peetah said:
Big signal, Larry? Maybe after Gannett bought the place, fired us all and moved the stick to Seattle. Hell, when I did appearances at the DoubleTree at Southcenter I couldn't tell people to listen to us on the way home, because they couldn't pick us up! And our Million Dollar giveaway was so poorly executed, making any qualifiers jump through so many hoops, that it was no wonder we didn't achieve huge ratings. Speaking of which, the best we ever did 12+ was a whopping 1.9. When Gannett took over with their huge corporate egos, the smug Steve Weed, their big-voiced airstaff, their healthy promotions budget and their new city grade signal...do you know what the best they ever did 12+? A 1.9.
You are correct Larry, a documentary should be made about KHIT. I'm just not sure most people would believe it. LOL.
Peter McLaine, proud alumnus of KHIT, May 1985 - December 1986.
You know Peter, when I talk to people about KHIT's signal from 1984-86 (100kw off Gold Mountain), it's either the loudest thing they ever heard. Or they couldn't pick them up at all.
I only know from my own experience and I have driven up and down I-5 back in the day, to Vancouver, BC and on my radio at least, that signal went EVERYWHERE. Except maybe if you were in parts of the Eastside down to Southcenter (where the money folks lived) or in the Cascade foothills, this might be the problem. If you were further inland from the coast, you had more terrestrial obstacles. That was the only area that had problems that I knew of. A lot might also depend on the radios themselves. But KHIT in my car was almost perfectly rock solid just about everywhere I went - my car stereo FM pilot light might have blinked a few times around Southcenter, but if it was a black hole for miles, I wouldn't have listened. And it was also clear as a bell in Lynnwood. I think the signal probably fared better north than south or east
I'm not sure if their Gold Mountain xmitter was on the KCPQ-TV or KTBW-TV's tower or on it's own, etc, but this is what I know - Gold Mountain is a straight shot across the Sound from Seattle and in downtown Seattle, it BOOMED in nicely (KCMS was still running 115,000 watts off the Aurora Village site less than 10 miles away and THEY had bigger problems getting into downtown than KHIT. I could actually SEE their tower from a Queen Anne apartment and STILL not get a clear signal) And KHIT could be picked up from Eugene OR (on some winter mornings) to Courtaney, BC. It was the clearest Seattle station to come into Bellingham and Everett, etc.
So It WAS a big signal, but ironically, it missed a lot of important key local areas. It also might be the fact KHIT was a latecomer in an already crowded market for CHR and finally, before KNDD signed on, people rarely tuned that high up on the FM radio dial - it pretty much ended at 103.7 (KBRD).
Further up, it was just that canned "Northwest Rock" thing from Bellingham on 104.3 (KNWR), KCMS just barely got off the ground, 106.1 (KRPM) was still pretty much a South Sound country station, the predecessor to KHIT (KWWA) was a country, then B/EZ, then AOR and finally automated CHR as it was testing it's new 100,000 watt digs in late '83/early '84. And 107.7 was KRAB, which I think had more people running the station than actual listeners. It went nipples up just before KHIT went on the air on July 4, 1984 (I still remember the first day, right down to it's playlist.)
The corny TV spots probably didn't help much either: The Mr. Rogers take off "(SINGING) Oh let's go down to the end of the dial...(SPEAKING) HI! Have you K-Hit your radio today? Can you say 'Wham'?....Can you say 'Madonna'? GOOD! You CAN get your hits together, can't you?...."
Or the one where you saw this babe making out with some hunky dude for a good 45 seconds as a Wham song plays in the background and just right when you thought you were finally going to see some hardcore XXX action on free TV, she turns to the camera and says "All the sexiest guys I know listen to KHIT 107...." WTF?
KHIT was the station with the biggest and best of everything that was somehow jinxed from the beginning. But many other factors seemed at play beyond the signal itself, which I think didn't penetrate the Eastside as well as Mount Vernon (and like I said, the Eastside is where the BIG $$$ was/is at). Much of the best signal probably came in areas OUTSIDE of the Seattle area, where there were fewer buildings and terrain that blocked it. It was totally unintended I'm sure. When the first reports came back of a rock sold clear Seattle signal in places like downtown Everett or Bellingham and clear up the BC coast, I'm sure it was perhaps assumed everywhere else was covered just as well.
In hindsight (unless you're poor Bob Bingham, KHIT damn near killed him I'm sure), KHIT was probably the best station nobody ever heard of. But for those who did listen (for whatever a 1.9 means), it was simply the best CHR station in Seattle bar none.
It was a station that came in loud and clear in Sedro-Woolley, but was multipathed out in parts of Bellevue. It had a million dollar contest that (in one of the most hilarious TRUE radio stories ever told on this board - by Mr. Rabow himself) went to a female contestant at a huge party held at the Four Seasons for all the finalists. When her name was called, she ran down the aisle screaming in some shower curtain-like plastic vinyl mu-mu or something that barely contained her enormous cleavage fell halfway off, exposing her breasts as she got to the stage. She jumped around onstage like this for a few minutes, her giant boobs still bouncing around in every direction, Bob Bingham quietly tried to draw her attention to her own cleavage, which she remedied - vaguely. And upon accepting that first $50,000 check - payable in yearly $50,000 increments for the next 20 years or something like that, she screamed in the mike right in front of everybody something to the effect of "OH MY GOD...HOLY S--T...HOLY F--K...I DON'T EVEN LISTEN TO THIS STATION!!!"
I don't have exact details and Steve's post was written several years and board upgrades ago, but this is as best as I can remember of it.
He also mentioned some TV stations were there covering the drawing and I also hope somebody brought a camcorder because a moment like this BELONGS on YouTube.
And to add to this, during a Soundies award ceremony (which Bob Bingham attended and the KHIT contest was nominated), guess who the award for Best Contest that year went to?
"We're giving a away a million dollars...that's right, KISW is giving away a million dollars. One dollar a year, every year...So listen to KISW and win a million dollars...if you live long enough...."
You just CAN'T make this stuff up.
But KHIT and Steve Rabow did unknowingly make one rarely known odd bit of rock history that lingers to this day. Steve Rabow had a yearly local music show on KHIT called the Local Tape Extravaganza, where local bands and even regular listeners could record themselves and send the cassette to KHIT. It wasn't a contest, it was just a way to reach out to the local music community. One of those bands was one called Mr. Epps and the Calculations (who also appeared on the KYYX Local Heroes And New Faces compilation cassette.) The frontman for Mr. Epps was a guy named Mark McLaughlin, who changed his name to Mark Arm and became frontman for Green River and later Mudhoney and is credited with coining the very term "grunge". Also, I recall a very early Soundgarden tape was played. You couldn't hear these bands on KISW in '85, KCMU barely touched them, but here they were on a Top 40 station. I'm sure there were other local musicians who later went on to stardom after getting their amateur tapes played on KHIT. Who knew?
There's a lot more crazy stories I've heard about KHIT, just can't remember them all - there were LOTS. I remember one crazy listener giving Andy Barber an embarrassing time. But all in all, KHIT's a hell of a story and if Bob Bingham gets nothing else out of KHIT, a hysterical documentary movie (and a blockbuster I KNOW it would be) would finally even it up. It was the most Spinal Tap-ish radio station ever. And pure fun.
It must have felt REALLY good to sign that very last $50,000 check to the topless shower curtain woman a few years ago. The nightmare is finally over.....
