Progressive Rock 24/7

While sister station WRFD was being Ohio's Country Giant, FM radio station WNCI was making moves of it's own.

By spring of 1969, the station was already moving the music toward a more hard edged sound with Bob North and Charlie Pickard handling mornings and afternoons and E. Karl hosting the Incredible Progressive Rock Circus in the evenings.

This ad appeared in the August, 1970 Columbus Dispatch announcing the station starting around the clock progressive rock. An ad in June announced the station would soon be going 24/7. DJs were Bob North, John L (Lazar), Charlie Pickard, E Karl, Dave Anthony and overnights with Gregg Campbell.

Of interest, although still located at the WRFD broadcast house, the station had just flipped on the stereo switch.

Announcing Ohio's County Giant

Ad from newspaper announcing the Monday morning debut of country music on WRFD in January 1970.

As I understand it, the balance of the line up was Jack Bartley in middays and Bill Preston hosting afternoons.

I was told by a now deceased staff member George left after a personal issue and was replaced by Len Anthony.

Diane Townsley

A photo from a January, 1970 edition of the old "Columbus Citizen-Journal" of WBBY radio host Diane Townsley.

Diane was not long out of high school when this article was written. At the time the station had been on the air for less than a year. Diane was hosting a weekend request show. A few months later, she was elevated to the midday slot, entertaining mid Ohio.

I was never quite sure when she left or why.

She was fun to listen to and was something unique at the time. On the air as female disc jockeys were virtually unheard of at that time and in the Central Ohio area I believe at the time she was the only one.

Hey Diane. If you see this, drop us a line someday and let us know what's going on.

Media Reporting

As I cull information to refresh my memory, I am so thankful the old Columbus Citizen-Journal had an active radio-television column. In the 60's, Jo Bradley Reed was the columnist. She steppped down in March of 1970 and was replaced by Sherry Woods.

Woods had made a periodic report or two prior to taking over the column, but became the almost daily reporter with the comings and goings of local personalities and of course the gripes and concerns of local readers. And as often as I could get my hands on the paper, a must read for me.

Of course the columns didn't capture every move of every person, but they have been a nice chronicle of most of the major radio folks.














Sherry left the CJ in 1974 for Miami, Florida to take a similar job there at a Miami newspaper. From there she began writing romance novels. First under "writers" names or pseudonyms , and later under her given name Sherryl Woods. She is one of the more published novel writers and is still active to this date.

Sherry spends her time between the beaches of Virginia where she was raised and Miami in the winter all the while writing. Some day I'll have to try to make contact to get a better understanding of how she covered her beat and what did and didn't make the paper. Maybe I can even jog a memory or two to provide a missing detail on a station move or personality who came or went.

It's sort of funny. When I first set out working on trying to piece together some of the radio memories from my youth and early career, my focus was entirely on about a dozen people or events.

I changed that about 4 or 5 months ago to try to catalog all the names, stations, faces and places concerning radio and radio personalities. The data bases that I am aware of don't list the comings and goings of people I listened to or in some cases worked with. So I decided to create one myself.

I started at 1970 and am currently up to September, 1977. I will go until the CJ folded and the internet has a search-able way to find the info on the internet. Once I have all that, I'll go back and do the 60's.

So what have I learned?

1) Until 1976 or 77 the Dispatch did very little coverage. Cynthia Robbins would write an article or two periodically in the early mid 70's, but it wasn't until Bud Wilkenson was hired that they wrote on a mostly daily basis.

2) The Citizen Journal did a pretty good job for some stations, but didn't always capture all the information. Examples? Jim Lohse becoming program director of WTVN in 1968, Keith Curtis replacing and then leaving about a year later Lohse on the air and Dave Parr replacing Curtis. While I have that information from memory and other sources, the paper didn't mark those events. Or WCOL, WVKO and WMNI didn't get much coverage, while WTVN, WBNS and WRFD did.

3) There was no article when WNCI dropped "The Young Sound" for progressive rock. I'm guessing it happened about the same time that WRFD went country, which was the first of the year in 1970, but can't find a sure change date. WNCI was a pioneer in this area for that kind of change.

4) Radio station WBBY had a decent amount of coverage when they first came on the air, but sort of fell off the cliff after that. A lot of memorable personalities came and went from that station and nothing was noted. For example, Scott Stevens, Rick Seiler, Jay Wayne, Bob Smith and Chris Ward. Joe Gallagher was never mentioned. Diane Townsley got some early mentions, but nothing ever mentioned when she left or where she went.

5) My interest was higher in the late 60's and early 70's time frame. That was more of my coming of age days. As I work in the later 70's, it just doesn't seem as interesting. I'll have to think about why.

4)

The Power of Advertising

The little block advertisement to the left supplied wagging tongues in Columbus with a lot to chatter about as well as had many Capital City announcers wondering if they were on the chopping block.

The ad appeared in Billboard Magazine on September 13, 1975.

DJ chatter about the ad gave Citizen Journal Radio-TV editor David Drake enough ammo to write a column a week or so later about the ad with denials from all area program directors that they had placed it.

I'm not sure if anyone ever owned up to the advertisement. As my review of the comings and goings or radio hosts continues, maybe I'll find the article that links the ad to the smoking gun radio station.

John & Bill

One of the more popular morning shows in the late 60's and through the late 70's was anchored by radio host John Fraim with news provided by Bill Patterson. Photos from a 1974 newspaper advertisement campaign.