KRTH History Question

[emailfailed]

For years I have heard this story, bit I was wondering if it was true, or had a grain of truth to it:

Is it true the name K-Earth came about due to RKO planning to format an AOR-type station on 101.1, and the name K-Earth was a play on the whole Earth Day/Mother Earth movement at the time?

 

[ajc_trw]

For years I have heard this story, bit I was wondering if it was true, or had a grain of truth to it:

Is it true the name K-Earth came about due to RKO planning to format an AOR-type station on 101.1, and the name K-Earth was a play on the whole Earth Day/Mother Earth movement at the time?

According to Wiki (yea, I know) in 1972 they switched to a Golden Oldies format (an all oldies station was unique at the time) and renamed the station after the first Earth Day the year previous and changed the call to KRTH as in KeaRTH.

 

[davideduardo]

For years I have heard this story, bit I was wondering if it was true, or had a grain of truth to it:

Is it true the name K-Earth came about due to RKO planning to format an AOR-type station on 101.1, and the name K-Earth was a play on the whole Earth Day/Mother Earth movement at the time?

According to Wiki (yea, I know) in 1972 they switched to a Golden Oldies format (an all oldies station was unique at the time) and renamed the station after the first Earth Day the year previous and changed the call to KRTH as in KeaRTH.

And I can not conceive of Drake doing an AOR / Progressive format. KRTH was a progression from the Hit Parade concept of gold-based adult Top 40, in any case.

 

[LKellerIII]

For years I have heard this story, bit I was wondering if it was true, or had a grain of truth to it:

Is it true the name K-Earth came about due to RKO planning to format an AOR-type station on 101.1, and the name K-Earth was a play on the whole Earth Day/Mother Earth movement at the time?

According to Wiki (yea, I know) in 1972 they switched to a Golden Oldies format (an all oldies station was unique at the time) and renamed the station after the first Earth Day the year previous and changed the call to KRTH as in KeaRTH.

And I can not conceive of Drake doing an AOR / Progressive format. KRTH was a progression from the Hit Parade concept of gold-based adult Top 40, in any case.

Perhaps RKO was not going to use Drake for the progressive format, until they decided to go with Oldies. Did Drake program KRTH during the early years?

I do recall that rock and roll stations at the time paid a lot of lip service to the earth. For a few years, the word "weather" wasn't used on some progressive stations, lthe preferred buzz word being "Southern California Environment..."

 

[davideduardo]

Perhaps RKO was not going to use Drake for the progressive format, until they decided to go with Oldies. Did Drake program KRTH during the early years?

Drake was the consultant for all the music stations of RKO... everything except WOR (AM) and the DC classicals.

Jacobs was the PD for LA, and that goes back to '65. RKO had nobody even close to able to do a contemporary music format, which is why the brought Drake in.

 

[MarkO]

At his website, former Drake-Chenault employee Woody Goulart quotes 1970s RKO president Bruce Johnson as saying the following concerning the early 70s format deliberations at 101.1-

"They [Drake-Chenault] wanted us to take the progressive rock format here at KRTH—it was then KHJ-FM. I didn’t want it. I don’t think Bill really wanted to do it, I think it was more Gene’s idea or somebody else’s idea. Bill was never hot about it....We decided to come up with something else which turned out to be the oldies rock format of the 1950’s and 1960’s which they called ‘Classic Gold’ and that was developed, I guess, in October 1972. It went on the air here in Los Angeles on KRTH and when it became such a tremendous success here, then it spread throughout the country.”

 

[RadioStarOne]

"I do recall that rock and roll stations at the time paid a lot of lip service to the earth. For a few years, the word "weather" wasn't used on some progressive stations, lthe preferred buzz word being "Southern California Environment..."


That would be (at least in Los Angeles, there may have been others that I don't recall) KKDJ 102.7 Under the watchful eye of Rick Carroll and his good friends John Peters, T. Michael Jordon, Russ O'Hungry O'hara, Jay Stevens, Billy Pearl, Charlie Tuna, Humble Harve and all the rest. Damn, that was a great station back then!

 

[recto101]

I've seen articles on LA radio museum type sites that KRTH was supposed to be Hot AC in 1972 and in 1984-1986.

 

[LKellerIII]

The story may be apocryphal - it's not like LA needed any more progressive rock stations in that era - there was already KMET, KLOS, KPPC, KNAC, KDAY, and probably others. But it is curious that they would choose the brand "K-Earth" for an oldies station. I remember seeing the billboards all over LA, and wondering what the call letters could be. This was about the same time that KIIS AM had billboards all over LA and were trying to make "Kiss" out of it. That kind of branding was new in those days.

 

[charlievandyke]

When RKO signed on WFYR in Chicago (Fire), Drake told me that there was a plan to have yet another station that would be "wind," so there would have been an "Earth, Wind, and Fire." He never said where the wind station was supposed to be.

 

[recto101]

When RKO signed on WFYR in Chicago (Fire), Drake told me that there was a plan to have yet another station that would be "wind," so there would have been an "Earth, Wind, and Fire." He never said where the wind station was supposed to be.

WIND was taken by Group W at 560 AM.

 

[Marv-L.A.]

LA had plenty of rock stations when KRTH was launched, and I don't believe that there were any 'holes' between them.

Drake was flat-out brilliant in just about everything he did, and launching KRTH was yet another great move on his part, and the same for K-100.

 

[calguy]

I've seen articles on LA radio museum type sites that KRTH was supposed to be Hot AC in 1972 and in 1984-1986.

Hmm, weird terminology for 1972. There was no Hot AC back then. There was no AC. There was MOR and Pop-Adult as well as Chicken-Rock. Pop adult is more or less what later became AC.
MOR morphed into Standards for the most part without the Full-Service. Wonder which sites you're talking about? They don't sound very knowledgeable to me if they got that one wrong...

 

[RadioStarOne]

There were radio listings in the papers back then with formats listed as AC.

 

[davideduardo]

There were radio listings in the papers back then with formats listed as AC.

I got references in Broadcasting Magazine going back to 1970, including this one describing the #2 station in Grand Rapids as Adult Contemporary...

http://www.americanradiohistory.com...08-24-BC-0033.pdf#search="adult contemporary"

 

[MarkO]

The station referred to as being "adult contemporary" in the Broadcasting Magazine piece, WOOD-FM in Grand Rapids, apparently had a Beautiful Music format at that time (at least that's what I find according to various other online sources)....which is not to say that what we know today as hot AC or AC didn't effectively exist in those days at a number of adult-leaning top 40 and/or MOR stations.

 

[calguy]

There were radio listings in the papers back then with formats listed as AC.

I got references in Broadcasting Magazine going back to 1970, including this one describing the #2 station in Grand Rapids as Adult Contemporary...

http://www.americanradiohistory.com...08-24-BC-0033.pdf#search="adult contemporary"

The station referred to as being "adult contemporary" in the Broadcasting Magazine piece, WOOD-FM in Grand Rapids, apparently had a Beautiful Music format at that time (at least that's what I find according to various other online sources)....which is not to say that what we know today as hot AC or AC didn't effectively exist in those days at a number of adult-leaning top 40 and/or MOR stations.

I was alive then and in radio in the 70's. There were no references to AC until the very late 70's in the circles we were moving in then, but sure enough you have an industry paper listing some stations that way. It may be there, but I would think that it wasn't a wide spread term in the very early 70's as my experience in the working radio world would indicate otherwise. I wonder what these stations even sounded like. As MarkO just posted while I was writing this, they may not be the AC we know today and I had a feeling that beautiful music could be the format they we're describing that way...

 

[recto101]

I've seen articles on LA radio museum type sites that KRTH was supposed to be Hot AC in 1972 and in 1984-1986.

Hmm, weird terminology for 1972. There was no Hot AC back then. There was no AC. There was MOR and Pop-Adult as well as Chicken-Rock. Pop adult is more or less what later became AC.
MOR morphed into Standards for the most part without the Full-Service. Wonder which sites you're talking about? They don't sound very knowledgeable to me if they got that one wrong...

OK a format that would later be called AC. in 1972 and a format in 1984-1986 when pop AC was established.

http://airchexx.com/2011/03/29/pat-evans-and-brian-bierne-on-krth-k-earth-101-los-angeles-1981/

http://airchexx.com/2006/01/07/brother-john-on-krth-los-angeles-k-earth-101-july-20-1981/

http://airchexx.com/2011/04/10/jay-...krth-k-earth-101-los-angeles-november-8-1986/

Heres my proof that KRTH was AC in the 1980's.

 

[davideduardo]

The station referred to as being "adult contemporary" in the Broadcasting Magazine piece, WOOD-FM in Grand Rapids, apparently had a Beautiful Music format at that time

The article very clearly says that WOOD is #1, while WLAV (AM) is second with an Adult Contemporary format.

...which is not to say that what we know today as hot AC or AC didn't effectively exist in those days at a number of adult-leaning top 40 and/or MOR stations.

Among the prime examples of AC in its early days around 1972 was John Lund programmed WGAR in Cleveland. Derided as "Chicken Rock" by some, it was a heavily gold based adult Top 40 with the heavy stuff removed.

Another pair of examples, and the year was '72, were WJDX in Jackson, programmed by the well known Bill Tanner (Y-100, 13-Q, Power 96, K-Love, etc.) and definitely AC, and yours truly's WERC (AM) in Birmingham, a very CHRish hot AC with weekly current adds, personalities and a good amount of gold. At the time, we called them "contemporary" but were very annoyed if the stations were referred to as MOR.

 

[davideduardo]

I wonder what these stations even sounded like. As MarkO just posted while I was writing this, they may not be the AC we know today and I had a feeling that beautiful music could be the format they we're describing that way...

1972: WERC in Birmingham had personality jocks. Doug Layton, the voice of the Crimson Tide, did mornings. Frank Giardina, later PD of WAPI, did mid-days, Jan Jeffries (now VP Programming of Cumulus) did afternoons and Neil Miller, who hosted a Ch. 6 kids show on weekends, did evenings. There was a 5 person news staff with Jesse Champion and Jim Dearman (from Scott Shannon's WMAK) among others.

Music was "Ben" and "Dancing in the Moonlight" and "Too Late to Turn Back Now" and "Drift Away" and "The Morning After" as a few examples. We reported to Rudman and Hamilton and Gavin, IIRC. When selecting songs, we looked at the adult friendly material on the Top 40 charts and eliminated the Allman Brothers.

Except that the format was much more full service, a throwback to the MOR heritage of AC and the fact that most of us were on AM, this was the same AC kind of music that we know today... maybe even more crossover with Top 40 than at present, in fact.