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 December 9, 2002
Bob Steele Dies at 91
By SCOTT FYBUSH
*The man who
defined morning radio in CONNECTICUT for fifty years died
last Friday (Dec. 6), ending a radio career that spanned seven
decades at just one station.
 Bob Steele came to
WTIC in Hartford in 1936, as a junior announcer fresh from the
motorcycle-racing circuit, where he had announced the races at
a local arena (and, earlier, on KGFJ in Los Angeles.)
The Missouri native was hired on a probationary basis and
urged to work on his accent. Within a few months, Steele was
announcing sports broadcasts on WTIC - and in 1943, he took over
the "Morning Watch" show.
Before long, "Morning Watch" became the Bob Steele
Show, and Steele became a WTIC institution, waking up generations
of Nutmeggers with the "Word for the Day," birthday
announcements, and general good humor until his retirement from
daily broadcasting in 1991.
And even then - at the age of 80 - Bob Steele was far from
finished at WTIC, moving to a Saturday-morning slot that eventually
became a monthly feature on the station. In recent years, Steele
was on the air only from May until November, but still proudly
claimed his title as the longest-running regular program host
in New England, and probably the entire country. When he turned
90 last year, Steele was quoted as saying he might consider retiring
"when I turn 100."
Sadly, he won't get that chance; Steele died in his sleep
sometime Friday morning, a month or so after what turned out
to be his last WTIC broadcast. It was a run that's unlikely to
ever be equalled, from a man who'll be widely remembered as one
of the class acts in this business, and he'll be missed.
(WTIC did a special four-hour broadcast Sunday morning to
remember Steele; we hear the station even cut carrier for 15
seconds at the end of the show in Steele's memory.)
*One other bit of Nutmeg State news: WACC-LP (107.7 Enfield)
has signed on, broadcasting a variety of music while it settles
on a permanent format. We hear the station is being heard quite
well north of Hartford, though the audio processing reportedly
needs a bit of tweaking...
*From MASSACHUSETTS comes word that
WLVI (Channel 56) is losing its news director, hot on the heels
of the departure of anchor Jeff Barnd. For Greg Caputo, who's
been at the station for seven years, it's both a promotion and
a homecoming; he's headed to Chicago to helm the news operation
at Tribune mothership WGN-TV (Channel 9), where he'll compete
head-to-head with Fox's WFLD (Channel 32), whose news operation
Caputo led from 1985 until 1993. No replacement has been announced
yet.
On the radio side, Alan Chartrand adds station manager duties
for WKLB-FM (99.5 Lowell) to his existing responsibilities at
sister Greater Media talker WTKK (96.9).
Out west, Terry Cordingley is out as PD and afternoon drive
jock at WBEC-FM (105.5 Pittsfield).
*It looks like the end of the line for "Jukebox
Radio" in Bergen County, NEW JERSEY. We hear that
W276AQ (103.1 Fort Lee), along with sister translator W232AL
(94.3 Pomona NY), is no longer translating the oldies/standards
format that originated in nearby Dumont, N.J. and was fed to
WJUX (99.7 Monticello NY), which then broadcast it back down
to New Jersey via the two translators.
As we've reported in previous
issues of NERW, the unusual primary/translator arrangement
had led to complaints from competing New Jersey broadcasters
and an FCC investigation; it's not clear exactly what's led to
the disappearance of the format this time, or what's running
now up in Monticello. We'll be back in that area in a few weeks
and will keep you posted...
 To the west, in
Sussex County, Clear Channel flipped formats on WNNJ (1360 Newton),
replacing satellite standards with voicetracked country as "Bear
Country 1360."
Down in Monmouth County, WPDQ (89.7 Freehold Township) could
soon be flipping from eclectic oldies to religion; owner "Lazarus
Elias Foundation" is selling the station to Bridgelight
Corporation, which is affiliated with several Calvary Church
branches in the area, for a reported $875,000.
*Just one bit of PENNSYLVANIA news:
southwest of Erie, little WVCC (101.7 Linesville) is being sold
by longtime owner Art Cervi. The new owner is Joseph Vilkie's
Vilkie Communications, and we're told the price tag was $330,000.
*The big story out of NEW YORK is
the long-delayed debut of a TV station that almost didn't make
it. Channel 52 in Ithaca was first applied for back in 1985,
and a series of construction permits extended until a final "drop
dead" date last Friday. While the station's owners hoped
to put it on the air at high power from a tower next to Syracuse's
WNYS (Channel 43) and WSYT (Channel 68), serving the Salt City
as well as Ithaca, a conflict with the class A status of Syracuse's
channel 51 LPTV forced channel 52 to fall back on plan B to get
on the air in time.
With brand-new calls of WNYI(TV), we're told channel 52 made
it to air Friday from a tower near Ithaca College, running just
26 kW of...color bars. What next? Stay tuned...
 It was one of the
worst-kept secrets of central New York radio: Bill Keeler was
out as morning jock on Galaxy's WRCK (107.3 Utica) as of last
Thursday. The longtime Utica morning host tells the Utica
Observer-Dispatch he had known for two months that he would
be getting fired; he says Galaxy accused him of promoting his
wife's comedy club on the air without permission.
Keeler says he'll be suing WRCK to collect on his contract,
which was to run through 2006 and paid him $135,000 this year.
Co-host Frank McBride is now doing mornings at WRCK.
Downstate, Buckley is bringing its "The Best of Everything"
format, which had a test run on WDRC in Hartford, to WOR in New
York - but never fear, it won't displace the talk programming
on AM 710. Instead, visitors to wor710.com
will have the opportunity to use RCS' iSelector software to create
their own individualized commercial-free Webcast stream of the
pop-standards-and-more format, for a fee of $4.95 per month (with
the first 48 hours free). The service launches today on WOR's
Web site.
It's not quite as long a record as Bob Steele, but Danny Stiles
certainly deserves recognition for his longevity in New York
City radio; last week marked his 79th birthday and his 55th anniversary
on the air in the Big Apple. Stiles is currently heard overnight
spinning the standards on WPAT (930 Paterson) and WNSW (1430
Newark), as well as Saturday nights on WNYC (820 New York).
Out on Long Island, the FCC granted a new LPFM to "The
Savior's Voice Broadcasting Company." It'll run with 100
watts on 100.9 in Center Moriches.
Back up here in Rochester, Entercom will hold an official
ribbon-cutting Wednesday (Dec. 11) for its new "High Falls
Studios" radio complex, home to WBEE-FM (92.5), WBBF (93.3
Fairport), WBZA (98.9) and WROC (950). We had a chance to see
this nifty new facility a couple of weeks ago, and it's far and
away the nicest commercial radio plant in town, complete with
historic brick-vaulted ceilings and a wonderful location in the
heart of the city's entertainment district.
From Buffalo comes word of the death on Dec. 1 of Les Arries,
the longtime general manager of channel 4, where he started as
general manager in 1967 (when it was WBEN-TV) and left in 1989
(when it had become WIVB-TV). Arries began his broadcast career
at the old DuMont Network in 1946 and was later instrumental
in creating the syndicated Merv Griffin Show while working for
Westinghouse in the sixties. Arries died of brain cancer at his
home in Sarasota, Florida; he was 77.
*A few quick notes from CANADA: we're
told the new religious station on 101.1 in Sudbury is testing,
and the calls have a historic resonance in the Nickel City, picking
up the CKSO identity that was on AM 790 (now CIGM) for so many
years. In London, the CRTC granted CHRW (94.7)'s application
to move from the University of Western Ontario campus to the
One London Place tower downtown, moving to 94.9 and upping power
to 3500 watts in the process.
And in Toronto, the CRTC gave airport information station
CFYZ (1280) approval to boost power to 400 watts day, 150 night,
from the present 25 watts day/99 watts night facility. CFYZ does
live travel programming in morning and afternoon drive,
and is one of the most interesting airport stations - heck, the
most interesting airport station - we've ever heard.
 *Have
you ordered your Tower Site Calendar 2003 yet? (Yes, the
very calendar that we had the honor of presenting to Paul Harvey
himself during his Rochester visit - and the delightful surprise
of hearing him praise on the air!)
Hear
what Paul Harvey had to say about his visit to Rochester...and
the 2003 Tower Site Calendar! (MP3,
3 min.)
It's no Oreck vacuum, or even Bose Wave radio, but if you
liked last year's calendar, you'll love this one: higher-quality
images (including Providence's WHJJ; Mount Mansfield, Vermont;
Buffalo's WBEN; KOMA in Oklahoma City; the legendary WSM, Nashville;
Harvey's flagship WGN, Chicago and many more), more dates in
radio history, a convenient hole for hanging - and we'll even
make sure all the dates fall on the right days!
This year's calendar is shipping this week! Look
for it in your mailbox; orders are being shipped in the order
received, and they're going out just as fast as we can get them
back from the printer.
And this year, you can order with your Visa, MasterCard, Discover
or American Express by using the handy link below!
Better yet, here's an incentive to make your 2003 NERW subscription
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You can also order by mail; just send a check for $16
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*And we're also happy to announce that
our good friends at M Street have released the 11th edition of
the M Street Radio Directory. With the disappearance
of the old Vane Jones log and the declining accuracy of the Broadcasting
Yearbook, the M Street directory is widely regarded as the most
accurate, most comprehensive source of information on the US
and Canadian radio scene - and we're thrilled to be able to offer
it to you at a substantial discount!
The directory includes power, frequency, ownership, key personnel,
formats, ratings and much more information for every radio station
in the U.S. and Canada, and now runs almost 900 pages in an 8.5"
x 11" softcover book. List price is $79 (plus $7 shipping/handling),
but if you order through fybush.com/NorthEast Radio Watch, you
can get this invaluable resource on your shelf for $69 (plus
$7 s/h) - a $10 savings! And your purchase benefits the continued
publication of NERW and Tower Site of the Week, so everybody
wins!
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