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The day the music died I

R

RBRadioWaves

30 years ago today, WABC-AM flipped from what I consider Hot AC to TalkRadio. All of the DJS left and wound up on CBS-FM. Harry Harrison and Ron Lundy were at the helm when the station went down at 12 noon, May 10th, 1982. Lennon had the last song on WABC.... ("Imagine"). Then after "Chime Time" and after the first jingle, WABC began talking and never looked back.

RIP MusicRadio 77 WABC!

I call this "Day the Music Died I" because of what happened in 2005 with CBS-FM (or, otherwise, WYNY in 96 or WNEW in 99).
 
Excellent post to begin with. Just a reminder that this weekend, the "DJ Hall of Fame" will focus on the last day of WABC when it was heard 30 years ago this week. I'll look forward to this when it comes on Rewound Radio. I didn't listen to WABC since I was three years old before the station flipped to talk, I was in a nursery school on Strong Pl. in Brooklyn. That was a week and a half before my parents moved to Puerto Rico at the time which is down south.
 
MsMusicRadio said:
Was WNNNNBC still a music station?
Click to expand...

Yep! WNBC was still Top 40 on AM, when WABC flipped to talk, many listeners goes to WNBC to get their music fix, but it might stick around until a year later in July, WPLJ went to Top 40 after the "New York's Best Rock" era was over, and finally a month later in August 1983, WHTZ's "Z100" came on the air, and it was a very successful Top 40 station and it has putting the station on top. Scott Shannon, Russ Britian, Mr. Leonard and rest of the gang had a successful morning show called the "Z Morning Zoo", the longest running morning show in radio. That has been filling the void a year after WABC went to talk.
 
You need to go to musicradio77.com and listen to the day the music died. You will notice it was NOT Harry Harrison. It was Big Dan with Ron Lundy.
 
<<<30 years ago today, WABC-AM flipped from what I consider Hot AC to TalkRadio. All of the DJS left and wound up on CBS-FM. Harry Harrison and Ron Lundy were at the helm when the station went down at 12 noon, May 10th, 1982>>

Since I was hosting AM Drive and in the room at the time, here are a couple corrections:
It was Ron and Dan Ingram who did the last couple hours of MusicRadio. Harry was already doing AM's at CBS. While Ron was quickly added, Dan didn't CBS for a few more years.

Ross and Wilson continued doing AM Drive in a modified Talk/AC format (we could play 2-4 songs/hr) until Sept 82 when Ross was fired. No music was played during AM Drive (or any other daypart) after Labor Day 1982.

Brian Wilson
 
Prior to WABC's flip to a talk format, I have four of the airchecks during the winding days of WABC as a music station. I have one from Ron Lundy and three from Dan Ingram. I recorded them off of Rewound Radio a while back when it was part of the "DJ Hall of Fame" show. You can hear Dr. Sniffen's intro before playing it. These are from 4/26/82, 4/27/82, 4/29/82 and 4/30/82. It also has extended newscast with John Mather, Rick James and Palmer Paine, as well as Gordon Williams doing the business news, a national news from ABC and Joe Noland doing the traffic reports. Joe Noland who is now doing traffic on WABC-TV (channel 7) as part of "Eyewitness News This Morning". You can hear traffic reports such as the Prospect Expressway near the Gowanus where they had a jack knife tractor trailer causes heavy delays or something like that. Here are four of the airchecks from the winding days of WABC from April 1982, this took place a month leading to the flip to talk about a week and a half later. Here it is!

http://www.mediafire.com/?v6znllm21ar4gb8
http://www.mediafire.com/?srfs106g5ov3mu0
http://www.mediafire.com/?pv3hipl9c856yk9
http://www.mediafire.com/?3na699vwiprnoru
 
A big day it is, listening to that final show on wabc as a music station, still gives me chills... a sad day, but a day we can look back on and be proud of what wabc accomplished as a music station.
 
Ron Lundy lived in Holly Springs and passed away like 2 years ago i think.
 
According to Wikipedia:

Ron Lundy retires from WCBS-FM in 1977.

Lundy died of a heart attack at age 75 on March 15, 2010 in Oxford, Mississippi. He had recently been recovering from a previous heart attack after being dehydrated.
 
jvn said:
According to Wikipedia:

Ron Lundy retires from WCBS-FM in 1977.

Lundy died of a heart attack at age 75 on March 15, 2010 in Oxford, Mississippi. He had recently been recovering from a previous heart attack after being dehydrated.
Click to expand...

It should read 1997, not 1977.
 
I had the pleasure of meeting Ron Lundy :) I always enjoyed him on the radio, and glad I got to know him!! Wonderful Guy and very well missed!!! :(
 
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