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South and Central Jersey Radio of the 70's

:)Folks..THIS is exactly what I was talking about in one of my posts above. Getting inside info about REAL people who toiled in this industry her in NJ. THIS is what this type of community is all about. I am so glad that people all over the state are getting to hear about these pockets of very talented people who graced the airwaves over the years. Now let's hear about the Trenton/Princeton area stations. How about the Camden stations? WRLB? WJLK? WHTG? WCTC? WERA? Stations in Salem? Mt. Holly? Sussex/Warren? This is like a history book in the making. I think that the NJ Radio Museum would be a WONDERFUL repository for all of these stories. I wish there was someone who could put all of this wonder history together and make it available online in a much longer form. I know Pirate Jim has SOME info on his site but he's kind of abandoned it for lack of time. OR..is ALL of this stuff just for the few who actually DID all of this as our means of making a living? Does the average radio fan who reads this stuff REALLLY care what happened in 1972 at WOND? I don't know.. Perhaps you NON professionals can give us some advise here. We don't want to BORE you with all this minutea..unless you like it. Help us out here..
BE BIG
www.reelradio.com ==The Time Machine LIVES
 
I did time in the AC market. First job out of College. Andy Volvo hired me for WMID evenings in June '80 for the stellar salary of 175.00/week. I was the 2nd highest paid guy on staff! Moved to AMD one month later. Moved up to Phila. to WUSL at summer's end. Since then, WKHK, WYNY, WNBC,WCBS, NYC. WJMK, Chicago, and now in Orlando at WMMO.

Many lost nights at the Shore Tavern and elsewhere. Fun stuff!

I actually auditioned at the Jersey 101. Guess I didn't get the job, but I remember the PD. Red headed guy. Seemed like a great concept.
 
Mt. Holly? Those WJJZ Washington House studios were so bad at the end. When "Eddie and the Cruisers was in town to shoot at "Rydell Hifgh (Rancocas), they wanted a vintage look radio station for a few scenes. The wiring would not handle the lighting load, so they drove to AC and shot at WMID. It was a toilet. Frozen in time.

My first day, I spotted an RCA 77-DX being used for a DOOR STOP!!! I reclaimed it and used it in my News Booth and production. Awesome. Installed a Kahn Symetric-Peak and rebuilt a Gates Sta-Level to replace the totally shot CBS Volumax. It was a sweet combination, and loud.

The transmitters were on Burlington Island in the Delaware River...4 tower directional. Totally vandalized by partying teens (they're lucky they didn't kill themselves), it could not get up to licensed 5kw. But the Vanguard 1kw backup was a workhorse. Weekly tower readings and emergency repairs involved driving from Mt. Holly to Burlington Marina, loading tool into the boat, and ROWING out to the island. The motor had been stolen or broken so many times, the owner would not buy another. Then shlep back to the boat, row back, unload tools and chain boat, and drive back to Mt. Holly. We got $35 extra in the paycheck for each trip to the island.

But at one time, in 1965, this place must have been a jewel...all Gates package

The owner lost the license for "lack of candor" to the Commision in hearings involving a cable franchise. Dave Kerr, the GM/PD did the final sign-off (The Beatles "The End"), while I took one final set of reading. Then I cut the plate high voltage at sundown, 11/1/82, and the filaments one minute later. WE knew it would never return to air.

Mike Venditti later used that same mic at WIBG in Ocean City.
 
I lived in Mt. Holly and visited WJJZ in the Washington House when I was 16,
Tom Wahl (who I knew from CB radio) was on the air, and Pat McCall was
hanging around taking meter readings, as someone with a first class license
had to be there at that time. The next station I visited was WIBG in Philly,
and did a videotape tour for my Rancocas Valley Regional HS journalism class.
The tourguides were John Record Landecker and I. We interviewed the
guy on the air and Peter Jackson in news, and the owner - Buckley.
It was a lot of fun and I wish I still had that tape, and of course, has
a machine it would play on.

Eddie and the Cruisers trivia ... the station in the movie AMFMSW refers to
was visited by Tom Berenger's character Frank Robbins, and the DJ was
Joe Pantoliano's character, Doc Robbins. The OUTSIDE of the station ...
seen here: http://mcnally.cc/pics/wrhe.jpg
was an abandoned building on Route 9 in Linwood, formerly the office
of Hagerthy Fuel Oil. The big WRHE (Asbury Park in the movie) sign was
only up for about a day - probably rented letters from sign company, and
the building was demolished right after that. The inside was WMID - a
shot shown here ... http://mcnally.cc/nixie/eddie.jpg
I have the panel seen behind Doc Robbins, with three meters on it,
and made a clock out of it (later found the shot in the movie)

By the way ... the high school was referred to as being in
Vine-Land in the movie, and as mentioned by AMFMSW was
Rancocas Valley ... I have a feeling the classroom they used
was my journalism class room ... not positive ... but kinda cool anyway.
 
Yeah, after I wrote that, I thought I got the name of the HS wrong. Rydell was in Grease. I remember those E-V DS35 mics...never did like them. I'm no baritone, and you had to use them like a toothbrush to get any bass out of them.

I had a similar tour of WIBG for my basic electronics class at St. Aloysius. I was a Junior at St. Pius X, and was asked to tutor kids struggeling with algebra, math and applied theory...I wasn't a total slacker yet. But we had no such celebrity as Scott Walker/JRL "Records really is my middle name". Archie Sitchel, the CE, was our guide. He showed us the water cooled tubes in those gorgeous BTA-50/10 RCA transmitters, bitched about how the jocks were all going deaf as he was building a Heath-Kit 20 watt rms headphone amp. At one point he took us through the basement conduit system and gave each of the kids a 40 watt flourescent bulb to hold on one end to light the way. The RF field was so high, the bulbs lit! They were amazed. Archie then gave a two minute talk to the kids on how inportant math would be in their life, and how he used it everyday. They caught onto Ohm's Law real fast after that. I had forgotten all that. Maybe my life in this crazy industry wasn't a total waste.
 
I didn't get a transmitter tour ... the PD - I can't think of his name
at the moment said "that's all boring stuff in there" haha

One funny thing we did in Buckley's office when we interviewed him ...
he said "let's do a skit" and had his secretary pretend to be sitting
on his lap, and we "interrupted" them as we came in ... it was
pretty good. The towers were right out his back window, and
that 50,000 watts got into my microphone so you heard
"Carry On" by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young pretty loudly
in the background. Every time I hear the song to this day
I think of that.
 
Tom -

I never did work at WLDB, although I did go there once to inquire about a job. My memory of the station is somewhat sketchy being that the one time I was there was more than 35 years ago. I have a memory of meeting the owner (I think her name was Dorothy). I remember her as an older severe woman with a full head of grey hair and if I remember correctly we sat and talked at a table in the "studio," because there was no other room besides the studio. Plus, the station was in a trailer which sat in an empty lot, and, if I recall, in this time before Atlantic City casinos, the area around the trailer was pretty desolate. I think the board op was playing ET's. The station had a "Twilight Zone" feel to it.

Ironically, I later worked with the guy who was the board op that day and we still stay in contact. His name was (and still is) Al Sergi. Al deserves a lot of credit because he figured out how to play the game of radio. He got out of radio to take a real world job in NJ, and while working at that job he bought a radio station in West Virginia. He sold it less than 10 years later and then bought a 50,000 watt FM and its AM for a song and dance. He fixed it up, started making lots of money and now owns 6 stations on 10 frequencies in central WV. His stations are very involved in their communities and Al still does air work as he gets ready to retire. So, even though it does take a major commitment as well as a willingness to take chances, you don't have to be Sumner Redstone or Lowry Mays to run a station the way you want it run.

By the way, my good sir, for the record, I was NEVER late for an air shift at WMGM. Of course, I wasn't one of the guys who had to drive 60 miles to work. I had to drive 120 miles to work! If I hadn't come down the night before to sleep on the floor at the home of a friend of a friend of a friend, I would leave New York about 6:30 on Saturday morning to make sure I had time to get gas, make a few coffee stops, avoid any possible traffic, and get to the station early enough to put together a few sets and pull the records for those sets. So, Tom, that couldn't have been the reason you always seemed so…how do I say?…detached whenever I came into the studio. Maybe it was because you had one of the cars that would sink into that quicksand of mud in that so-called station parking lot :)

WMGM was too long ago for me to remember what I got paid. I know it was unbelievably low, although it's hard to believe it was as sickeningly low as $2/hour. Wasn't minimum wage higher than that?

At any rate, does anybody know what weekenders are getting for on-air shifts at Jersey radio stations in 2008? Just how much, if at all (allowing for 36 years of inflation) have things changed since 1972? Needless to say, I wouldn't expect anybody to tell us what their hourly wage is, but can some anonymous poster give us a range for the current weekender pay rate? It might even be good info for those kids at home who are reading this and thinking of making radio a career (if there are any kids left who haven't been talked out of that idea yet).

Also, Tom, can you give any tips or advice on how to get jobs without resumes or airchecks? That probably won't help kids looking to get into the business, but it might very well help experienced professionals who are looking for their next gig.
 
WLDB was quite an operation. I visited back in 1972 and it amazed me that they had no cart machines. Someone told me they would record spots onto a cassette machine and hold it up to the mic. Sometimes you could hear any conversations when the mic was supposedly off. I heard Dorothy and the jock having a loud argument one day. I also heard that when the audio got scratchy, Leroy Bremmer would go out to the transmitter and rap on it with a baseball bat to shake out any dust in the contacts. Don't they make aerosol cleaners for that? Give it a good shot of Blue Shower. One time, they couldn't pay their FCC fees and the other stations in town got together and paid them for her figuring that with WLDB staying on the air,it was one less competitor.Or was that a radio urban legend?
They had a weird format or formats. CW one time,the next,it was big band and they carried NBCs Monitor.SHe sold out for something like $50,000, hooked up the trailer and moved out to the midwest.
 
You've heard quite a few urban legends !

No cart machines, correct ... BUT ... no cassettes either.
They had Gates Spot Tapes, when they broke the spots were
played from reel. A few times when the main reel to reel broke,
they WOULD play a back up machine through the mike.
You can see some info on the Spot Tapes on teh web page,
it was basically an attempt at competing with the cart.
It held 101 spots of up to 90 seconds. They had two.

I never heard the one about the baseball bat ... Leroy was a good engineer, so I doubt it.

I don't think the story about the FCC filing fees is true, they did run into a little
trouble after Leroy died and she didn't know what to do ...

She sold the station for a respectable (at the time) $ 170,000 or something.
Yes ... the trailer was pulled wayyyyy out west to Egg Harbor Township, to
Ocean Heights and English Creek Road, and not immediately, the new owners
used it until they finished a new studio.

There is some WLDB history at: http://mcnally.cc/wldb.htm

I have some more stuff to add, courtesy of Owen Keating, I just haven't gotten
to it. By the way, I got some nice emails from Mrs. Bremmer's grandchildren,
who never knew her, but found my web page and got to learn about her.
I also got a nice email from her son, known as "Mr. Moore" who you'll see
on the 1955 web history.
 
Thanks for the info and setting the record straight. Is there anyway you can make it possible to hear those old WLDB jingles? They were very interesting, to say the least.
 
deff...Tom has the richest radio history,including WLDB on his site www.mcnally.cc.

Tom...the PD, depending on the year, was one of these guys. From Kevin Fennessy:

PAUL DREW
JACK REYNOLDS (came in with Buckley)
ED RICHARDS
BILL WINTERS
JERRY DELCOLLIANO
DON CANNON

Dean Tyler was Music Director at WIBG until '68, then went to WIP as Music Director...and ascended to PD there in 1970, when WNBC's Tony Taylor left.
 
Deff - shoot me an email at [email protected] and I'll hook you up with some jingles

Yep - Jack Reynolds was the guy I couldn't remember ... I think he was supposed
to give me the tour, but Ed Richards was out sick that day, so he was on the air.
He gave me a nice interview in the studio ... they had the "union busting" board
at that time ... it was automatic, with no pots, since I think that was a loophole
that allowed the jocks to run their own board. Thanks !
 
Will any posters on this board be at the Metropolitan Room in the City this weekend to see the showcase being done by the hottest singer on radio...Ashley Alexandra Dupre :)

But, seriously, I wanna tell ya...How about that Tamela D'Amico? Is she somethin' or what? Gggrrrrrrrrrr!!!!
 
Harry...Take it to the Moon Motel on Rt. NINE in Howell, will ya please?
I like the tone of the postings on this board lately. Seems the major bashing and uncalled for crap is done. None of us mind taking a shot here and there, but the overall TONE has changed. Thanks to whomever is making that happen.
Now ban Harry once and for all, as his mind is in the gutter. So's mine, so ya better ban me too.
BTW...does ANYONE have tape of 11-7 Radio from '73-'76? Or even pre 11-7 WHLW from 1970 thru the beginning of the "Joey" era? I would LOVE to get my hands on things. I only have tape of ME obviously, not ever thinking that someday it would be an invaluable resourse for some of yous out there in Jerseyland, especially Monmouth/Ocean afficiandos of the radio dial.
I ALSO just realized that someone is writing a column in the former great newspaper The Asbury Park Press about RADIO and it's LOCAL PEOPLE. Holy crap.. Have they lost their minds? Now all of the local ads in the Press will be stolen by the radio stations.. What will they DO? How will the Press survive?
That NEVER happened and never will. These papers used to NEVER talk about a radio station unless it was REALLLY bad stuff...or perhaps a real good sob story about some kid that was sick, and some guys sits on a telephone pole for 89 hours for the charity. Wow..some forward thinkers at Gannett. But don't say it too loud, because the Trenton papers, The AC Press, the Homeboy News, and Courier-Post and Courier-News and the STAR-LEDGER might actually COVER radio in NJ...what a concept. Actually...the LEDGER DOES with Claudia Perry. She's written about ME and many other folks and does a nice job..so does the woman at the AP Press. People actually DO listen..and actually LIKE some people they hear on the air, and maybe would like to KNOW a bit more about them as REAL PEOPLE and not some appliance that wakes them up each day. Naw...what am I prescribed mind altering drugs? Yes.
Look, I gotta take a shot at the papers sometime..'cause back about 10 years ago, the Star-Ledger did a HUGE article on NJ 101.5..and all of its personalities, and took many cheap shots at me and Hilarie; called me ALL kinds of names..I likely could have sued..but they had deep pockets. It was all true of course, that I was a ****-phobe, a racist, a person unduly fearful or contemptuous of that which is foreign, especially of strangers or foreign peoples (xenophobe), and a rather funny guy at times. But the co-host chick went right along with him, targetting her in the same way...except..SHE was a flaming Liberal in real life and on the air. So misdirected. And the writer of the article had an agenda..and not only that, didn't like the way we had to ask her to leave the studio one day...
Then the program director at the time, THREW us both under the bus when we asked her to leave when she asked us about us LEAVING the station..she had done some undercover snooping about our moving to the station in Philly..and was probing..incessantly. Some will know who I'm talking about. I read the story that Sunday in the car on a trip to Upstate NY..and almost turned around and wanted to not only do bodily harm to the writer, but the Program Director at the time. We patched THAT one up..I think. It was a "misunderstanding" I was told. More intrigue from your old buddy Big Jay the Jock a/k/a Zeke Feeblebitzer president of FDS. No, not that one...The Feeblebitzer Digital System.
BE BIG
www.reelradio.com where Big Jay's Original WNBC Time Machine LIVES.
 
Classic Puker said:
And now an open letter to the crappy Radio Business...

FOR GOSH SAKES (oy, this is getting ridiculous... is Mrs. F a charter member of the 700 Club or something? I'M SICK OF THIS!! YER GOIN' DOWN IN NOVEMBER! THE WHOLE MIGHTY LOT O'Y'UNS!!...

(And while you're at it, dear Radio Fairy, get me off the "Hair Dryer"... you know, the one with 4 towers and the null toward Newark! 8) )
Click to expand...

Masterwork Vomiteer:

I have a few questions about your open letter to the crappy Radio Business:

Who is Mrs. F?

Who comprises the WHOLE MIGHTY LOY O'Y'UNS WHO ARE GOIN' DOWN IN NOVEMBER?

What is the "Hair Dryer"…you know, the one with 4 towers and the null toward Newark! 8) )...
Is it anything like the other "Hair Dryer"…you know, the one with Steve Martin on the box? 8) (extremely obscure reference…although, for you obscure reference detectives, it's referred to by bigjay in an earlier post)
 
Ok now..I guess freedom of speech is a touchy issue around these parts. Well, let's get back to radio in NJ shall we? Gotta love those McGreevy's huh? 101.5 will have a week's worth of topics. And lame morning shows will attempt humor about it..and fail miserably..because they don't know HOW to be funny. Most morning shows will ignore it because the soccor mom set doesn't LIKE to talk about 3-ways. Then they'd have to explain it to the 2.1 kids they have in the back of the Volva station wagon. So radio, once again, misses a perfect opportunity for TSL and CUME. Especially those wonderful Adult Contemporaty or Hot AC stations that 18-44 women adore. The OTHER stations appealing to REAL ADULTS who can tolorate REAL life, should have a field day with it.
Boy I wish I was on today...
BE BIG
Teddy Pederson
PS..wouldn't it be funny if his last name was PETER son.. Ha ha..
 
Does anyone ever look at the other state's boards?

Even though I've never heard of the stations, or the jocks, or sometimes even the towns, I find it interesting that every state board I look at has a thread similar to this one. Posters talk about what radio was like in their small burg 30 or 40 years ago and they reminisce about their favorite jocks of yesteryear - jocks with names like Boom-Boom, Hot Rod, Big Joe and Slim Jim - and whether anybody knows where those guys are today.

The board posters are also folk who are still working in radio, generally in smaller markets at smaller stations, or who used to work in radio 25 or so years ago but ended up pursuing different paths or even similar paths, such as opening up their own production studios. They share stories about horrible equipment and even worse owners and worser (sic) yet pay in Duluth or Dubuque or Dayton, and then end up saying how much they enjoyed it all anyway.

You could change the call letters and jock and town names on some of the posts that are on this New Jersey board, and then move that NJ post to another state board and it would fit right in without missing a beat.

It's funny (Joe Hinton - 1964) how people who live thousands of miles apart, have never met, don't know each other and never will, can actually share such similar experiences and feelings. I guess it's the magic of radio…or maybe it's just the equivalent of the Bizarro Jerry episode of Seinfeld (not to be confused with the Fusilli Jerry episode).
 
You are SO correct Harry. And THAT'S the sin of what has happened to radio as we KNEW it these days. I dare say that the platforms will change, but someone will HAVE to be ON the air or Podcast, or whatever form it'll be in or what we know as radio WILL be over. If they keep cutting talent, then who's gonna DO the shows, the janitorial staff? Judging by getting to know some of those (like Janey at WNBC...she was funny and didn't know it) it might be funnier.
And while I'm at it.. just WHY was Classic Pukers post deleted. I think the posters on this site have a right to KNOW why by the administrators of the board. It's only fair. And if we DON'T hear from them, the I guess all of these very informative threads may have to go elsewhere, and it'll all go back to posts like "Who is your favorite female jock in Salem, NJ from 1974?" I for one won't be here to read that!!!

BE BIG
I think we're owed an explanation.
 
A certain post was removed because it had very little to do with the discussion at hand and was more about someone's personal disagreement with how the site is run. We don't have a problem with anyone taking issue with how we administer the site. That's not why this board is here.

The New Jersey board exists for the discussion of radio in New Jersey. It is our practice to only discuss those actions with the parties involved. We do this out of respect for their privacy.

We do reserve the right to enforce our terms of service. Fortunately those terms rarely have to enforced at all on the New Jersey board. This situation is precisely why we steer threads towards the discussion of the industry. We're already getting off the subject at hand which is "South and Central Jersey Radio of the 70's'.

Thanks to all for your concern. We take your complaints seriously to the point where every page has a "contact us" portion at the top right hand. Those messages go straight to me. If you have further questions about this matter, you can also PM me through the site or reach me at [email protected]. I'll be glad to talk about it to the extent that I'm able.

And now back to the subject of New Jersey radio.
 
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