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LAST DAYS OF WFIL 1980-81

R

radiorob2.0

I found this on the Tube of You:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sL8z...DF28DA84&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=34

It's moments of WFIL's last year before country, including the format change promos. Here is a comment from the page:

Thanks for posting. This was a sad time during my tenure at "Famous 56" as so many good friends lost their jobs in the dreadful format change to country and the move to "combo boards." Management nearly decided to move the call letters and rock format to FM (WUSL at the time) but WCAU's "Hot Hits" already filled that niche. Too bad, as a legendary radio station could have had new life with "no static at all.".
 
Never would have happened. WUSL went country too. Dean tyler was the program director for WFIL just before and during most of their country tenure. Lin broadcasting was completely bent on country in Philadelphia. Lin broadcasting  purchased WFIL AM as part of the spin off/divestiture of WFIL AM/FM when WFIL TV was sold by Walter Annenberg's triangle communications to Capitol Cities communications and the FCC forced Capitol cities to spin off the radio properties.

Lin broadcasting never quite understood Philadelphia or how to really keep WFIL intact. They ultimately sold WFIL AM to WEAZ Inc., and the call letters were promptly changed to WEAZ AM. 560 used the identity 'WISH' for, (get this) beautiful music on AM.

In 1971, the FCC forced Walter Annenberg to sell off his broadcasting properties due to protests from then, Pennsylvania Governor Milton Shapp. Shapp complained that Walter Annenberg had used his three Pennsylvania television stations, WFIL-TV, WLYH-TV in Lebanon and WFBG-TV (now WTAJ-TV) in Altoona -- in a smear campaign against him. WFIL AM/FM/TV was sold to Capital Cities Communications. As a condition of the sale, Capital Cities had to spin-off the radio stations to other entities (WFIL radio to LIN Broadcasting and WFIL-FM to Richer Communications, which changed the call letters to WIOQ), and channel 6 changed its call letters to the current WPVI-TV on April 27, 1971.


More WFIL AM/FM/TV history and pictures here.
 
Sam Lit said:
Lin broadcasting purchased WFIL AM as part of the spin off/divestiture of WFIL AM/FM when WFIL TV was sold by Walter Annenberg's triangle communications to Capitol Cities communications and the FCC forced Capitol cities to spin off the radio properties.
Click to expand...

I believe that would be Capit_A_l Cities. The difference between a capital and a capitol is explained here: http://geography.about.com/library/faq/blqzcapitalol.htm

It's very confusing and a lot of people get it wrong, but I think it's worth getting right.
 
Based on what you are saying, WFIL dropped it's called letter for a time. Is that true? I'm surprised no one picked them up. josh
 
josh said:
Based on what you are saying, WFIL dropped it's called letter for a time. Is that true? I'm surprised no one picked them up. josh
Click to expand...

The call was picked up by a TV station in the Carolinas. They eventually gave it up and Salem, which had bought 560 by then, reclaimed it.
 
I always thought Annenberg sold (most of his) his media properties (except TV Guide) strictly because of his duties as ambassador to the UK preventing him from looking after them. (Remember the Inky's masthead listing Walt as "on leave of absence"?)

ixnay
 
Interesting stuff from RadioRob. Especially the Dr. Don material. Back in 1972 I was doing mornings at WBAX in Wilkes-Barre. It was an Oldies format and I was using one liners and couldn't find the laugh track that I wanted and wrote to Dr. Don and he sent me that same laugh track that he used at WFIL. I wish I could've met him and didn't realize that he had passed away. I do a Classic Country show in Las Vegas. Thanks again, it was great listening.
 
From what I heard Dr. DOn Rose was a devout Christian with a huge heart.... and as you know he was extremely funny!

Wish he would have lived long enough for us to hire him. josh
 
The call letters in the early 1989 went from WFIL to WEAZ and then to WBEB in May, 1993, both to match sister FM 101.1. When Salem took over in Nov. 1993 the calls became WPHY, and went back to WFIL in 1994.

WUSL switched to country before WFIL, on the 4th of July weekend, 1981. WFIL switched that Labor Day weekend. WUSL had a 'continuous country' approach while WFIL was personality-driven with lots of country gold. If they had combined the 2 approaches on WUSL it may have lasted, but they divided their own audience, killed off their competitor, 14 year country station WRCP later that September, and ran the stations competing against each other 1 year, switching WUSL to the urban format (Kiss 99/Power 99) in October 1982, then switching WFIL to a mainly crossover pop/country station with a lot of live sports (Stars/76ers) until September, 1983. By 1981 it was just too late to try and introduce a new music station on AM with any success. When WXTU switched to country on March 1, 1984 they started with the 'continuous country' style similar to WUSL, but quickly changed to a more personality-oriented format that has worked for them for over 25 years.
 
Does anyone remember when the switched to back to oldies under "The Boss is Back" in 1983ish when they tried to recreate the glory days? I remember the news with Allen Stone and they brought back some of the jingles but they never quite got the processing right. Even the reverb did not sound like the original.
 
I know this topic was posted over a month ago, but here is some input I remember about the last year of FiL as a AC/MOR station in 1980-1981. Don Cannon was still the morning man up until about two weeks before the switch to Country. They tried a national sports talk show in the evening. The last 3 months before the switch, they carried Dick Clark's National Music Survey on Sunday Morning (this didn't even fit the format, since most of the current songs by now were on the mellow side). Starting around January of 1980, they started to play alot of 1960's oldies in the rotation, and they even brought back the Million Dollar Weekend. Last, Dick Fennesey on Saturday Afternoon, had a 2 hour show called the "Saturday Afternoon Dance Party" from 12 to 2 p.m. It was oldies of the 50' and 60's with emphasis on 1960's Philly R&B Soul (It was a good show in my opinion).
Until this day, I still cannot understand why they switched to CW. Here is what they should have done, was try to stay with MOR format up until September of 1983. So it would have been a transition to the Boss is Back in September of 1983. The Boss is Back was a great effort in September of 83, but trying to bring listeners back to Fil and the AM dail was hard, since they previous switch to CW in September of 81.
 
The WFIL attempt with "The Boss is Back" got off to a good start, including Joey Reynolds in morning for awhile and Harvey Holiday in the afternoon. Of course with 4 Philly oldies stations at one point: WCAU-FM, WIOQ, WPGR and WFIL, there were going to be losers.

Joey was quickly fired for a dumb on-air stunt. Holiday basically turned his show into a talk show with a little music. Then came a live morning show with the rest of the day from the bird. WIOQ's "live & programmed in Philadelphia" joined 98.1 in beating Famous 56.

Frankly, I enjoyed the time it was B/Ez also. The AM stereo sounded good. They had a good TV ad also. It showed an AM dial with the dial setting moving along 1060, then left to WPEN, then WIP, and finally coming to rest on 560.
 
Yep. It involved a contest where a woman was put on the air and was told she had won something. Then Joey was like "April Fool!" And I am not sure on this, but I believe another station's call was included. The fall out was most unpleasant. WFIL even gace on on-air apology and admitted they knew Joey was trouble (particularly from his WIBBAGE days), but wanted to give him a chance to prove he could be trusted. Didn't work!
 
Wow...I never heard that version of Joey Reynolds, and I was PD there within a year of Joey's departure for WNBC. Two weeks before I came in as PD, was the on air death of Jane Dornacker on his afternoon show at WNBC.

The 20th Anniversary of The Pop Explosion garnered enough cume to propel WFIL almost to a 3 share, in the fall '86 book, which preceded the announcement of WFIL's sale to WEAZ Incorporated, who put on The Oldies Channel upon takeover.
 
Harry and Kevin, I'm surprised you didn't know of how Joey LEFT WFIL... I heard it live and shuddered. Little did I know that a few months later I'd be back with JOEY on WNNBC...and I have the ORIGINAL reel-to-reel tape of when Jane's helicopter went down. ANY version you hear on the air or in archives now came from the tape that I made. We were just getting ready to record a bit, and I was running tape so I could edit it and play it back later in the show. I just happened to have hit the record button just before this tragedy happened.

Back to Joey...we all KNOW Joey is Peck's Original Bad Boy. But this was a stunt that backfired. I have a feeling JOEY was not the only person DIRECTLY responsible for airing that phone call. Remember, he had a sidekick at FIL at the time...who also ran the board. I think Joey could have simply apologized and it would be done, but they put his butt on the spit and turned it.

BTW...when HOLIDAY was the PD, he wanted to hire me to do MID-DAYS at WFIL and be the production dude. GM Bruce Holberg (sic) said, "I was too YOUNG-SOUNDING" for FIL. I guess he was WRONG as I ended up on NBC about a year later. BE BIG! Jay
 
jhguthlac said:
Yep. It involved a contest where a woman was put on the air and was told she had won something. Then Joey was like "April Fool!" And I am not sure on this, but I believe another station's call was included. The fall out was most unpleasant.
Click to expand...

I seem to recall that he claimed to be Don Cannon (who was on WSNI by then) The FCC fails to see the humor in that sort of thing. Very unfortunate as Joey had been doing a highly entertaining show.
 
Big Jay...thanks for the update...never got that story from anyone. After Joey, they had the Sarzynskis...then Steve O'Brien...then I took over mornings until the sale. I would usually find out stuff about my Brother Dick...who was laid off there a year earlier.
 
jimmyt1962 said:
I know this topic was posted over a month ago, but here is some input I remember about the last year of FiL as a AC/MOR station in 1980-1981. Don Cannon was still the morning man up until about two weeks before the switch to Country. They tried a national sports talk show in the evening.
Click to expand...

I actually listened to that national sports talk show every night in the summer of '81 (if I wasn't working at the Towne House restaurant in Media) after Howard Eskin signed off on WWDB, listening for the latest news about the baseball players' strike. Didn't WABC have talk in the evenings starting in '81 before going full time talk in '82?

And you know, for years I believed that "WFIL" was a reference to "FIL-adelphia". Was "WFIL" used in any other market during the time 560 was WEAZ?

ixnay
 
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