I worked at WKAZ/WQBE in 1982 as a news reporter. 95 WKAZ had an adult
contemporary/news format then and was trying to compete with V-100 but wasn't
very successful. When the Arbitron ratings came out, WKAZ didn't fare well, but
WQBE-FM came out #1 in Charleston. WQBE was aimed at female listeners and
featured (as I recall) a steady diet of Kenny Rogers, Eagles, Crystal Gayle and
light country rock.
In 1982, WKAZ had a 3 person news department. There was a 30 minute
"Commuter digest" news block at 5 pm featuring local news, Allan Archer's
weather, stocks, Paul Harvey and ABC news. Local news was done every hour on 'KAZ
and a more limited amount of news was fed to WQBE.
I spent most of my time out on the street doing news reporting at places like
the WV State House, the Kanawha County Courthouse, Charleston City Council, the
United Mine Workers office, and "on scene" stuff like fires, wrecks, plane
crashes and special events. I did live reports constantly and made friends
with anybody who would let me use their phone (no cell phones back then) to call
in live reports ! I found a place behind Appalachian Power where I could park
for free and still get to all the city/county/court events.
I did occasional "in-station" news announcing but spent most of my time on
the street. I remember one Saturday morning I was handling the morning studio
news shift when the Diamond Shamrock Chemical plant in Belle, WV just south of
Charleston had a toxic gas emission and thousands of people were evacuated.
I-64 was completely closed. That was an interesting morning for news ! Our
feed became a national story that was used by the ABC Radio network.
WKAZ/WQBE was located in the Heart of Town Motor Inn on the top floor. We
had a tiny news studio with a door that walked out onto the roof of the
Heart-of-Town motel. The newsroom was more like a broom closet. There was a
triple stack cart machine in the newsroom but one of the cart players didn't
play at regular speed. We couldn't play any wraparound reporter voiceover
stories on that machine because the voice would sound a lot different. The wire
machine was in the newsroom and was audible when the mike was open.
I remember a sign in the WKAZ control room that said "kill WVAF" during the
spring ratings period. It was ironic that it was WQBE that actually did so.
WKAZ moved out of the Heart of Town motel in mid '82. Bob Turley was our
General Manager before and after the move.
There was a strange promotion we did in 1982 about
'what's in the black
box?' V-100 had a black box so WKAZ had a black box promotion too. There was a
crane holding a suspended black box by I-64 near Dunbar.
I think WKAZ had a good air product, especially before the days of AM talk
radio. WKAZ had a strong signal on 950 AM which could be heard well into Ohio.
I wasn't originally from the Charleston area and didn't know that WKAZ was a Top
40 station at one time until I found your web site. I had always assumed it was
adult contemporary ...
One last thing I remember about working at WKAZ: The station was on the top
floor of the motel, so after hours you had to unlock a cage type metal door at
the top of the stairwell to get into the radio station. It reminded me of
unlocking a jail cell !
Best Regards,
