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Wikipedia

vchimpanzee said:
Those of you who really know the station should be adding what you know to my contribution. I just wrote what I remembered. I know I saw John Boy interviewed on TV--it must have been WBTV because that's what I watched then--and that's where he mentioned his faith and how it conflicted with some of his duties as a DJ.
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Yes it was WBTV, I remember seeing that segment as well, and I thought it was real.

However one year later, almost to the day, he showed up, with Billy in tow over at the Fox, andhas been there ever since.

My guess has always been that WRFX paid him to sit out for a year until his non compete contract ran out.
 
I believe it was MetroPlex that owned the station (FOX) at the time. Norm Wain and Bob Weiss. They later sold to Clear Channel (long before CC became the mega company). I recall JB & B did some promotions with bags over their heads - and billboards that use the little girl from 2001 A Space Oddesy saying "they're back"!
 
JB&B went down to one of the rockers in Florida, Tampa I think, and just totally had their hats handed to them within a couple of books.
 
I recall JB & B did some promotions with bags over their heads - and billboards that use the little girl from 2001 A Space Oddesy saying "they're back"!

I remember those, but it was Poltergeist, not 2001.

Was John Boy really leave WBCY for religious reasons back then? Some of the content in the earlier JB&B days was rather over the top sometimes. Not Stern per se, but rather racy.
 
John Boy got saved in 1983 but remained at WBCY and (as I recall) he and Billy toned down the edge slightly.

It wasn't until late 1985 or early 1986 that John Boy abruptly quit WBCY. Management searched to find someone to work with Billy. The result of that was the ill-fated "Catfish and Billy for Breakfast" experiment. When Catfish and Billy didn't work out, Billy was fired because management felt they had done all they could do to work with him.

April of 1986 was when Z-100 changed formats and became the Fox. As I recall, David Stone did mornings some of the time until September when John-Boy and Billy debuted on the Fox. The rest....as they say.......
 
Bill Martin was the PD who ran off first John Boy then Billy . I had the feeling he didn't like the power they had at WBCY, I don't remember but I think it was a comment he made to me one day. I wonder where HE ended up?
 
nerleman said:
April of 1986 was when Z-100 changed formats and became the Fox. As I recall, David Stone did mornings some of the time until September when John-Boy and Billy debuted on the Fox. The rest....as they say.......
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It was Jefferson Stone who did mornings on The Fox when Metroplex bought it and changed it from Z-100 to WRFX, Gina Lee Harris did news with Jefferson at that time, and I pulled the music and did the laughs in the background. When JB&B came on board with us, Jefferson went to an FM in Gastonia and did a Jazz show. That FM is now one of the big stations in Charlotte, I forgot which one, it was right off of highway 321 South though, we used to use their ABC News feed on WSGE at Gaston College, it was an agreement and we had to play PSA's over the ABC Network spots, I'll never forget, our PSA's at the College ran a second short, and when they ended with "... FROM THE AD COUNCIL AND THIS STATION", the network feed would get potted up and we would always follow the PSA out cue with the network's "...USE ONLY AS DIRECTED"!!!! It was funny at the time. Guess you had to be there.
Kahuna
 
Yes, Kahuna. You're correct. I remembered the last name Stone, but got the first names mixed up.

So you probably remember Bill Young's brief stint at the Fox (as Michael Van Zant). I worked with Bill as a part-timer at WXRC when he was doing afternoon drive there. I remember the very last jock meeting he attended before leaving to go to the Fox. Someone asked him if he was going to meet JB & B and he replied "NO, that's not a requirement in my contract."
 
nerleman said:
April of 1986 was when Z-100 changed formats and became the Fox. As I recall, David Stone did mornings some of the time until September when John-Boy and Billy debuted on the Fox. The rest....as they say.......
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I'd better correct that. I was thinking they started sooner than that. I know I listened that first morning.
 
You may be right. I thought it was April, but it may have been earlier. I do remember that Chris Corley (spelling?) was the first live jock on the new Fox format and the first song they played after the launch was "Satisfaction" by the Stones. I don't remember all the songs they played in the first hour, but I do recall that out of the :20 stopset he gave the weather and then played "Get Back" by the Beatles. Out of the :35 stopset he played "Money For Nothing".

This was during the time when playing music directly from CD was a big thing and all stations who did it promoted it heavily. We sure did at XRC. However, while most of the other stations were simply referring to them as "compact discs" or "CDs", all the Fox jocks were still saying "here's a cut from Elton John on compact LASER disc". Some may disagree with me, but I thought that sounded a bit cheesy.

However, I really liked the way the Fox launched the new format. At the top of the hour (was it noon? I don't recall), a Terry Setzer liner said "WJZR Kannapolis-Charlotte. At this time Z100 leaves the air and in 15 seconds, a brand new radio station will occupy this frequency. Thanks for the past 2 and 1/2 years. Now...stand by for a rocket ride into the future!" After about 10 seconds of silence, we heard what sounded like the last 30 seconds of a NASA countdown. As the countdown progressed, the intro of "Sympathy For The Devil" by the Stones came up under the countdown narrative. I don't know who did the voice production on this format launch, but he began like this....

"The Beatles...CCR...The Stones...Dire Straits...The Who...Led Zeppelin...So you thought great album rock radio was a thing of the past?...
"The Rolling Stones...A to Z" (montage of Stones tunes)
"The Beatles...A to Z" (montage of Beatles tunes)
"Led Zeppelin...A to Z" (montage of LZ tunes)
"Bruce Springsteen...A to Z" (montage of Boss tunes)
"...a better variety of rock and roll...old and new! The hunt is over! You've found Charlotte's New Fox." (Sound effect) "THE FOX! 99.7 WRFX Kannapolis-Charlotte. Only The Finest Rock And Roll"

Then the music format was launched in earnest with The Stones "Satisfaction." Kahuna will certainly have a lot more to add. I remember that Z100 was operating jockless for the last several days up the format change and had been dropping a liner every five songs stating that something new was coming soon to Charlotte radio. Like many of my friends and co-workers, I was listening at home and recording the Fox format launch on cassette. I wish I still had the tape. Lots of memories!
 
Matt Smith said:
I have added some information to the Wikipedia entries for Charlotte stations WGFY-1480 and WGIV-1370/1600. Take a look and let me know if I'm in error on any of the information.

I also added some things for WAVS-1170 in Miami FL, and an entry under "The Whammy in Miami" that may be interesting to some.

http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/WGFY
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/WGIV
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/WAVS
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Whammy_in_Miami

Later....
Matt Smith
WGSR-TV
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Wow, that looks good. There's no way I'd know if any of it was wrong. Some of those details I had forgotten but I did know a lot of them once.

I have a book about Charlotte from when we were thinking of putting my grandmother in an old age home there, and that's where some of my knowledge comes from.
 
I wasn't aware of all that detail on the Jimmy Swaggart situation on 1480.

The Observer has never written about WGIV 1370 AM. Which reminds me: they will expect sources for all of this information. The written rules aren't followed that closely, but if you can find an actual published source, be sure and use it.
 
I wasn't aware of all that detail on the Jimmy Swaggart situation on 1480.
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I was their program director 1980-81. We went through three General Managers in a year, and the fourth one made it his calling to see me resign my position...which I did and went to work the next week for WLVV for significantly more money.

One of these days, I'll do the story of my days with Metrolina Communications Corporation, a/k/a WLVV/WDRV.

Later....
Matt Smith
WGSR-TV
Click to expand...
 
Nerleman and all;
Yes, I have a tidbit to add about the Z-100/Fox flip, I have the master tape with the WRFX sign on with the NASA countdown, it is a four-track master, I'll get it mixed down and into MP3 format soon and put it on my site. Bob Chrysler produced it and did the original two-track mix-down that was heard on the air. I also have the aircheck of the Z-100 sign off with Terry Setzer, I'll get that converted too, I'm glad I keep everything!
I think I have some unscoped airchecks of the last days when Z-100 was jockless (It was I who stood there and reloaded those same 5 songs on cart over and over again, 16 hours straight!), I'll see if I can dig that up.

Kahuna
www.thatwasradio.com
 
Changing the subject for a minute, I've been reading the histories of Charlotte TV stations on Wikipedia. I was particularly interested in WAYS-TV/36, the predecessor of today's WCCB-TV/18. Wiki says channel 36 came on in 1953 as WQMC-TV, a NBC affil, then was changed to WAYS-TV about a year later. I'll go along with that, but I don't believe some of the additional info. Wiki says 36 remained on the air until 1959, changing its calls to WUTV at some point. Wiki says 36 lost the NBC affil in 1957, when WSOC-TV came on, then went with ABC until 59. I am old enough to remember Charlotte TV in the 50s, and I remember that most of my relatives there had UHF tuners built into their TV sets, but I never remember them watching 36, in fact they all had some kind of outside antenna to watch out of town stations such as WIS and WLOS. Despite all the handicaps of UHF at the time, I believe 36 could have survived as a second TV station in Charlotte, IF it had been able to stay on the air for any extended period of time. I believe 36 was off the air for almost all of this time. I bet the pre-Kaplan owners of WAYS were an applicant for channel 9 and kept the 36 license alive thinking that would help them. After WSOC got 9, they sold what was left of the license, and facilities, to another party who held it until Bahakel finally got it back on the air as WCCB in 1964. Does anyone know the true story? I'd like to see that tidbit of Charlotte broadcast history preserved. I bet someone in the Bahakel organization knows the full story....
 
Let me know if you find anything on the old Channel 36 in Charlotte. It's my understanding that's what the taller tower was used for out on Radio Road. It held the UHF TV antenna many years ago, then later WROQ. I have also heard that Bahackel bought the first 36 and moved it down to 18.

It's not unlikely that 36 got pushed off the air by Channel 9. The same exact thing happened in Buffalo with Channel 17 which was an NBC O&O (a failed exparament for NBC). There was also a WFTL-TV in Fort Lauderdale (UHF 23) which I have been trying to get information on. Same thing there, as soon as Channel 7 went on in Miami it was the end of WFTL-TV. The UHF stations back then were not running as much power as they do today. Plus there were allot of TV's sold without UHF tuners before the FCC made it a requirement.

Good luck, sources for this kind of information seem to be hard to find. You might try looking through the newspapers on microfiche at the downtown library.
 
I've never heard of Channel 36 being on the air before it was WCTU.

This 1967 book on Charlotte I have (which they may still have at the library there) said it came on the air in 1967. I could check that tonight if I remember.
 
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