REEL TOP 40 RADIO REPOSITORY
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Even though he was born 15 years earlier, Lexington, Kentucky native John Quincy (a.k.a. Ted Tatman) didn't really discover Top 40 radio until he smuggled in a transistor radio to his church camp outside of Louisville in the summer of 1970. After a few hours of listening to the legendary WAKY in his dorm room, he caught the radio fever. Upon his return to Lexington and a visit to local AM-ers WVLK and WLAP to find out how radio stations really performed that on-air magic, he was hooked. Luckily, an English teacher at his high school told him about a Junior Achievement program being sponsored by WVLK-AM. Every Wednesday night, WVLK would turn over a half hour of their programming to high school kids, who would sell, operate, and program it. Quincy made sure he was one of the ones chosen to be one of the teen DJs. Between his junior and senior year Quincy scored a summer job working seven days a week at WBGR AM & FM in Paris, Kentucky. Most of the time was spent running Cincinnati Reds baseball games but for a little while each shift he got to play DJ. It was country music (which was especially bad in the early 70s) but it was radio. From that point, Quincy never looked back.
There were stints in other Lexington area radio stations (WEKY, WAXU, WCBR, WKDJ, and WBLG) before Quincy got the call in 1979 to escape
Lexington's awful winters and work in sunny Savannah, Georgia (WKBX and WZAT). Then in 1981, Quincy moved up the coast to Charleston, SC to
take on PM drive duties at WSSX. Later Charleston gigs included AC WXTC (where he spent nearly 10 years as PD), All 70s WJUK, Country
WBUB, and Oldies WXLY. Subscribers to Today Quincy is the assistant program director and afternoon host at AC WSUY-FM in Charleston. Along with his radio work, he creates and maintains Web pages plus does regular mobile DJ gigs. The Repository thanks John Quincy for sharing! |
[Descriptions by John Quincy, unless otherwise indicated]
TOP STREAM 32Kbps (14Khz)
Marc Avery, Clark Reid WJBK Detroit August 1963 (28:33)
. . . M.A. in the A.M. . . . Marc Avery was M.A. in the A.M. on WJBK between 1961 and 1965. Contributor John Quincy says this aircheck comes from the personal collection of the late Herb Oscar Kent of Lexington, KY. Most of Mr. Kent's airchecks were from FM simulcasts, as is this recording. For 1963, the fidelity is exceptional. This exhibit seems to include three days in August, 1963. Thursday, August 15, Friday August 16, and Monday August 19. One set from midday mainstay Clark Reid on 8/16 appears around 13:35, before we jump (without any warning) to the following Monday and Avery's show from 8/19. And even though it's loosely 'scoped, there's a nice selection of classic commercials, jingles, and pieces of popular music. Altogether, a terrific sample of 1963 Motor City radio. |
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TOP STREAM 32 Kbps (8.5Khz)
Buddy Carr, KAAY Little Rock AR, October 1963 (14:37)
. . . At street level, I have 82 degrees . . . [Description by Uncle Ricky, contributed by John Quincy]
There's one incompletely 'scoped song we have to report, but otherwise, this 'scoped exhibit includes some fabulous commercial jingles, and it sounds really nice, despite the infrequent atmospheric crackles and squelched whistle. It has some excellent samples of what made KAAY in Little Rock, Arkansas, a remarkable and memorable Top 40 radio station in the golden age of appropriately regulated radio. It's the 5PM hour, and
Contributor John Quincy says this aircheck is from the personal collection of the late Lexington, KY. broadcaster How about that nearly mystical "bumper" jingle under and after the hits? Really works here, best use of this technique I've heard. And who remembers those record offers for albums featuring soundalike performers? Tonight is Halloween, the Great Pumpkin is out and there's an invite to the KAAY Holiday Haunted House. |
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TOP STREAM 32 Kbps (10Khz)
Big Hugh Baby Jarrett, WPLO Atlanta, December 1963 (19:10)
. . . puttin' some words on ya, and talkin' that trash . . . [Description by Uncle Ricky, contributed by John Quincy]
Contributor John Quincy says this aircheck is from the personal collection of the late Lexington, KY. broadcaster
In this rare FM simulcast recording, you'll hear Jarrett literally yelling into the microphone, and then jump between his music show and the news. His original presentation of the latest R&B and rock 'n' roll music was irrestible for a generation of Georgia teens and young adults. This was the coolest radio in Atlanta. Big Hugh Baby was The Man. Hugh Jarrett passed away on May 31, 2008. He had been hospitalized for two months after being critically injured in an auto accident. |
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TOP STREAM 20.7Kbps (10Khz)
Larry Lujack, Tom Murphy, WCFL Narration, 1973 (8:05)
. . . This is really a rather dull film, isn't it? . . . Larry Lujack and "World Famous" Tom Murphy narrate a WCFL film prepared for the Bob Hamilton Report Convention. It's likely this was in 1972; Murphy left KRLA in 1971. Wouldn't it be great to find a copy of the film? Even though it's just the audio track, it's still fun to imagine what these guys were looking at. This rarity is courtesy of Tom Konard's Aircheck Factory. |
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TOP STREAM 20.7Kbps (10Khz)
Larry Lujack Birthday Klunk, WCFL, June 1973 (5:24)
. . . Since it's my birthday, I can do anything I want . . . This begins as Larry Lujack's Klunk Letter of the Day on WCFL, June 6, 1973 (Lar's birthday). It's courtesy of Tom Konard. This might have been on a Programmer's Digest LP, but it never sounded as good as this. |
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TOP STREAM 20.7Kbps (10Khz)
Jim Channell (Captain Whammo) WMET 1977 (6:49)
. . . Whammo! . . . Here's Captain Whammo (Jim Channell), smokin' on WMET (FM) in Chicago, 1977. I was introduced to the good Captain by Dave Kohl, sports director at WBLG in Lexington, KY when I worked there in the late 70's. Dave worked at WMET when it was WDHF and Captain Whammo sent him this aircheck, and I got a dub. I later got a chance to go up to WMET's studios and watch Whammo work. It was the dead of winter in Chicago, but he was on the air barefoot in a t-shirt and Bermuda shorts sweatin' his butt off. I remember being especially impressed with their phone system where the jock talked into the microphone, but the caller was heard out of a speaker. Pretty much the norm today, but where I worked at the time it was radical technology. |
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TOP STREAM 32 Kbps (14Khz)
WLS Chicago Composite, 1978 (27:07)
. . . this is not an actual radio program . . . I worked with Tad Griffin at WSSX in Charleston in the early '80s. Tad requested a WLS aircheck from John Gehron in the late '70s. John sent him this composite. Tad gave the original reel to me in early 2005. Included: Larry Lujack, Jeffrey Hendrix, Kathy McFarland, Tommy Edwards, Bob Sirott, John Records Landecker, Jeff Davis, and Yvonne Daniels.
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TOP STREAM 20.7Kbps (10Khz)
WAKY, Louisville, KY., 21st Birthday Vignettes (11:04)
. . . after an intensive survey, I concluded that Louisville had more piano bars than happy marriages . . . I heard these on the air in what was probably 1978 or 1979 — they must have run them every hour. I called up their production director, Bill Purdom, and asked if he'd send me some. (I had worked with Bill at WEKY in Richmond, Kentucky in late 1972.) Bill did the "narration" as he played the carts onto the reel for me.
Featured: Gary Burbank,
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TOP STREAM 20.7Kbps (10Khz)
WSGA Savannah GA. Composite, 1979 (8:55)
. . . Everyone out of the way, there's a lobster on the loose . . . This WSGA (Savannah, Georgia) composite from 1979 features morning guy Chris O'Brien, who was doing mornings at WKRQ/Q102 in Cincinnati before coming to Savannah to be with his ailing father. He later went back to Q102. Quite a catch for WSGA. The rest of the staff ain't bad either: David Blair, Jim Lewis, Jerry Rogers, Chuck Cannon, Dennis Reid and Dave Miller. |
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TOP STREAM 32Kbps (14Khz)
WTMA Charleston, S.C. Composite, 1969-1979 (28:21)
. . . In fact, South Carolina's Number One Station . . . [Description by Producer John Burwell]
The 1969 introduction was voiced by PD John Trenton as a sales pitch to Eastman Radio, a national sales rep. My favorite line is when he speaks of five resident newsmen and one full-time news specialist. The "five resident newsmen" were actually the jocks!
Featured: Booby Nash, from January 1969. This aircheck was recorded on tape
supplied by the U.S. Navy. They would get us to record whole days of shows, and then they would play them on Charleston-based ships while the ships were out to sea, as a little reminder of home.
John Trenton was Program Director in 1972 when he was taken off the air and made
General Manager. You also hear "Big Boob" substituting for John Trenton, and newsmen
After that, Crazy Bob McLain, Tim St. George and a compilation of the on-air staff in 1979: Magic Mark, Ted Bell, Jack Lundy, JB, and Rick Tracy. Booby Nash was rehired as PD in 1979. As you can hear, his comedic wit in '79 was just as good as it was in ‘69.
"WTMA - always striving to be better!" That is the way that it was. |
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TOP STREAM 44.1Kbps (20Khz)
WAKY Louisville Remembered, 2003 (01:02:30)
. . . W-A-K-Y, or "wacky", as it was called, was just downright exciting . . .
Airchecks are included from Producer Quincy says, "A few of the airchecks came from the same sources as some of the WAKY airchecks on REELRADIO. What I did was contact the contributors and asked them for a copy. So, there's a little duplication, but the vast majority of the material hasn't appeared on REELRADIO." In addition, John's tribute features lots of authentic WAKY jingles, and Randolph's stories are typical of the realities of the "Glory Days" of medium-market Top 40, all over America. There's even an explanation of the audio processing. This is a very high-fidelity presentation and we are very proud to present this original production at REELRADIO. Our thanks again to John Quincy. |
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John Quincy on WEKY, Richmond KY, 1972 (Age 17)
This tape was originally put together for a WTMA New Years Eve staff party on
January 31, 1979. It was collected from bits and pieces of air checks lying
around the program director's office. Some of the quality is horrendous on
a few of the segments, due to the rather primitive machines we often used to
tape the air-checks.
At 20:30, you'll hear actual on-air profanity. (We didn't use a tape delay.) The idea of the
contest was to guess the name of a song. The "computer" – the Mighty TMA
Music Machine — would reveal more lyrics each time we didn't get a winner.
There were three carts involved in the contest – 1) the main cart with the
song words, 2) a "Does not compute" cart for incorrect guesses, and 3) a
"Correct! -You are a winner!" cart. Don't ask me how I did it, but in spite
of what happened, I was still able to punch the "Does Not Compute" cart,
and go on with the show like nothing happened. By the way, there is no
"Green Street" in Mt. Pleasant.
This tribute to Louisville's WAKY was written, produced and is narrated by contributor