WQAM


WQAM is famous for its days in the 1960s, under ownership of Storz Broadcasting, when it presented a Top 40 format and competed vigorously with rival WFUN.


GENE WEED
February 5, 1958
[ LISTEN ] (24:54)

LEE SHERWOOD
March 2, 1964
[ LISTEN ] (44:27)

CHARLIE MURDOCK
October 22, 1964
[ LISTEN ] (33:09)

RICK SHAW
September 1965
[ LISTEN ] (8:55)

ROBY YONGE
March 28, 1966
[ LISTEN ] (45:54)

JIM "CATFISH" DUNLAP
July 29, 1966
[ LISTEN ] (22:21)

DAN CHANDLER
May 27, 1967
[ LISTEN ] (26:16)

CLARK MOORE
December 17, 1967
[ LISTEN ] (36:46)

JOHNNY KNOX
Jan/Feb, 1968
[ LISTEN ] (39:27)
In February 1964, the station interviewed and heavily promoted The Beatles' second and third nationally televised appearances on CBS's The Ed Sullivan Show live from the Deauville Hotel in North Beach, Miami Beach. By far Miami and South Florida's preeminent radio station at the time, baby boomers from Jupiter to Key West, and down to Havana, listened to WQAM for the latest in local and American pop music from the 1960s well into the late 1970s.

Dan Chandler with the Beach Boys, Rick Shaw & the Dave Clark Five.

At that time, WQAM was one of the many AM radio stations airing Casey Kasem's American Top 40, and Cuban youngsters used to gather at friend's houses to listen to the countdown of America's most popular songs, especially the 8-hour-long year-end show of Billboard's top 100 songs of the year in which the syndication company that owned the show had put out on vinyl records at a speed of 33 RPM.

Roby Yonge April, 1966
[ LISTEN ] (20:20)
On February 29, 1980, after many years as contemporary music station, competition from FM competitors forced the station to switch to a country music format, but not after running a montage of music and soundbites from its Top 40 days. From that time, WQAM was known as "56 Country WQAM", and was successful in the ratings and had many veteran DJ's. WQAM shared studios with then WKQS at 9881 Sheridan Street in Cooper City. The stations were owned by Sunshine Wireless at the time. During the late 1980s, WQAM would add sports talk programming in the evening hours.
WQAM Automation. In 1961, Todd Storz, President of the Storz Broadcasting Company, decided to try automation at WQAM. Employees, including the DJs, didn’t like it. The listeners could tell the difference, and ratings dropped. The decision was made to phase out automation and DJs went live again.
The WQAM Tiger Team during the summer of 1968. From left to right are Rich Shaw, Dan Chandler, Jan Kantor (promotions), Jim Dunlap in back, Ronnie Grant in front row, Johnny Knox, John Paul Roberts, and the overnight DJ Clark Moore.

By 1989, the station had been unable to achieve a full share point in the Arbitron surveys with its mix of country music and sports. In 1990, WQAM had abandoned its country music format in favor of the satellite-fed "Kool Gold" service, which aired '50s and '60s music.

Around 1992, WQAM became an all-sports station. Currently, WQAM is the flagship station for the Miami Dolphins, Florida Panthers, and University of Miami Hurricanes.

WQAM used to be a Yahoo! Sports Radio affiliate. On January 2, 2013, the station switched to CBS Sports Radio for after-hours programming.

On October 2, 2014, Beasley Broadcast Group announced that it would trade 5 radio stations located in Miami (including WQAM) and Philadelphia to CBS Radio in exchange for 14 stations located in Tampa, Charlotte and Philadelphia. The swap was completed on December 1, 2014.

Rick Shaw December 20, 1967. [ LISTEN ] (24:07)
WQAM has a jingle for nearly everything. Since this is just days away from Christmas, there are numerous WQAM Christmas jingles. Much of the holiday music heard is of the classical/church choir style.

WQAM vs. WFUN: If ever there was any doubt as to whether the rivalry between radio stations WQAM and WFUN was for real, the following memo should put those questions to rest. The rivalry wasn’t just real – it was intense – and grew to monumental proportions after WFUN’s Morton “Doc” Downey’s dirty tricks on WQAM program director Charlie Murdock.

When Downey and Murdock both left the Miami airwaves in 1965 – during the very same week – it didn’t end the bitterness between the two stations. WQAM had the better signal, but WFUN had the audacity, the moxie, the chutzpah, and would have stopped at little to try to dethrone their cross-town rivals.

A 1966 libel suit against WQAM – filed by Hialeah Mayor Henry Milander – was like a gift from heaven for the WFUN Boss Jocks and their Sunset Drive sales staff. Someone at FUN copied a Miami Herald article about the lawsuit, and sent it to every client and agency that bought time on WQAM. It put the QAM Tigers in a tough spot, since the station had admitted it made a mistake in the Milander report… and couldn’t really deny it. In the memo, the staff is urged to “keep our heads up”, and “not let it bother you”… along with a reminder that “our image is too good to be tarnished by this type of nonsense.”

WHO WORKED AT WQAM? Here is the list: Bill Calder, Richard Ward Fatherley, Alan Freed, Jerry Goodwin, Bob Green, Stephen Harlow Haas, Jon Holiday, Johnny Knox, Jeff Laurence, Steve Lewis, Paxton Quigly, Joey Reynolds Eric Rhoads, John Paul Roberts, Rick Shaw, Carl Strandell, Lee Vogel, John Waters, Gene Weed, Bill Winters, and Roby Yonge.



Some materials found on this page were originally published by the following: 560, Robert Williams of Brooklyn, Airchexx, Savage Lost.