1948- Alfred G. Kenngott, Jr. Comes to WKDA as staff announcer from WDEF in Chattanooga. Sports Director Larry Munson has infamous miscue while doing play-by-play of Nashville Vols baseball game with New Orleans. He is suspended from the local airwaves indefinitely.
1951- Kenngott was named WKDA Program Director by General Manager Thomas B. Baker, Jr.
May 3, 1954- WKDA was sold by Baker and Beaman to John Kluge and Associates of Washington, D.C. for $312,500. Baker and Beaman sold the station so they could become stockholders in WLAC-TV. The sale resulted from an FCC ruling against cross ownership at that time. It is also announced that Harvey Glascock of station WWDC in Washington, D.C. will come to Nashville to serve as the station’s general manager.
1958- Jack Stapp comes to WKDA after several years at WSM. Stapp becomes Vice President and General Manager at WKDA. Stapp, along with Buddy Killen, had also established Tree Music in 1953.
June 16, 1958- Radio station rivals WKDA and WMAK tie up Nashville traffic for 20 minutes on Church Street at Fourth Avenue. The traffic jam brings angry response from Police Chief D.E. Hosse, who told officials at both stations “never to pull a trick” like that again. Reportedly, WKDA had a costumed Purple People Eater (named for the popular song), who was tossing money and balloons to the crowd gathered below the Noel Hotel. The Purple People Eater was perched some 400 feet above the street level at the base of the large “Noel Hotel” sign atop the structure. WMAK tried to top the WKDA stunt with a banner waving airplane, which reportedly flew just above the tops of downtown buildings bearing gifts of candy and records. Officials at both stations pledged to never repeat such an incident.
March 21, 1959-WKDA changes hands again. This time John Kluge, Chairman of Metropolitan Broadcasting in New York sells to a group consisting of singer Pat Boone; Jack Stapp; and Townsend Investment Company of New York. The sale price was announced at approximately $1 million.
1960- A major renovation is completed at the First American Bank Building. Another floor was added to the structure, and WKDA studios were relocated from the 7th floor to the 8th floor.
April 17, 1964- WKDA DJ Charlie Brown is forced to halt a publicity promotion to set a new world record for staying awake and on-the-air. When he was placed on a hospital stretcher and taken to St. Thomas Hospital, he had been awake and broadcasting over WKDA for more than 124 straight hours. Brown missed the world record, which was set at 227 hours and 44 minutes. WKDA patrons said they began to notice Brown’s fatigue, including slurred speach, in the final hours of the promotion. Other station personalities at the time were Dick Buckley, Don Bowman, John Fox, Bill Craig, Bill Berlin, and Lee Dorman (doing overnight show after firing of Captain Midnight, who was rehired the next year when Dorman was named Program Director at WDXN in Clarksville).
WKDA "Good Guys" w/the Shangri-Las 1965.New owners begin a project of progam planning and major equipment purchases. The station is silenced while the unpublicized project is in progress. WNFO-FM had been the third FM station in Nashville (behind WSM-FM and WLAC-FM). Meanwhile, the WKDA “Good Guys” continue to dominate the Nashville radio scene. The air-staff consists of: Doc Holliday; Dick Buckley (Richard B. Huckaba); Bill Berlin; Bill Craig; Ray Lynn; and the infamous Captain Midnight (Roger Schutt).
March 20, 1965- Jack Stapp announces that he is resigning as president and general manager at WKDA to devote fulltime to his other business ventures: Tree Publishing and Dial Records. Stapp, who colleagues called a genius in the areas of sales and marketing, was credited with taking WKDA to new heights of success during his tenure.
May 6, 1965- Charles F. (Smokey) Walker is named new President and General Manager at WKDA-AM and WNFO-FM. Walker has been at WKDA since 1950. Moving into Walker’s previous position as Program Director is Dick Buckley (Richard B. Huckaba), who had hosted the Dick Buckley Show on WKDA since 1958.
May 1966- WKDA and WNFO are sold to the Chatham Corporation out of Chicago. The terms of the sale are not known. Chatham Corp. reportedly has some 4700 stockholders and owns another radio station in the Dallas- Fort Worth area of Texas.
June 1966- WKDA studios are moved from the First American Bank Building, where they have been located since the station took to the airwaves back in 1947, to the top floor, the 12th floor, of the Stahlman Building at Third Avenue and Union Street in downtown Nashville. The historic Stahlman Building had been built in 1906 and opened to the public in 1907. It was one of the city’s first skyscrapers. The historic 12th floor of the Stahlman Building had previously housed the Nashville office of the National Weather Service from March 25, 1909 until July 6, 1948. After that, the local weather service office relocated to their airport headquarters at Berry Field.
December 1966- WNFO-FM returns to the Nashville airwaves as WKDA-FM. It broadcasts 20,000 watts in stereo at 103.3 on the dial. The station’s transmitter is located atop the Stahlman Building, new home to the WKDA AM-FM studios. Everett Larson is the Chief Engineer at WKDA AM-FM. The station spent $50,000 on new equipment to automate broadcasting on the FM station. This new equipment consists of: seven tape machines for music; two machines for the time; and two machines for commercials and public service announcements. The first Program Director of WKDA-FM is Dick Buckley (Richard B. Huckaba).
Boots Randolph, DJ Dan Hoffman, and Davy Jones in 1967.It was during the implementation phase of this improvement plan that the large neon lights were placed atop the Stahlman Building. These lights featured the station call letters: “WKDA.” Then, when lights
Dan Hoffman 1969.
blinked at intervals, they revealed: “AM-FM.” This sign became a fixture of the Nashville skyline- and was quite a grand sight from the east side of the city looking into the downtown area.September 6, 1967- Sadly, it was announced that WKDA AM-FM President and General Manager, Charles F. (Smokey) Walker, had been killed in a motorcycle accident. According to press reports, Walker was taking his 10-year old daughter, Michelle, for a ride when the motorcycle left the roadway and struck a tree. Walker was killed instantly as a result of a broken neck. His daughter escaped without injury. Walker had first came to WKDA as an engineer in 1950. He had headed up the station’s operations since May of 1965.
October 18, 1967- It was announced that Richard B. Huckaba (Dick Buckley) would succeed the late Smokey Walker as WKDA General Manager. It was also announced that Doc Holliday would serve as the new Program Director at WKDA; Bill Craig was named Music Director.
"Official Good Guys Survey" for the week of October 14, 1967.1968- WKDA-AM is named Station Of The Year in Nashville for the second straight year. This award was presented by the Radio and TV Council of Middle Tennessee. The top TV station award went to WSM-TV.
March 24, 1968- Bob Cole, 27-year old native of Brooklyn, New York, is featured in a special newspaper piece in The Nashville Tennessean as the newest WKDA Good Guy. Cole worked the shift from noon until 4 pm.Cole’s career in broadcasting began as a messenger boy for an Italian language radio station in his hometown of Brooklyn. He had also worked at stations in New Mexico, Florida, and Missouri.
Bill Berlin behind the mic at WKDA on December 27, 1968 Part 1 [ LISTEN ]
(27:16) and Part 2 [ LISTEN ] (19:56)
(27:16) and Part 2 [ LISTEN ] (19:56)
January 1, 1970- Bob Cole becomes the first underground rock jock in Nashville as he begins a regular progressive rock show on WKDA-FM. The show was featured nightly from 10 pm to 5 am. Cole’s show was a stark contrast to the automated elevator-type music that had been featured on the station since it went on the air in December of 1966. However, a huge fan base developed quickly for this underground format- and it became an instant hit! It also became an instant hit with advertisers trying to reach the teen market. One of the first to commit was Coca-Cola.
In making the announcement, WKDA General Manager Al Greenfield stressed the need for a 24-hour station to play the “very modern Nashville sound.” Up until this time, WSM was not committed to a full-time country format; and WENO radio, the only other country station in town, signed off every night at midnight. It was also announced that WKDA-FM would be formatting the station with the recently-introduced underground rock music. These major changes were set to take effect by late March.
Some materials found on this page were originally published by the following: TennRadioHOF
0 comments:
Post a Comment