Ham Talk Live! Episode 58 - Ham Nation #300 and Young Ham of the Year Nominations with Don, AE5DW

Coming up this week on Ham Talk Live!, our friend Don Wilbanks, AE5DW will be on the show talking about the upcoming Ham Nation episode #300 and nominations for the Amateur Radio Newsline Bill Pasternak Young Ham of the Year Award. Tune in by going to hamtalklive.com Thursday night at 9 pm Eastern time to listen LIVE.

CALL in with your questions, comments, or kudos LIVE during the show at 812-NET-HAM-1 or via Skype at hamtalklive. Or, tweet us before or during the show @HamTalkLive.

If you miss the live show, we are available 24/7/365.25 at hamtalklive.com, on your favorite podcasting service, and YouTube.

 

Off topic, but... the picture Johnny and Les got me to click on this to see what it was anyway...

My favorite Dr. Johnny Fever Legal ID: "You're listening to WKRP in Cincinnati, where we have MORE Music, and LESS... Nessman."

 

As I say on Ham Talk Live, May the Good DX Be Yours!

 

I believe WKRP was/is copyrighted material. That means someone got paid for those great ideas and shows and should be recognized for their work.

(And every bit of it was from true life, I can tell you!)

 

One ham ops tribute to WKRP.....lounge style. I got to play the theme with world renowned guitartist (and dear friend) John Dougall in Toronto last year. Good times.

 

While I was in college I worked a few commercial radio stations and can attest to every one of them having each of the personality types featured on WKRP: the on-air personality (Les) trapped in the '50s, the cool disc jockey (Dr. Johnny), the smooth late-night jazz man (Venus), the program director (Andy) trying to ride herd on the mob, the bombshell secretary (Jennifer), and the sleazy leisure suit salesmen (Herb). They may or may not have been in the same job (our "Less" was in fact the Continuity Director in charge of scheduling commercials), but they were recognizably the same.

 

Same here! A lot of my broadcasting friends say the same! And WKRP was based on a real life group of people! (But that callsign was actually issued to North Vernon, Indiana and totally unrelated)

 

I've heard that Mary Tyler Moore didn't like the show but I don't know why. It came from her MTM Productions. Some say GM Arthur Carlson was based on a GM at WQXI Atlanta and One of the guys who wrote some of the episodes was Casey Piotrowski who had worked at WKBW Buffalo. Having spent 20 years in radio I too believe the characters were true to life.

In the '90's they tried a syndicated New WKRP with some old and new characters. I thought it was very good on it's own but you never hear anything about it which is a shame. I'll never forget "the morning maniacs husband and wife team Burns and Allen". Off the air they were always fighting. Then there was the "Cincinnati League Of Decency" or "CLOD". Funny stuff!

 

Yes, and if you can find the person who wrote that line, be sure to give them credit... however, that information has been lost to time since before there were 5 different competing AM Stereo transmission systems. (CQUAM won the battle, but Kahn wouldn't let the ISB fight go until the whole concept died.)

Yes, I can also attest to the fact that back in the day... every radio station had all of these personalities on staff. (Now, it's a computer controlled satellite feed at many stations, with no staff at all.) I've been a Broadcast Engineer and air talent since 1984. I have announced Classical Music, Easy Listening, Adult Contemporary, Rock, Blues, and Country. I have read news reports, and markets. I was even a yelling, overly excited "Boss Jock" in the late 80s/early 90s at a Hot Top 40 station, trying to be excited about Paula Abdul, Bel Biv Devoe, M.C. Hammer, and Milli Vanilli. Most recently, I was a music director at an Alternative station. I've given all that up, except the engineering. I currently contract for 5 AMs and 9 FMs under 6 different ownerships.

I love radio.

 

About this time last year I watched EVERY single episode of WKRP Cincinnati over the course of a few weeks. The show was well before my time. I had never known of it until I read it somewhere on here. I fell in love at the first episode. Also, my favorite episode was the "turkey drop". They did some silly stuff, but they also tackled some really heavy topics. Remember when Herp was drinking excessively and had to face his demons? (with the help of GM Carlson) That was also a great episode. There was some great character development in that show.

 

I just watched the "Hold Up" episode again last night. It's great stuff. Even the reboot wasn't bad... but not as good. And the Phone Cops episode is another one that's just extra great!

 

As a radio news director for 30+ years who has done it all (disc jockey, sales, traffic, etc.) at one time or another, I really enjoyed WKRP. However, there were some subtle technical errors in the show. The disc jockeys rarely wore headphones, the on-air speakers did not mute when the microphone was open, etc. But even with the technical errors, it was a great show. One of my favorite episodes was the remote broadcast at Del's Stereo (Speed kills, Del).