Roben Jones

Longtime 95 WKAZ listener

Dear Mr. Callebs,

This letter is in response to your WKAZ website and your request for remarks, comments or memories from all who were fans of the station and visit the site.

You are providing a true public service for everyone fortunate enough to have grown up in the golden years of Charleston radio.

My sister and I are natives of eastern Kanawha County and were devoted listeners of 95 WKAZ when we lived there.  Later when our family moved to Gallipolis (Ohio) we still continued to listen.  It was like a voice from home.

I am a published poet, appearing in WILD SWEET NOTES: BEST OF WEST VIRGINIA POETRY (published in 2000) but my real passions have always been music and radio.  I myself had a short career at WMOV-AM in Ravenswood, West Virginia.  I had the morning show and I tried to make it as much of a quality show as I could.  My direct inspiration -- my tutors, you might say -- were the announcers in the glory years of WKAZ.

Our memories of WKAZ begin in November 1967 when we first became aware of the station.  Around January 1968, WKAZ's affiliation switched to American Contemporary Radio (an ABC outlet).  The ACR news breaks came at the top of the hour (with local news on the half-hour) and were preceded by a distinctive "beeping" tone.  I hope you will be able to get a sample of it.  They carried Paul Harvey at 12:30 pm and 6:00 pm, and Howard Cosell's "Speaking of Sports" at 5:30 pm.  The weekend ACR newsman in New York was Ted Koppel.

At that time the morning man was Joe Copley, but he soon changed shifts with the program director Mike Hammer who had worked mid-days.  Copley had a soft-spoken on-air style.  Very mellow.  Later we recall he became the news director for a while, but in early 1968, the news director was Larry Gibson.  In addition to the news, WKAZ featured morning and evening traffic reports phoned in by the news directors from the station's mobile vans, "Big Red" and "Roving Old Blue".

Mike Hammer was PD until the fall of 1972.  I've heard he later became an insurance man.  He was the Rush Limbaugh of Charleston -- not irreverent like Al Sahley later would be, but satirical, aggressive and deeply cynical.  An example would be how he handled a 1971 public service ad inviting all West Virginians to "come home and vacation".  "Great", Hammer snarled, "but will there be any room left for those of us still living here?"

When Joe Copley retired from on-air work in 1968, Jim Little came in.  His first show was on April 1, 1968.  He introduced himself to the audience and right away you knew he was special.  What he gave the station, quite simply, was class.  He set the standard for good taste in music and announcing.  Little seemed to have a tremendous rapport with Hammer, and they were almost a two-act.  Jim Little was the mid-day man and often worked Sunday afternoons until November 1968 when he replaced Bill Blake as drive time announcer.  Jim Little held that shift until leaving for WCHS in March 1971.

"Governor" Bill Blake was my own radio hero and inspiration.  I hope you can get some tapes of his 1967-68 satirical "gubernatorial campaign".  He tackled targets with those jingles even the crusading Charleston Gazette was afraid to touch.  And he could create moods with the slightest inflection of voice.  When he did an occasional Sunday-night shift in 1968 he devoted the 10 pm - Midnight hours to love songs exclusively, and his narration tied it all together.  Bill Blake was the 60's rebellion come to Charleston.

The evening man, 6pm to Midnight, was Jay Jarrell.  He was wild.  His shows were a combination request-line and call-in talk show, with the raucous "Night Train" as his closing theme.  Jay was there until the fall of 1970, when he was replaced by Ric Robinson.  Ironically, Robinson left in March 1971 to go to WXIT where Jarrell was already working.

In early 1968, "Loveable Sam" Rivers (Amy Johns) was on the overnight shift, midnight til 6 am.  She's never gotten the credit she should have as one of West Virginia's first female radio announcers, and as a role-model to other young women who wanted to try their luck in radio.  Her voice was both elegant and sprightly, friendly yet sophisticated.  In March 1968 she went to WGKV (which became WXIT) and Lovell Webb replaced her.  Webb was almost pure country, but his exuberance pulled listeners in.  He sounded as if he were hosting the hippest hoedown in town.

You would be remiss if you forgot the man-of-all-work at the station:  Jim Byard, the voice of "Granny".  Byard did sports, news, and later a Sunday night show that lasted until he left in November 1971.  He and Bill Blake did live coverage of local high school football, and startlingly original commercials for sponsors like Classic Shoe Store and Robert Long's Hobby House.  I hope you can find some of these commercials, as well as the more serious ones Byard did on his own, like the 1968 Admiral TV ad "Winter Windfall".  That ad was everything a good radio spot should be.

In 1968, WKAZ hired Larry Stevens from Winston-Salem, North Carolina.  Stevens left Charleston the next year and was replaced by a Texan named Johnny Goin who left WKAZ in 1970.  Rich Hunt was hired in June 1970 and stayed until August 1973.  He was dry and droll on the air, quiet but given to ironically wry little remarks.

The WKAZ-WXIT "ratings war" heated up in 1972.  Both stations fought for the best announcers and music, sometimes hiring the other station's employees away!  Terry Lore, for example, was a WKAZ weekend man in 1972; by the next year he worked mid-days at WXIT.  Cameron Keyser, their 1971-72 news director, was also hired away.

In 1973, the golden era was almost over, and a "revolving-door" policy began.  Al Sahley came over from WCHS and Amy Johns came back for a while, only to be publicly and controversially fired.  Charleston newspaper columnist J.P. Rool publicly took Johns' side.  Frank George, "The Friendly Freak from Davis Creek" became the midnight man and Bruce Clark, who'd worked evenings there in 1971 came back as "King of the Kanawha River Valley".  Al Woody (who still works at WQBE-FM) was the mid-day man.  Lovell Webb left for WXIT but came back in 1976 and stayed through the early 80's.  Rich Hunt had been doing drive time since 1971 (opposite Jim Little at WCHS) but Hunt left in 1973.  Bill Radtke left WXIT and did the Sunday afternoon show.  Bill always featured two songs, no matter what else he played:  Carole King's version of "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow" from Tapestry and "Operator" by Manhattan Transfer.

In 1969 Jane Martin began a 9:30 am - 10:00 am "features" show that lasted until she left for WCHS in April 1971.  The news directors at WKAZ during the golden era were:  Larry Gibson ('66-'68), Tom Ragen ('68-'72) and Cameron Keyser ('72-'73).  During the Ragen era, local news coverage was especially good as he practiced advocacy journalism, giving much time to issues like coal-mine safety and the Miners for Democracy movement.  Ragen also conducted a half-hour news show Monday through Friday at 6:00 pm , to which Jim Byard, Rich Hunt and Jim Little all contributed.  Occasionally, Tom Ragen pulled DJ shifts as "Randy Tolliver" or "Jack Schack".  It was as "Jack Schack" that Ragen was given an hour of "progressive" music every Sunday evening at 9:00 pm in 1970 and 1971, taking an hour's time from Jim Byard's show.

Another interesting feature of the golden era was the "Pick of the Week", discontinued in 1969.  Although the "In 40" was a regular Top 40 playlist, other types of songs were featured too, and each announcer made a weekly choice of a favorite song.  The choices often reflected the diversity of taste:  Hammer was likely to choose something from Henry Mancini, the Rat Pack or the British Invasion;  Jim Little selected the latest Jim Webb or John Hartford composition;  Bill Blake chose psychedelic or beach music;  Jay Jarrell went for soul;  Jim Byard liked novelties or 50's remakes;  Amy Johns chose everything from instrumentals to soul ballads; and Lovell Webb would pick the latest crossover country hit from Memphis or Nashville.  Webb featured Memphis music a lot.

There it is, some memories of two young girls who grew up on the music and the state-of-the art announcing that was 95 WKAZ.  Thank you again for the site and the memories it brings.  We hope this letter will trigger "much more music" and many more memories.

Sincerely,

Roben Jones and Jill D. Simpkins

Gallipolis, Ohio

submitted June 17, 2001