WTAE Classical Music Ratings ?

[Steve Green NEPA]

On another R-D forum -- the DX and reception one -- the topic of 1250 turned up. And I'd posted about one Auroral night when WTAE was blanked out, and WTMA Charlseton SC and their top 40 stuff was coming in on the car radio, in Queens NYC.

Considering that WTAE had a pretty huge nighttime signal -- they were usually atop the channel by us -- it got me to wondering just how well they did in the ratings, circa the mid-60's.

Darned if I know why I ask this. But perhaps someone here would be able to, at worst, guestimate how they did. Remember now, FM and its music fidelity hadn't permeated, let alone monopolized, the available radio audience yet.

Now, I'm not a classical music fan in the slightest, although I guess my favorite would be Mozart. Depends on my mood.
I also like Three Dog Night, the Chiffons and the Screaming Trees, lol.
But since the huge 50,000 watt classical WQXR 1560's were the closest towers to my DXing house .... and since there didn't seem to be any holes in their shoes for decades : Well, that 1250 DX thread got me to thinking about how big a station WTAE was.

(Please try to stay awake when I'm typing, okay? )

 

[FreddyE1977]

To my recollection WTAE never had a classical music format. For a time they did have a Beautiful Music format under the call letters WRYT. Is that perhaps what you were thinking of?

WWCS in Canonsburg did have a classical format in the late 1980's. With the low dial position that signal got out quite a way. I remember being able to tune it in, even at night, well along my drives to Michigan.

In their Top 40 heyday under Captain Showbiz they generally finished #2 to KDKA in the ratings. The signal did get out quite aways. I remember it booming through one night in the Norfolk, Virginia area.

 

[Steve Green NEPA]

Doubtless you're right, FreddyE, about the Beautiful Music . It still seemed as though every other time I'd tune in 1250 to DX, WTAE was playing a promo that opened with some Mussorgsky riff; hence, my miscalculation. Perhaps they ran some specialty classical show at times.

(I'm sure Mussorgsky would enjoy hearing some of his music being referred to as 'riff's,

At one time in the Sixties, NYC had about a half-dozen B/M stations on the dials. Two of them were on AM as full-timers -- WVNJ 620 and WPAT 930. WV-Enjoy and WPAT also had big-signalled FM stations, competing against equally big-signalled WTFM and WRFM.

>> 'In their Top 40 heyday under Captain Showbiz they generally finished #2 to KDKA in the ratings. The signal did get out quite a ways. I remember it booming through one night in the Norfolk, Virginia area.' <<
If you're speaking about WTAE, yessir -- small world. I caught WTAE in Norfolk myself once, DXing as a kid while on vacation with the family. The cousins down there had the exact same Zenith console radio that my Folks had.

Thanks for the memories and the info, Freddy E !