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Stations dropping Paul Harvey's former programs?

anotherguyTN

anotherguyTN

I found out that WREC AM 600 in Memphis dropped ABC's News and Comments and Rest of the Story programs after Paul Harvey's death. Somehow I'm not surprised at this happening, especially since it was announced that Gil Gross would take over News and Comments and Doug Limerick would take over The Rest of the Story. I won't be surprised to hear this happening at more stations until the programs are eventually cancelled. I think this would have been less likely if Paul Jr. had taken over. Did ABC dump him or is he still involved in production of the programs and not hosting them by his own choice?

Are other stations dropping or cutting back Paul Harvey's former programs as well?
 
anotherguy said:
Doug Limerick would take over The Rest of the Story.
Click to expand...

Hasn't The Rest Of The Story as a feature been around since the '70s? If so, why couldn't they just run the originals over and over? I don't know how many were produced, but I'm sure no one has heard every single one over the years. Besides, it would serve as a nice remembrance since I can't imagine any interest in replaying the old newscasts like they do Casey Kasem's old American Top 40 countdowns.

I would listen to the old newscasts again, though, since his unique style was just as much an attraction as the news was. Who knows... that might even be a good idea for a syndicated feature... actual Paul Harvey news and comments from a particular date, say, 10, 20, or 30 years ago. Just think of the historical lessons, too.
 
I think that Gil Gross was one of the best fill ins for Paul Harvey and he did a great job on the tributes. But I get the impression that some news talk stations like WREC in Memphis have been itching to dump the program when Mr. Harvey died and fill it with time from other talk shows that they could make bigger bucks off of. Perhaps they would have done it regardless, but then I wonder if Paul Jr. had stayed on if they would have done the same thing. But then I also wonder if he really even wanted to do any of the programs and perhaps just wants to be in the production side of things. I hope that ABC radio didn't just dump him.
 
anotherguy said:
I think that Gil Gross was one of the best fill ins for Paul Harvey and he did a great job on the tributes. But I get the impression that some news talk stations like WREC in Memphis have been itching to dump the program when Mr. Harvey died and fill it with time from other talk shows that they could make bigger bucks off of. Perhaps they would have done it regardless, but then I wonder if Paul Jr. had stayed on if they would have done the same thing. But then I also wonder if he really even wanted to do any of the programs and perhaps just wants to be in the production side of things. I hope that ABC radio didn't just dump him.
Click to expand...

I agree with your theory that some stations were looking to drop the program.
 
I noticed that WASL 100.1/WTRO 1450 in Dyersburg, TN had dropped the Gross and Limerick programs and replaced it with The Huckabee Report. At first I thought that this was just local, but I had also heard that this may have been across the entire ABC network. In doing some further reading I found these reports:

http://ohiomedia.blogspot.com/2009/03/harvey-to-huckabee.html

http://ohiomedia.blogspot.com/2009/03/harvey-menu-fills-up.html

Apparently Gross and Limerick's programs were just temporary and ABC is offering different options now in place of Paul Harvey's program. This will probably push even more stations into not filling those times. Perhaps it's just as well, because there will never another Paul Harvey. Gross and Limerick might have come closer than anyone else, but it would still never be the same.
 
ABC is originating Huckabee on the network at exactly the same times as Paul Harvey. The change is that the midday report is five minutes instead of fifteen.

I understood that Jr had no intention of trying to step in for his father.

I would assume that PH Jr owns The Rest of the Story, since he wrote them and his father voiced them, and I would not be surprised to see them come back at some time.

When Paul passed away, ABC first indicated that the segments would end after the week of salutes and memories. They then changed their mind and had Gross and Limerick do features. They then announced that Huckabee would take over the slots.

A lot has changed since Paul Harvey entered the scene, and the day of the 15-minute feature is long gone, I'm afraid.

On the West Coast, stations don't run the features live; they're at the wrong time. Thus, by the time they do run, the news could be dated, so any feature must have a shelf life of at least 3 hours.
 
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