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Ohio Beautiful Music Roll Call

G

gr8oldies

We talked about Top 40, now since there recently was a topic about beautiful music on one of the other boards, it did get me thinking about how many big and small Ohio stations carried that format. There were a few BMers that had their own little quirks.

Some I'm familiar with:

WHIO-FM Dayton (started in the 60s or earlier, had live personalities such as Gary Calvert.)
WPTW-FM Piqua (WPTW AM Piqua and WPTW-FM Piqua Troy Ohio)
WMVR-FM Sidney (very cheaply run using three extra large carts and the AM operator would throw a switch, interrupting the song whenever there was an asterik on the log in order to simulcast the spot
WOGM Bellefontaine
WWEZ Cincinnati
WDBN, Medina (had a rather long slogan as I recall, ending with "and all the way back again")
WBEA Elyria
WLQR (?) Toledo
WBNS-FM, Columbus
WAEZ, Akron
I'm sure there are tons more
 
Surely you can't forget the last holdout, Stan Coning's late, lamented WCTM in Eaton!
 
Wasn't WMHE/Toledo beautiful music before going Top 40?
 
There was also WLSR "Lima Stereo Radio" in the 60s and 70s before switching to adult contemporary,then urban/R&B (as WLJM-FM),classic hits (as WAJC)and later classic rock WUZZ which is now WEGE "The Eagle."

Only thing close to anything resembling beautiful music is smooth jazz WRPO-LP in Russells Point when it airs an overnight smooth jazz/beautiful music mix.

Warm 98 in Cincy might have been beautiful music at one time but unsure.
 
Warm 98 was beautiful music...it was WLQA-FM

You also could list:
WLYK-FM107, Milford, OH
WYCH-FM103.5, Hamilton, OH
WZIP-FM92.5, Cincinnati, OH
WCXR-FM 105.1, Cincinnati, OH
WJBI-FM102.7 then 94.1, Cincinnati
WAEF-FM, 98.5, Cincinnati
WLVV-FM 94.9, Fairfield, OH and before that it was WFOL-FM
WPBF-FM 105.9, Middletown, OH
WKRC-FM 101.9 (before they were solid gold or WKRQ), Cincinnati

That about exhausts the list for SW Ohio!
 
I think there may be the stray station with some version of the 'beautiful music' format - not really contemporary instrumentals or a new age variation on 'smooth jazz' - in Texas and Florida, and mayne one in Tennessee somewhere. For conservative retirees, I suppose.

My family moved from Detroit to Toledo in 1968. I was a pre-teenybopper who dialed around AM and FM a lot and recall BM on the following outlets:

WSPD-FM Toledo 101.5, which became WLQR when Susquehanna took it over and refined the format. I used to hang out in their studio when a buddy did his airshift on the station. They had the usual large tapes filled with instrumental versions of popular songs, plus a few other instrumentals that actually worked as something other than "cover songs." And a few soft vocals, but very little of what would make it into the Music of Your Life" format. Local announcers all the time, with short newscasts each hour. WLQR (I was told the call letters were supposed to suggest "liquor") probably dominated the market back then, since they did a better job with the format than the others without live announcers.

WMHE-FM 92.5 Toledo was still in mono with actual "muzak" on the air, since the licensee held the local francise for that dreck. But they did eventually go stereo at night for Toledo Symphony broadcasts, which, strangely, cleared up their not-yet-50kw signal, as opposed to the severe multipath or "twisted" clarity on their mono signal, despite the area's flat terrain. I recall WLQR later picked up the TSO concerts on Sunday nights. Maybe Boston Pops, too.

WFRO-FM 99.1 Fremont held onto the format for a long time (probably into the 1980s?), while they still had a good AM signal on 900 to do pop music and local stuff. They also added the Cleveland Indians games to FM, I think.

WQTE-AM 560 from Monroe was probably the first example of the format most people knew in the Detroit area. My parents listened to it on Sunday mornings back in the early 1960s. And WEOL-AM 930 from Elyria also had a soft "BM format, and had a decent signal along the lakeshore to Detroit, and used a harp glissando signature with their ID. Like in the Rolling Rock beer ads.

WDBN-FM (94.9?) from Medina was something like a 300,000 signal with the BM format, but you still couldn't usually hear it in Toledo unless the Lake Erie skip factor was at work (in the summer, signals from Cleveland, Erie and Buffalo often strengthened for days at a time and came in in Toledo, which was a problem for the TV and FM stations sharing the same frequency 200 miles apart, like TV channel 24.

Who else? WBNS-FM 97.1 in Columbus was a big BM signal They used to pipe it into the University Inn at Ohio U in Athens 80 miles away. That, while students were treated to "death rock" on the cafeteria loudspeakers from the closed-circuit campus station called ACRN. Neither option, in my opinion, were very appetizing.

Detroit's WKNR-FM 100.3 was, I think, the big FM version of the BM format in Motown, but went to soft rock as WNIC-FM earlier than many others made the switch. WOMC 104.3 FM also did it. And 95.5 FM was "cosy" for awhile.

There were probably also several other small town FMs that did this format until they found something better to do, or let the boss' son experiment with something different.

Funny, but while beautiful music was a filler format for many fledgling FMs, once the FM band started to catch on, not many held onto the format for long.

-- Goldilocks
 
Of course I remember WCTM. I'm thinking Stan used automation tapes recorded in the early 70s. When was 94.9's (Fairfield)'s BM period? I remember WCNW-FM but not much until recent history. How about WPFB-FM (or WPBF)? I remember black gospel, disco the it's all a blur until "Mellow 106".

WPTW-FM, after years of BM, started marketing to Dayton after WHIO-FM flipped to Country
(this very facility is now WHIO-FM, simulcasting 1290's news talk format.) As "Clear 95", they even hired a couple of announcers from WHIO-FM. Soon A/C and Oldies "Kool 95" followed.
 
I seem to remember as a kid WFOB-FM playing BM. This would have been around 1975-76. I recall for sure a program on Sundays called "Sunday Serenade" hosted by a gentlemen with a foreign accent who read dedications over the air. Not really my music of choice but it seemed cool back then because it sounded so far away from my "boring" little town in NW Ohio

Goldilocks94941 said:
I think there may be the stray station with some version of the 'beautiful music' format - not really contemporary instrumentals or a new age variation on 'smooth jazz' - in Texas and Florida, and mayne one in Tennessee somewhere. For conservative retirees, I suppose.

My family moved from Detroit to Toledo in 1968. I was a pre-teenybopper who dialed around AM and FM a lot and recall BM on the following outlets:

WSPD-FM Toledo 101.5, which became WLQR when Susquehanna took it over and refined the format. I used to hang out in their studio when a buddy did his airshift on the station. They had the usual large tapes filled with instrumental versions of popular songs, plus a few other instrumentals that actually worked as something other than "cover songs." And a few soft vocals, but very little of what would make it into the Music of Your Life" format. Local announcers all the time, with short newscasts each hour. WLQR (I was told the call letters were supposed to suggest "liquor") probably dominated the market back then, since they did a better job with the format than the others without live announcers.

WMHE-FM 92.5 Toledo was still in mono with actual "muzak" on the air, since the licensee held the local francise for that dreck. But they did eventually go stereo at night for Toledo Symphony broadcasts, which, strangely, cleared up their not-yet-50kw signal, as opposed to the severe multipath or "twisted" clarity on their mono signal, despite the area's flat terrain. I recall WLQR later picked up the TSO concerts on Sunday nights. Maybe Boston Pops, too.

WFRO-FM 99.1 Fremont held onto the format for a long time (probably into the 1980s?), while they still had a good AM signal on 900 to do pop music and local stuff. They also added the Cleveland Indians games to FM, I think.

WQTE-AM 560 from Monroe was probably the first example of the format most people knew in the Detroit area. My parents listened to it on Sunday mornings back in the early 1960s. And WEOL-AM 930 from Elyria also had a soft "BM format, and had a decent signal along the lakeshore to Detroit, and used a harp glissando signature with their ID. Like in the Rolling Rock beer ads.

WDBN-FM (94.9?) from Medina was something like a 300,000 signal with the BM format, but you still couldn't usually hear it in Toledo unless the Lake Erie skip factor was at work (in the summer, signals from Cleveland, Erie and Buffalo often strengthened for days at a time and came in in Toledo, which was a problem for the TV and FM stations sharing the same frequency 200 miles apart, like TV channel 24.

Who else? WBNS-FM 97.1 in Columbus was a big BM signal They used to pipe it into the University Inn at Ohio U in Athens 80 miles away. That, while students were treated to "death rock" on the cafeteria loudspeakers from the closed-circuit campus station called ACRN. Neither option, in my opinion, were very appetizing.

Detroit's WKNR-FM 100.3 was, I think, the big FM version of the BM format in Motown, but went to soft rock as WNIC-FM earlier than many others made the switch. WOMC 104.3 FM also did it. And 95.5 FM was "cosy" for awhile.

There were probably also several other small town FMs that did this format until they found something better to do, or let the boss' son experiment with something different.

Funny, but while beautiful music was a filler format for many fledgling FMs, once the FM band started to catch on, not many held onto the format for long.

-- Goldilocks
Click to expand...
 
With regard to Fairfield, the first station on 94.9-FM was WFOL in 1962 named for owner Walter Folmer. It was southwestern Ohio's first fulltime stereo station. The only real break in the music was when the station carried University of Kentucky basketball games during the 1962-63 season as a part of the Standard Oil Network with Claude Sullivan doing the play-by-play.
 
There should also be a mention of WQMS at 96.7-FM in Hamilton, Ohio. The call-letters stood for "Quality Music Station". It featured what might now be called "Beautiful Music" with minimal interuption for station ID's which were voiced by an older-sounding gentleman. On Saturday nights in the early 1960's, WQMS featured recordings by: Guy Lombardo, Freddy Martin and Eddy Howard.
 
Hey gr8

Good call on Stanley Coning's WCTM...great fellow..hope he reads your post...he had a lot of listeners who appreciated what he did when all of the FMs dropped BM. Used to help him out with liners,promos and spots for him when Darrel Studebaker wasn't there at the moment to help.

You may also remember a few more over at the other side of the Buckeye-Hoosier line. Richmond's WQLK did automated BM as did WMEF in Ft. Wayne before WMEE'S top 40 moved over to FM. WMRI-FM in Marion was another one and the most unusual one was Anderson's WLHN Stereo 98 which used live jocks calling the format "all gold"..unusual not only because it was live but also mixed some adult standards and some "extremely light" adult contemporary. It's jingle was inspired by Mark Lindsay's 1970 hit "Arizona."
 
Definately remember some of the Hoosier BMers that made it accross the border. Now that you mention WMRI on 106.9 in Marion, IN, there was also Marion OH's WMRN in the same spot doing BM. WMEF..I remember around the format flip the announcement "Effective July ?, 1979, at 4pm, this station will no longer program Beautiful Music. The music you will hear will be contemporary top 40. There is a new beautiful music station now broadcasting at 101.7 FM". I believe WMEF was BM even when they were WKJG-FM, and if I'm not mistaken, so was WPTH in the pre "Stereo Rock" days. I don't remember much about WQLK before automated country.
 
96.3 in Columbus under the call letters WBUK and WTVN-FM until valentines day 1977 when it became Q-FM-96.

Also 94.7, currently Sunny 95 did BM during the day as WSPO, and ran the format of daytimer WVKO at night which was a black format.

I think WBBY in Westerville originally had a BM format when it arrived on the air.

WCEZ 107.9 signed on as Easy 108 with beautiful music. They have been many formats and many call letters since and currently are running the BNS-FM format before it went sports.
 
WHIO-FM has been noted, but I wanted to add some more to it from when the station was at 99.1 on FM. I first got an FM radio in January, 1961 and was almost immediately became familar with this station for its beautiful music format. That basically continued into at least the mid-1980's. The station also had news every few hours on the hour so you were able to keep up with what was taking place both in the region as well as nationally (for example, I will always remember hearing of the death of Jack Webb on WHIO-FM a two days before Christmas in 1982 when I had the station on at work). Most certainly, the station's power gained it listeners throughout Southwest Ohio, into Indiana and to the far north of Dayton. In terms of power, I remember in 1966, WHIO-FM originated the D.P. & L News Network each weekday at 5 P.M. and fed some area stations using its strong signal which those stations picked up and re-broadcast. The newscaster for that program was a station employee named Phil Donahue.
 
gr8oldies said:
We talked about Top 40, now since there recently was a topic about beautiful music on one of the other boards, it did get me thinking about how many big and small Ohio stations carried that format. There were a few BMers that had their own little quirks.

Some I'm familiar with:

WHIO-FM Dayton (started in the 60s or earlier, had live personalities such as Gary Calvert.)
WPTW-FM Piqua (WPTW AM Piqua and WPTW-FM Piqua Troy Ohio)
WMVR-FM Sidney (very cheaply run using three extra large carts and the AM operator would throw a switch, interrupting the song whenever there was an asterik on the log in order to simulcast the spot
WOGM Bellefontaine
WWEZ Cincinnati
WDBN, Medina (had a rather long slogan as I recall, ending with "and all the way back again")
WBEA Elyria
WLQR (?) Toledo
WBNS-FM, Columbus
WAEZ, Akron
I'm sure there are tons more
Click to expand...

Gr8t:

WHIO-FM was actually on the air in the area of 1946-1949. It originally occupied as an "experimental" FM, one of the lower FM frequencies down in the 47 meg range in its earlier days. When the FCC boosted FM up to its present home at 88-108 mhz, it took the 99.1 position on the dial and, I think that is when it took the WHIO-FM call letters.

The station operated as a "good music" or "beautiful music" station well before the name of the format had been established.

The interesting story behind this: when the Governor put the FM on the air, so the story goes, he really didn't think FM would amount to much. So, they operated it as cheaply as they could for the time. In fact, for a while, Governor Cox reportedly told his managers not to even bother trying to sell commercial time on the station! Which may, posthumously, make him a candidate for a Program Director Of The Year award. Why? The station operated commercial-free, or virtually so long enough that, one day someone walked into the Governor's office with a rating book that showed the FM was #1 in Dayton. That in a day when nobody, but nobody thought that an FM was capable of that. Needless to say, that changed the Governor's mind about not selling commercials. Even so, at first the "commercial policy" was extremely limited: a 55 word live read spot at the top of the hour, and a 15 word live read spot at the bottom...that was it!

For a while, Governor Cox, it is told, even bought into the theory that television would eventually supplant radio and put it out of business. That's why when he constructed the 1414 Wilmington Avenue facility for WHIO-TV, he constructed the radio side of the building identical to the TV side. Why? He figured when radio went out of business, he'd just convert the radio studios to TV studios. Of course, that never happened....
 
In northeast Ohio, WHBC-FM in Canton and WKBN-FM in Youngstown were Beautiful Music for years before they evolved into AC formats. Even in the early '80s, northeast Ohio was surely a great place to live if you liked BM, with WDOK, WQAL, WDBN, WHBC-FM, and WAEZ all programming it. Plus, parts of NE Ohio could pick up WSHH "Wish" from Pittsburgh at 99.7. I have also read that WDPN-AM 1310 in Alliance programmed BM after WHBC-FM evolved to AC around 1990.

105.5 FM in Sylvania/Toledo was also BM in the mid-'70s as WXEZ.

Wasn't WDFM in Defiance BM originally? I remember it DXing into the northern suburbs of Detroit in the late '90s as a very soft AC, before the change into Mix 98-1.

I wasn't aware that WFRO-FM ever programmed beautiful music... I had assumed the AM and FM were always simulcast. Was it full-time or did they just have it as a fill after AM sign-off?

In regard to the format's history in Detroit... 100.3 was never actually "true" BM under the WKNR-FM calls, but for a short time in the early '70s it programmed a mix of BM, MOR album cuts and softer Top 40 hits known as "Stereo Island." "Stereo Island" was a format used at several other FMs around the country including WFMK in East Lansing, but I'm not aware of any stations in Ohio that used it. New owners came in and in April 1972 flipped WKNR-FM, along with its AM Top 40 sister (Keener 13), to "true" BM as WNIC-AM/FM. WNIC-FM started its long-running AC format in about 1976, while the AM side has gone through countless format changes since.

In the mid-'70s, Detroit also had 95.5 WLDM (pre-WCZY), 96.3 WJR-FM, 97.1 WWJ-FM and 104.3 WOMC all playing BM in addition to WNIC and WQTE (which flipped to Oldies as WHND "Honey Radio" in 1973 or '74). A decade later, the only station still in the format (and with huge ratings because of that) was 97.1 FM, by then known as WJOI ("Joy 97). WOMC and WNIC had gone AC, and 96.3 and 95.5 had gone CHR (as WHYT "Hot Hits" and WCZY "Z95.5") respectively. WJOI was probably quite listenable in Toledo then before 97.3 Oak Harbor and 96.9 Wauseon signed on.

Also, 93.9 FM in Windsor, which comes in well in the Toledo area, was briefly CKEZ with BM in 1985 - after the ill-fated "Fox FM" experiment there but before it re-acquired the CKLW-FM calls and did oldies "Big 8" style. Plus WPAG-FM in Ann Arbor (now WQKL) was BM for most of the '80s, and I think WVMO in Monroe may have done it too before becoming WTWR.

OT, but... what did WMEE-AM do after WMEE-FM acquired the Top 40 format in 1979? Did it simulcast or did it flip to something else?
 
While growing up as an angst-ridden teenager in Toledo's Point Place, I used to listen to WVMO 98.3 from Monroe on the living room stereo, while the rest of the family was stuck in from of the TV in the living room. I remember it programming a general full-service type of adult contemporary music and info format during the days, and country-western at nights. It was the first time I got to hear singers like Tammy Wynette and Johnnyh Rodriguez in FM (mono, but still a revelation over hearing the music on AM). Yeah, I was a little odd.

I also used to DX Radio Progreso and a couple of other services from Havana on AM 590, AM 640, and sometimes on AM 690. The music they played on their half-hour "youth show" at 8pm "A las veinte horas" was fantastic Cuban rumba, son, soloists and bands.

Back to small town Michigan and Ohio: Too bad there's scant few of the county-seat stations anymore. Hard to believe the FCC let Cumulus move WVMO, then as WTWR, to Luna Pier (which actually was where the transmitter was), then move the studios into Toledo and essentially not have a local identity anymore. That, plus AM560 having studios in Detroit, means a rather large population between-market county like Monroe County really has no local radio. (The religious and high school stations don't really count, in my opinion). In small city Midwest, as elsewhere, even if you didn't listen to the local station routinely, you would from time to time, since it did relate to the world you lived in. Whether it was Monroe County, Fostoria, Port Clinton, Sandusky, Adrian, etc - they all had one, maybe two, local stations that actually provide some element of local service, even if it was just high school sports. Now, what's left in those county seats on WFOB or WTWR or WLEC etc that you can't also get commerical free and with better announcers on satellite radio? No wonder the stations are losing audience and revenue -- by watering down their service to the Toledo suburbs, they don't really belong to anybody. (Not to mention the overvalued license sales -- so much for the unfettered free market treating radio as real estate, not a public trust).

Don't get me wrong - some of those stations often sounded like crap in the 1970s. I worked briefly at WRWR in Port Clinton, and it taught me not to trust a lot of the people in the radio biz after how I was treated there as a kid just out of high school. Plus, the equipment was pretty ratty. But, it still was a station that people who lived in the "Vacationland" area could call their own, with local news on the hour, and if somebody said anything worth noting on the air there, everybody knew it.

I think having some sort of local radio in smaller-town America again can revive interest in AM and FM radio - as long as it's more than just another background music format (like the BM we started talking about here), and has local air staff that deals with stuff that actually happens where you live. A sense of place, I guess is what you call it.

Goldilocks
 
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