KQLH 95.1 FM 95Q FM

[dpyle]

I worked as a weekend jock from 1983 - 1988 with occasional vacation fill in during the week. Danny Gilchrist was the PD and Music Director who hired me. Pat Michaels was the GM. My weekend shift changed quite often over the years. Started Saturday and Sunday mornings 6am-12. (Airing Dodger baseball on the weekend made for a long shift!) Moved to noon - 6pm. 6pm - midnight. Finally Midnight - 6am. (My favorite).
I was there when the station management changed in 1988 and became 95Q FM. Top of the hour Mutual News went away and had less commercial breaks, and the music was AC but steered away from the Lite-er Hits. A far cry from what “Loving & Gentle” was.
I worked in Automotive as my full time job during the week and remembered getting a call at work from the PD at 95Q FM offering a full-time weekday on air position. The money was minimum wage and couldn’t afford to quit my automotive job that paid very well. So I worked two more weekends and resigned, as my wife needed me home weekends because we were expecting our second child. It was the hardest thing quitting a radio job I loved.
I loved every minute of my 5 1/2 years there!

 

[TheBigA]

The money was minimum wage and couldn’t afford to quit my automotive job that paid very well. So I worked two more weekends and resigned, as my wife needed me home weekends because we were expecting our second child. It was the hardest thing quitting a radio job I loved.
I loved every minute of my 5 1/2 years there!

It's a familiar story. At one point I was working 7 days a week at two places. The difference was I wasn't married. No wife would put up with that.

I'm still working in radio today. Not for minimum wage, either. But yes, working in radio requires personal compromises.

 

[Neel]

My parents moved to the IE in December 1989. I barely got a taste of KQLH after we moved there, when within months, it relaunched as K-FROG. They briefly tried KQLH "Q-LITE HITS" on 92.7 out of Riverside sometime in the early 90s.

 

[davideduardo]

It's a familiar story. At one point I was working 7 days a week at two places. The difference was I wasn't married. No wife would put up with that.

From the time I was 18, I felt I was working 7 days a week. Before the cellphone, I would carry a "transistor radio" even to weddings, movies and restaurants and check each station every quarter hour or so. It takes a particular kind of partner to put up with things like that... or "running by the stations" after a movie or night out... or putting up with me getting up at 2 AM on Sunday morning to go do maintenance on a transmitter.

I'm still working in radio today. Not for minimum wage, either. But yes, working in radio requires personal compromises.

Later on, I'd travel once or twice a week to another market for program consulting or a research project. Alarm at 3:30 AM, return late at night several days later. Over and over, maybe 50 to 60 times a year.

Any business that runs 24/7 will involve some kind of sacrifice. The compromises only turn out well if the partner is also in the business or in one "just like it".

When I think we have it bad, I realize what it must be like to be a cop or an ER medical staffer or...

 

[vw86]

Before the cellphone, I would carry a "transistor radio" even to weddings, movies and restaurants and check each station every quarter hour or so.

The best PDs I ever worked for were the ones that did *not* do that. In the era of a live body in the building 24/7, they hired jocks/board ops they trusted so they did not have to do that.