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MS Radio Esoterica

D

DeadElvis

I started in radio in the Magnolia State when I was 14 years old. Thus, I am well-versed in much Mississippi radio history. Still, there are holes in my knowledge, a function of dates and faded memories of those around me.

A couple of days ago, I became aware of a really useful source of information. Someone scanned and posted online many of the old Vane Jones Logbooks from the 60s and 70s -- I bought those books in the late 1970s. This was a guide, mainly for DXers, listing all radio & TV stations in America -- the sort of thing in which I can become lost for hours. Link:

http://www.amlogbook.com/jones/jones.htm

Finally, I have been able to clear up some questions I have had for ages. Example: I have always been told that Taylorsville once had a short-lived AM, but no one could give me facility data and any FCC reference is either gone or not retrievable. Looking at a listing in the 1970s, I now know that WSCO was a 500W daytimer on 1280. Now, I can stop wondering.

Other irrelevant facts I have gleaned:

WVMI/570 was once a 1 kW daytimer. Before my time. Good to know. (I guess that means, too, that the only DAs in South Miss in the early 1970s were WHNY/McComb and WROA Gulfport, unless I missed one. Gosh, what did people listen to at night? Clears and a few graveyarders and MAYBE an beautiful music FM, I guess. WPMP/Pascagoula was still 1kW ND; they added the 2-tower DA for 5 kW day later, not long before I worked there.)

My first station, then-WCIS/1460 in beautiful Moss Point was once 1 kW. It was 500W when I worked there. I wonder why it dropped power -- perhaps that prehistoric Collins transmitter, perhaps?

One can also track the sign-ons of many of Mississippi's most venerable FMs. In 1963, I learned, there were only 3 FMs on in the entire state. Fascinating.

Geeky information, to be sure. But fun.

DE
 
OK, here's one that has my curiosity up. Under symbols and notes, there is a special designation for "Airborne transmitters operating from DC-3 planes flying over towns indicated." What's up with that?
 
Stratovision.

Back in the early days of TV, it seemed unlikely smaller towns & more rural areas would ever have television. The cost of building & operating a station was such that TV would likely never come to places like Tupelo and Hattiesburg and Meridian, not to mention smaller towns.

A number of solutions were proposed:
- Cable TV. (but while cable was a possibility for cities, it would be prohibitively expensive to wire rural areas)
- Translators. (not legal until something like 1958; the FCC felt the Communications Act prohibited them from authorizing such stations.)
- Satellites. (full-license stations that were 100% relays of some other full license station. No need for expensive production studios or the people to man them, but the transmitting gear would still be pretty steep.)

And the last proposal was airborne transmitters. Someone figured something like a half-dozen aircraft flying figure-8s across North America could provide a nationwide TV service. The FCC seemed pretty cool to the idea.

But they did authorize Purdue University to give it a try in the 1960s:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midwest_Program_on_Airborne_Television_Instruction
http://mediacommons.futureofthebook.org/imr/2008/02/28/flying-classrooms-in-the-midwest-the-mpatis-experiment-in-regional-educational-television

They broadcast recorded educational programs over KS2XGA channel 72 and KS2XGD channel 76, at (very) roughly 25,000 watts ERP at 23,000'. It ran from 1961 through 1968 in the skies over Indiana.

ISTR seeing a number of other channels authorized, in the Television Factbook from the mid-1960s. All information I've ever read suggests channels 72 and 76 were the only two ever activated.
 
DE — I plugged those coordinates into Bing Maps and got this. Looks like it's not there anymore if those are the correct coordinates. There's also a street view from Google. Could that parking pad be where the studio was? There's a hard to make out little out building right at the tree line.

If I had to wager a guess, I'd bet those project-looking houses to the east of the pin are where the tower was.
 
Yes, in the 60s WVMI was a 1 kw daytimer ... went fulltime by erecting that 5 or 6 tower array, then shut it down in favor of non-dir 1640. It was top 40 when I was in high school (1960-62).

As late as 1972, WROA was a 1 kw daytimer ... they went fulltime by putting up that massive array (8 towers?).

Yes, there was a time when Biloxi Gulfport had only those class IV stations for fulltime operation, on 1240 and 1490. However, there was nighttime radio service from New Orleans stations on 690 870 1280 1350.

The fact that this large population on the coast was under-served with fulltime signals was obviously why WVMI and WROA went to such ridiculous expense to get fulltime. That's a lot of towers and engineering expense.

Yes, Taylorsville once had a station. WSJC Magee originally had 1280, then moved to 790, then went to the big power on 810. WSCO took over the 1280 that WSJC abandoned, but the town was just not big enough to support the station, and it folded after a few years. I dated a lady from that town in 1977, and the station was dark by that time. Because of 1280 New Orleans it probably could not get more power.

I knew the guy who put 1460 Moss Point on the air (Cliff Hunter). It was 1963. Came on with 500 w D as a top 40... the 3 kw FM came with it, tho they did not simulcast until much later. The FM just floated easy listening LPs. Hunter had worked in top 40 in some larger markets, and had a pretty decent sounding station for a market that size... jingles, good jocks, bells and whistles. It could not get more power because its signal to the west butted up against 1460 Baton Rouge.
 
Yes. WROA is a whopping 8 towers. It's very impressive to see.

The pattern is quite tight, sending almost all signal out to sea. It's not very strong in Pascagoula, but one can hear it like a local in Honduras.

The story I always was told was that a less-ornate DA was possible for 1 kW, but the family had its heart set on 5 kW; thus, the Orange Grove tower farm.

You'll recall WSJC spent some time on 790 before finding its final home on 810 with its 50 kW day/500 W night signal.

Again. Fascinating stuff. But truly useless information.

DE
 
The original calls for 1460 Moss Point: WACY, aka "Whacky" ... an idea possibly taken from WAKY 790 Louisville with the same nickname. I believe its original power of 500 watts was because the theoretical signal toward Baton Rouge prohibited 1 kw; however, I believe later the FCC allowed an applicant to make actual measurements, which could have resulted in slightly less conductivity than predicted, so perhaps the 1 kw was permitted based on the actual instead of theoretical contours. Station has been silent for some time now.

1390 WROA was originally an MoR station - thought it was kinda dumb that at one time the only two stations licensed to Gulfport were both in same general format. Later the easy/adult format was moved to its FM 107.1, and then 1390 went top 40. And 1130 WGUF came on in mid 70s as a country daytimer.

Biloxi's 1490 was top 40 for at least some of the time in the 70s, and as I mentioned in previous post, at one time 570 was doing top 40 ...but all these stations had to contend with monster competition from New Orleans (690 day/night and 1060 day), as those signals traveled a salt water path from the Crescent City to the Coast.

Didja know: WROA stood for Riviera of America?

Speaking of DA-N stations in south Miss: WPMP/WPMO 1580 at one time had a CP to go night with 3 or 4 towers, but never went through with it ... there came a time when one realized that the trend from AM to FM made the investment questionable.

I recall a time when there was no DA station in Meridian... until WMOX went from 1240 to 1010 ... this may have been about 1960.
 
I did not know that about WPMP, despite the fact that I worked there for a few years. It's surprising they would build-out a DA for daytime (protecting Hattiesburg, I assume) but not bother to add a tower (or 2) for night. That DA was only a few years old when I got there in High School -- that swanky Harris MW5A was still shiny & new. Somehow, an engineer managed to tune that transmitter down far enough to make the pittance of night authority they were awarded in the 80s.

One would think that a station on the Coast such as 1580 could engineer something that might work -- one has the luxury of pointing out to the Gulf. See discussion on 1390 above. When I was a kid, though, 1580 (a Canadian Clear) was occupied at night by then-KLOU Lake Charles. It was only 1 kW, but they got their money's worth. It was a fine-sounding Top-40 in its day.

There has never been a DA of any kind in Laurel-Hattiesburg. I suppose wisdom was that the Class IVs that were there (now called Class Cs) were enough (1230 & 1400 in Hattiesburg; 1340 in Laurel). You'll recall in the 1980s, 1260 moved to 890 as a 10 kW daytimer and attempted to serve both towns. In Twitter-speak, that would be a #fail.

It has always perplexed me that McComb had a DA-N.

A trip down Amnesia Lane.

DE
 
Three FMs in Miss. in '63? WJDX FM, WNSL FM, and who was the third one ? There was a non-commercial FM in Meridian, WMMI on 88.1, back in the 50s. That freq is now used by the Miss Public Bcstg xmtr for that area of the state. Only saw 2 FM listed in the '63 Bcstg Yrbook, but the data for that publication was compiled the year before. WWHO 94.7 (I was involved with this station when it became WKXI in '71) came on in '64.
 
WLAU was on 1430, country daytimer... owned by F.M. Smith, a colorful character if there ever was one... knew him from attending Miss Bcstrs Assn conventions on the coast. Laurel Hattiesburg has its share of now-silent AMs ... WHSY 1230 and WXXX 1310 also bit the dust.
 
I am only going by what's in the directory, of course. I have NO personal knowledge at all. But, the third station was:

WMMI/91.5 in Meridian. A blistering 650W.

That allocation is gone now.

WLAU/Laurel on 1430 didn't go dark until well into the 1980s. When I was working in Collins, it was still on -- playing country. One of the staff once told me that they watched movies on HBO and segued records most of the day. It appears all AMs in Jones County are now dark. WAML/1340 has filed an application for an STA to remain silent and a separate application to move to Collins. I can't imagine why they would want to move it there, unless it is part of a larger plan to allow the Collins FM to change COL. Why else?

DE
 
Long time MBA members who knew F M Smith had all sorts of stories about his unique approach to the trade. My favorite one: He had acquired the rights to use a particular production library and jingle package from the Wm B Tanner Company. Such contracts convey the right to use the materials in a particular market, for a specified period of time, on an exclusive basis. In this case, the Tanner deal was for the use of the library in the Laurel market on his station, WLAU.

Along the way, he bought an AM station in Mobile (WLIQ 1360) and proceeded to use the production library in Mobile. But Tanner had already sold the exclusive rights to that library to another Mobile station, which complained that WLIQ was violating its market exclusivity. Tanner had no choice but to sue Smith. I never knew the outcome, but I'm sure Tanner won ... tho it didn't stop Smith from bragging at the MBA gatherings about how he was defying the evil Tanner company, and that, having paid for the library, was going to use it wherever and whenever he chose.

The Tanner company was a bunch of grave robbers, but that's beside the point.
 
I thought a little longer and harder about 1460 Moss Point... I now recall they had two towers ... so they came on the air 1 kw DA-D (presumably protecting 1450 New Orleans and 1460 Baton Rouge with a single slight null to the west) ... and probably later on they collapsed one tower and dropped to 500 w non-DA.
 
When I worked with Larry Blakeney at WKOR in the mid 70's, he confidentially let me in on the fact that he and family were looking at going into ownership. He couldn't be specific, but I surmised that Collins was his target at the time. Larry has one of those voices that, until I got used to hearing him, every time he went into a break I thought it was a big-time VO guy doing a promo... then I realized it was just Larry doing a backsell into spots.

There were a couple of former WROA guys I worked with at JDX, Ray Zoller and Dennis Jon Bailey. DJB did 10 to 2 nights, I was doing middays, and I got into no little trouble because we would go out "partying" (coffee at IHOP?) after he got off at 2 in the morning. Not good dragging tail in just in time to catch the end of news at 10 AM, especially when it was the PD (Bob Burton) sitting waiting for me to drag in. We did a road trip one night, probably with the head start of getting off at Sunday night sign off. The play was to roll down to see old haunts on the coast, with the idea of having coffee and beignets in the quarter before speeding back into town in time to pop on and do my four. I would sleep on the way back. It all makes so much sense when you're 18. I think it worked, but I didn't last long at that pace.
 
Ray Zoller went from JDX up to 13Q in Pittsburgh. Within a year of working at JDX, Dennis Jon Bailey was at WRKO in Boston. All that to say WROA must have been a happenin' place at one point.

BTW, Dennis won a Marconi Award last year for his work doing mornings in Evansville.
 
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