WEDO Radio

[PHIL Z]

WEDO is for sale [1.75 million] If it is sold to a Religious Broadcaster, Many Local Shows wil will be looking for a new home.
A big break for WKFB / WKHB ,Those unfilled taped music hours will bring in a profit for MR. Stevens. Now if he would Rework WKHB's Nighttime Power CP, He can sell from 6AM to 12 Midnight. Good Luck Bob.

 

[FreddyE1977]

it will be interesting to see what sort of price it will fetch. My guess is something around half that.

 

[Parttimer]

Most of the shows on WEDO are already religious, as far as I know.

 

[petey99]

Don't get me wrong, I want to see the underdog be successful. But, I think it might be best if the signal just goes dark. Its not a strong signal. Unless your a 50KW blowtorch (KDKA) or have a national network on (WEAE), then AM in a major market is practically a waste of precious electricity.

AM stations can continue to serve localized, smaller well. WBUT/WISR, WKZV and WMBS are fine examples of this. They serve their smaller cities the best way they can with the resources and money they have. If only WEDO could serve its actual C.O.L. McKeesport and the nearby upper Mon Valley...

 

[Parttimer]

It can make a little money doing the same things as 620/770.... (hey maybe the Frankie Day oldies show, sponsored by Frankie Day and his sponsors, will want to expand their reach...).

 

[Pratte4Life]

Religious shows tend to have this stigma. I think of a small, southern AM with preachers buying up Sunday half-hours for $37 and doing a hellfire sermon on the evils of birth control pills of that they were going to avoid sin by "staying out of whales' bellies!"

Does one really need to be religious to stay out of whale's bellies? I've met thousands of people during my life and NOT ONE OF THEM has been swallowed by a whale.

Of course, I don't know a whole lot of people named "Jonah," either. But I digress.

What I have heard on WEDO, and I can't speak of every show, but I am familiar with a show a friend of mine does entitled "The Jewish Experience."

http://www.jewishexperienceradio.com/

This show has good content. I'm more into AC/DC than Jewish music, but this show is run well with a mixture of music, news and commentary with engaging personalities.

Temples often have a lot of money. It wouldn't surprise me to see this station sold.

But $1.75 million seems like an awful lot.

 

[Parttimer]

Probably. I mean, if you check out some broker websites you can see that you could get an FM in Tallahasse for $2.5 mil.

And then again there is also a "2 AM combo in a (Northeast) Top 25 market, serves 4 million people, great cash flow, call for details"..... $5million. I obviously can't prove it but I think the listing is 620/770. And this broker has has that same listing for at least 6 years now (and the price keeps going up).

 

[OldSchoolWoman]

WEDO HAD NO PURPOSE IN 1958 AND IT'S STILL THE SAME IN 2008. THERE WAS CREATIVE PROGRAMMING ON AM DAYTIMERS LIKE PITTSBURGH'S FIRST JAZZ SHOW ON WKPA, DOO-WOP ON WAMO, CLASSICAL ON WLOA,FRANKIE CROCKER ON WZUM, AND EARLY TOP 40 ON WEEP. I CAN'T REMEMBER ANYTHING ON WEDO. :

 

[cingram]

I'm sure someone more familiar with WEDO will be along any moment, but until then:

In its heyday, WEDO made pretty good money and supported about a dozen full-time employees. It was also the CBS radio affiliate for Pittsburgh. That's right: if you wanted to hear CBS news and "Arthur Godfrey Time," WEDO carried it until long after anyone wanted to hear Arthur Godfrey.

I find myself listening to WEDO from time to time. Big Ray Edwards and his oldies show landed over there a few years ago, and they have been running old Garry Moore radio shows on Thursday evenings.

The entire program schedule is on display at http://www.wedo810.com.

I think $1.75M is way too high.

C.

 

[kenhawk1160]

Is Judy Barron still alive? I know she's been retired and living in Florida for quite some time, but she had no interest in selling that station, unless now she's changed her mind.

I think WEDO can do even better than it's doing now if it had nighttime power. Naturally, that can't happen on its current dial position. It might have a chance if it does what Sima Birach (lessor of AM 540 in Canonsburg) does with his AM property (WNZK) in Westland, Michigan. It operates at 690 during the day, and 680 at night, and is the only station in North America to do it.

But WEDO, regardless of what the critics might say, is a very profitable enterprise. They operate with a very low overhead and John James has always been good at pacing airtime increases properly without it coming as too much of a shock to the program hosts. Plus, it's got a signal that's just insane, even for a 1,000 watt clear channel station. Do I think it's worth $1.7 million? No.

To those of you who say it "had no purpose" then and now, I say this...it has a lot more purpose doing what it's doing than some other stations in this market who turn a deaf ear to the needs of the community by marketing themselves as Pittsburgh stations or by turning other stations into simulcast repeaters or shutting them down entirely.

I would really like to see Sima buy this station. He's got the money and the moxie to pull it off, and he believes in AM radio. It would look really good in his portfolio. One thing is for sure...he's definitely not going to pay $1.7 million for it.

 

[OldSchoolWoman]

My apologies . I just don't ever remember WEDO for anything. Guess I preferred Phil Brooks and jazz and Porky to Arthur Godfrey. But then I have a terminal case of 60's "coolness"

 

[NoTimeForSleep]

1.7Million is a pipe dream for a 1KW daytimer licensed to a distressed community. If anyone buys it look for it to go for around 200-300,000 and nothing more. Look at all the recent buys and that is all they are getting.

 

[Parttimer]

I didn't even know this station existed until the 80's. Were they just brokered all the way back to that time?

 

[AM McKeesport]

Back when McKeesport was the second largest city in Western Pennsylvania, with a population of 55,000, it had two radio stations that served it: WEDO and WMCK. Both started in 1946-47 - both were located downtown. There were enough businesses in the McKeesport area to provide clients for both stations, and the both covered McKeesport news, sports, and community events. Some of the WEDO alumni include Al McDowell, Adam Lynch, Bob Kopler, Cathy Milton, Stu Emery, and Guy Junker. When the mills began to close, and G.C. Murphy's head office moved, the city began it's decline in the early 80's. AFTRA was bought out, and the station began to incorporate the brokered programming. Some of those clients have been with the station for close to 25 years. As everyone has stated, it sure isn't worth 1.75 million, but with it's client base and large amount of property at its transmitter site, it's worth more than the 2-300,000 that someone speculated.

And in case you didn't know, WMCK became WIXZ, and then WPTT.

 

[Boss Radio]

There was a time around the late '70s that they were doing an oldies format. A lot of it was off satellite, but Tom Lyons landed there after he was cut loose by WTAE and was the PD. They had a sports talk show with Nellie King for a while and a very young Guy Junker was his producer and the station's news voice.

 

[Pratte4Life]

AM- I know McKeesport was far larger population wise that it is now, but second largest city in Western PA?

What about Erie? It was twice as large as 55,000! And it's more than 100,000 today!

But that's nitpicking. What you have done is show how McKeesport thought of themselves as an independent metro area during that time.

Here's a great example. During the time frame you mention, either WEDO or WMCK (I forget which one) was an affiliate of the Brooklyn Dodgers.

And according to Curt Smith in "Voices of the Game," these broadcasts were actually more popular than the Pirates games were on KDKA or WWSW.

Of course, the Dodgers moved to Los Angeles in 1958. So what a previous poster said about WEDO's relevancy might still be considered accurate . . .

 

[Parttimer]

It makes sense that it was a viable station. McKeesport was the hub of the Mon valley, and if you look at how a few facilities are engineered, it was clear that coverage of the Mon valley was a high priority back in the days when they went on the air. 970's signal is aimed from the north hills right down the Mon to Uniontown (they can't really be picked up as near as Cranberry to the north). Channel 4's tower is down in Forward Township, and covers the lower Mon valley better than it does the city (you'd never know that with cable, but it's the one HDTV signal in the market that most people can't receive over the air). 1250's site also favors the south.

It will be interesting to see what becomes of it.

 

[cingram]

Back when McKeesport was the second largest city in Western Pennsylvania, with a population of 55,000, it had two radio stations that served it: WEDO and WMCK.

And for several years, there was WMCK-FM on 104.9, which evidently was never anything but a simulcast of 1360. They turned in the license in the 1950's, which eventually made possible the allocation of 104.7 to the north.

C.

 

[AM McKeesport]

AM- I know McKeesport was far larger population wise that it is now, but second largest city in Western PA?

What about Erie? It was twice as large as 55,000! And it's more than 100,000 today!


I should have made it clear that I was referring to Southwestern Pa. It was bigger than Butler, Washington, Uniontown, Latrobe, and other towns
that have their own stations.

 

[Whiplash]

During the 70's, or maybe it was the 80's the battle between WEDO and WIXZ was pretty good. John Longo beat Tony Renda in the
battle of McKeesport. Mr. Renda admitted so much! But I agree with the rest of the posters. Its not worth that price tag.