40 years ago, when young children hovered around their radios at night to listen to stations such as WOWO / Ft. Wayne Ind. or 14 KQV

The reason for this was the fact that most local radio stations refused to play popular top 40 music, if it did not agree with the station owners tastes.

How many of you can remember your parents turning on a station that played elevator music? Those stations are long gone, as is 50's music.
As the generations changes - the oldies changed from the 50's to the 60's to the 70's and now is considered the 80's.

Chuck Brinkman had the right idea 50 years ago, if you want to play what the kids wants to hear, you hire a 15 or 16 year old kid to play music - not some 40 year old.

http://user.pa.net/~ejjeff/jingles.html

http://user.pa.net/~ejjeff/jeffkqv2.html

 

[KeyTimes950]

Didn't the late Bill Bland own/run GLU in those days?

Not quite. It was 'GLU's predecessor WFMM, on which Bonneville music was run.

 

[KeyTimes950]

Adding to my previous thoughts here and on another board today, I miss local full-service radio. I miss what used to be found on WHP in Harrisburg and WSBA in York and WRTA in Altoona and WMAJ in State College. There were some fascinating radio stations out there back in the day (for me, from 1974-1988), from WNCC in Barnesboro to WTLR and WRSC/WQWK and WMAJ in State College to WKOK in Sunbury and so many others. Give me the radio of the late 1970s and early to mid 1980s. Operations may be more modern today, but so many of them do not have a common touch anymore.

 

[RockofHBG]

A lot of those full-service stations did many things, but not many of those things well. Don't believe me, listen to the Ron Drake aircheck accessible at Youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6iHnv5c504. He was horrible and he was the high point of the radio station. Musically, there was no direction. Jocks played what they wanted, ranging from show tunes to MOR and light contemporary.There were no real formatics and at night there was a three hour block of paid religion. Perhaps the nostalgia makes it seem better than it was.

 

[grandoleopry]

Don't knock those three hour blocks of paid religion....I am sure they paid
a lot of bills. In fact I know for certain at WWVA in Wheeling , WV ; the
station for years was country all day and paid religion 6pm - midnight and
those hours of paid religion took care of the stations entire overhead....the
spots sold in the other dayparts were 100 percent profit!
I once had a national ministry sign a contract with me for over 25K annually on a
York AM, and they paid 6 months in advance. Kinda difficult to find a local
account that does that. So you can bet somebody pays me that kinda money
I sure as heck wouldnt turn it down.