Somewhere around 1979-83 or 84 , 1300 AM in Trenton NJ made an ambitious attempt to challenge WHWH 1350am which was the most dominant station at the time, it tried to copy their format , which at the time was AC and News heavy. Prior to that WTNJ ran a soul/disco /jazz type format that was ok but not enough to sustain, Jeanne and Herb Greenberg owned the station at the time and I believe that it was based in Princeton and they also had a studio in Washington Crossing PA.
I think they called it imagination radio, with lots of thoughts and ideas of different types of radio programming. It had a news intensive morning show with Chris Canali as host, Rich Mates as news anchor, Rob Magaziner doing sports, and Sam Clover doing traffic , along with some music, and lots of features to entertain. The station also had Mindy Magid as midday jock and for a time she did the news as well.
Al Brooks also did time there and I think did mornings before Chris took over. Also Mike Mayo did play by play of high school sports and was a dj there too. Marv Bilk also hosted weekend big band shows.
The music was a mix of current at the time adult contemporary product(Kenny Rogers/ The Bee Gees/James Taylor/ Billy Joel/ to name a few) and oldies from a decade or 2 earlier and some Sinatra mixed in.
The station also had a sports talk show called sports action talk and other talk shows as well on weekend mornings.
Sundays was a holdover from the old urban format(gospel much of the day with other ethnic programming in later afternoons if my memory is correct with Ed Bannister hosting the gospel in the morning(Sunday Morning Inspiration). Ed Bannister was George Luther( of WBUD fame)s son.
All of this plus Mets baseball and high school football and other local type programming plus ABC INFORMATION NETWORK NEWS at the top of the hour was ambitous , but one of the problems that WIMG WTNJ had was that it was a DAYTIME ONLY station meaning it could only operate during the daylight hours and during winter months had to sign off at 4:30pm and couldnt sign on again until sunrise , meaning they would miss out on important drive home time during the winter months.
Later on around the end of 1981 WIMG received permission to broadcast around the clock but at very reduced power in order to protect clear channel stations, and one of the conditions of the full time license was to move its COL to Ewing and to this day 40 years later still adheres to this even though currently their studio is on South Broad Street in Hamilton not far from the Trenton border line. After that they added more programming including a jazz show on Wednesday or Friday nights and some old time radio programming as well.
The format while ambitious unfortunately did not translate well in the ratings probably due to its early on daytime limits and that hinderance was probably the reason why the station wasnt as successful as they could have been and just couldnt topple the dominant WHWH AM and eventually the Greenbergs cashed out and sold the station to religious broadcasters and is now gospel music 1300 WIMG AM.
It was a noble effort but WHWH had the money and promotion to market itself and WIMG didnt have that kind of support due to its daytime only hinderance and inability at first to have drive time shows during the winter due to early sunsets.
Anyone out there remember this rather noble effort by 1300 AM 40 years ago or worked there and have some memories to share and reflect on the station?
I think they called it imagination radio, with lots of thoughts and ideas of different types of radio programming. It had a news intensive morning show with Chris Canali as host, Rich Mates as news anchor, Rob Magaziner doing sports, and Sam Clover doing traffic , along with some music, and lots of features to entertain. The station also had Mindy Magid as midday jock and for a time she did the news as well.
Al Brooks also did time there and I think did mornings before Chris took over. Also Mike Mayo did play by play of high school sports and was a dj there too. Marv Bilk also hosted weekend big band shows.
The music was a mix of current at the time adult contemporary product(Kenny Rogers/ The Bee Gees/James Taylor/ Billy Joel/ to name a few) and oldies from a decade or 2 earlier and some Sinatra mixed in.
The station also had a sports talk show called sports action talk and other talk shows as well on weekend mornings.
Sundays was a holdover from the old urban format(gospel much of the day with other ethnic programming in later afternoons if my memory is correct with Ed Bannister hosting the gospel in the morning(Sunday Morning Inspiration). Ed Bannister was George Luther( of WBUD fame)s son.
All of this plus Mets baseball and high school football and other local type programming plus ABC INFORMATION NETWORK NEWS at the top of the hour was ambitous , but one of the problems that WIMG WTNJ had was that it was a DAYTIME ONLY station meaning it could only operate during the daylight hours and during winter months had to sign off at 4:30pm and couldnt sign on again until sunrise , meaning they would miss out on important drive home time during the winter months.
Later on around the end of 1981 WIMG received permission to broadcast around the clock but at very reduced power in order to protect clear channel stations, and one of the conditions of the full time license was to move its COL to Ewing and to this day 40 years later still adheres to this even though currently their studio is on South Broad Street in Hamilton not far from the Trenton border line. After that they added more programming including a jazz show on Wednesday or Friday nights and some old time radio programming as well.
The format while ambitious unfortunately did not translate well in the ratings probably due to its early on daytime limits and that hinderance was probably the reason why the station wasnt as successful as they could have been and just couldnt topple the dominant WHWH AM and eventually the Greenbergs cashed out and sold the station to religious broadcasters and is now gospel music 1300 WIMG AM.
It was a noble effort but WHWH had the money and promotion to market itself and WIMG didnt have that kind of support due to its daytime only hinderance and inability at first to have drive time shows during the winter due to early sunsets.
Anyone out there remember this rather noble effort by 1300 AM 40 years ago or worked there and have some memories to share and reflect on the station?
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