STATION BREAKS June 1978. [ LISTEN ]
106.1 FM began as KGO-FM, sister station of KGO. The FM station was originally licensed at 96.9 FM in 1946. KGO-FM moved to 106.1 FM on November 3, 1947, with facilities at a former General Electric plant on East 12th Street in Oakland. On January 14, 1955, KGO-FM moved from 106.1 to 103.7.
RKO General, owner of Top 40 powerhouse KFRC 610 AM, eventually purchased the station and on November 30, 1960, it became KFRC-FM. The station's call letters changed to KFMS in November 1968, then KKEE in October 1972. In September 1973, the KFRC-FM call letters were reinstated, and the station began a "nostalgia rock" format, playing oldies and soft rock as "K106".
On July 2, 1977, after Century Broadcasting purchased the FM station, K106 was rebranded KMEL, playing album-oriented rock ("AOR"). Psychedelic poster artist Victor Moscoso created the station's mascot: a camel wearing headphones. The station used the KMEL call letters to name itself "Kamel 106".
KMEL was a top-rated station in 1980 with a tightly formatted approach, and along with newer rival KSFX, helped force legendary rival KSAN to switch to country music. That same year, KMEL signed popular New York radio personality and San Francisco native Alex Bennett. Bennett anchored the morning position which was followed by well-liked veteran Tony Kilbert covering mid-day, music director Paul Vincent covering the afternoon, then Mary Holloway and Michael St John in the evening. The station played mostly cuts from about 30 top rock albums, interspersed with a few lesser known songs such as on the "Fresh Kamel Trax" feature highlighting new albums at noon and at 8 pm. With news reporter/sidekick Joe Regelski, Bennett built a large following over the next two years, becoming known as a "benignly nasty" morning DJ, "the guy everybody loves to hate", according to Promotion Director Ken Wardell.
The year 1982 saw many changes at Bay Area rock stations. In January 1982, KMEL obtained a new rival when KCBS-FM transformed itself from an adult contemporary-format station into rock-formatted KRQR. In May 1982, AOR competitor KSFX dropped rock and went to a talk format as KGO-FM. Bennett and Regelski left KMEL in June after the station hired Sebastian, Casey & Associates as programming consultants to increase ratings. Bennett said that programming consultants were "the single most cancerous force in our industry." In August, Bennett and Regelski went to work at KQAK. KMEL lost market share to its competition—KQAK, KRQR, KOME and KSJO. In September 1982, KFOG entered the battle for rock-listener market share after dropping its beautiful music format in favor of an eclectic mix of rock. With so many AOR stations in the Bay Area, KMEL faced stiff competition.
Mary Holloway is behind the mic on July 2, 1982. [ LISTEN ] (1:33:08) and Marvelous Mark McKay on August 25, 1984. [ LISTEN ] (45:18)
In 1984 KMEL ended their run as a AOR rockradio station and was reborn a Top 40 hit music station under their new name of "All New All Hit 106 KMEL".
Some materials found on this page were originally published by the following: Bay Area Radio Museum.
