r.i.p. red parton & karie sargent shields

[CNYRadio.com]

Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but we've had two recent passings of local radio note, which haven't been mentioned on the board yet.

1) Longtime Syracuse sportscaster Red Parton died on Wednesday. He worked for a number of Syracuse radio stations, along with channels 3 and 9, during a career spanning six decades. He's in the Syracuse Sports Hall of Fame and the Syracuse Press Club Hall of Fame -- and he was president of SPC twice. In addition to working as a sports reporter/anchor, Red also called play-by-play for a number of local sports teams.

http://www.cnyradio.com/2010/05/05/syracuse-sportscaster-red-parton-dies/

2) Karie Sargent Shields was found dead at the age of 41 earlier this week in northwestern Pennsylvania. She worked for quite awhile on middays as "Crickett" at Big Frog 104. Jim Shields was OM of the cluster, and she moved with him to Pennsylvania to stay with Forever after Regent bought Forever's Utica-Rome cluster in 2000. (Jim's now the GM of the Forever cluster where Karie had been doing the same shift with the same nickname on a "Froggy" station there.) Before Big Frog, Karie had worked at WOUR, and before that, at WZOZ Oneonta.

http://www.cnyradio.com/2010/05/05/former-big-frog-104-dj-crickett-dies/

 

[therealjm12]

Didn't Red Parton at one time own WPAW 1540?

 

[CNYRadio.com]

Didn't Red Parton at one time own WPAW 1540?

Yes, according to the Syracuse Press Club, Parton was a co-founder, president and GM of WPAW.

Admittedly, I did leave this out of the article because I was unable to find more information beyond the brief mention in the SPC bio (ie. how long he owned/managed WPAW, what frequency it was, and so forth) and I couldn't add anything more than what the SPC had already mentioned.

Tip of the hat to Scott Fybush who either knew or somehow was able to research the fact that WPAW was the original callsign of 1540 East Syracuse, now known as WSIV, as mentioned in the May 10th edition of NERW.

 

[therealjm12]

Parton was a co-founder, president and GM of WPAW.


Many years ago I was told by a very knowledgeable engineer that WPAW was supposed to be 50,000 watts. Newhouse used their political pull and blocked it. So the 50 kw'er was put in Albany- WPTR 1540 instead.

 

[W2JUV_AL]

""Many years ago I was told by a very knowledgeable engineer that WPAW was supposed to be 50,000 watts. Newhouse used their political pull and blocked it. So the 50 kw'er was put in Albany- WPTR 1540 instead. "" ... therealjm12

I've heard this before and have my doubts. WPTR signed on in 1948 at 10Kw DA-1, upgraded to 50 Kw in a year or so. WPAW didn't sign on until 1965. If Red Parton and partners were aced out by Newhouse, why did they wait 17 years to put a station on the air? And why would they settle for 1Kw on 1540 when presumably there were regional frequencies available in 1948 that allowed higher power? Doesn't add up.

 

[therealjm12]

Doesn't add up.

The guy that told me this has long since passed. So no more info out of him. He was involved in it as an engineer. His engineering qualifications were very well respected. However, the time line he implied to me would have been between the end of W. W. II and say, 1950. He told me this in the 70's. I did not question him when he told me the story. I never took him to be a B. S. 'er but maybe........
But like you, I have heard the story elsewhere.
The mystery probably will never be solved now.