History of Baltimore Radio Questions (Help please)

Hey Guys:

I have been doing research and I have a couple of questions on some dates of some format changes from Blatimore's past.

Would anybody know the exact date that:

1. WLPL 92.3 went from Proressive Rock to Top 40 in 1972?

2. WITH 104.3 Beautiful Music went to Top 40 WDJQ? Did WDJQ ever go Disco then back to Top 40?

3. WFMM 93.1 went from Classical to Beautiful Music?

Thanks for your help.

T.J.

Track down Euclid Coukouma, the former United Broadcasting Company Chief Engineer. He could probably tell you everything you need to know about WLPL.

t.j. said:

1. WLPL 92.3 went from Proressive Rock to Top 40 in 1972?

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WLPL was indeed doing top 40 in 1972 as there is a scene in John Water's infamous movie "Pink Flamingos" where Divine was seen walking around Baltimore and in one very very brief shot one can see a billboard in the background for top 40 WLPL-FM.

However...WLPL was doing regular top 40 in 1970...at least Gary Michaels was anyway. Years later, actually until very recently Gary was a fixture in the Hagerstown, MD market on WICL "Oldies 95.9" and I can remember at least once hearing one of his old airchecks on that station. Jackson 5, Bobby Sherman's Little Woman, The Archies "Sugar Sugar" doesn't sound like "progressive rock to me.

Too bad this question wasn't asked say 6 months ago since a phone call to Prettyman Broadcasting ( WICL ) would answer your LPL questions as I am sure Gary would tell you everything about WLPL ( likewise with Bill Prettyman and WPGC ). But alas..Gary retired last October, WICL looks like it may be changing format and Bill Prettyman is getting up there in years..who knows how long will he be involved with radio.

mleach:

You bring up a very interesting point. I found this aircheck on line talking about WLPL in 1970 and 1971

STREAM 32.0 Kbps (13 Khz)
Jim Tice, WLPL-FM Baltimore, June 13, 1970 (01:04:00)

. . . we'll tell you when it's time to roll over . . .

[Description by Uncle Ricky]

Jim Tice counts down the All Time Top 200, interspersed with selections from the current WLPL Top 30, on June 13, 1970. As a service of the Even Tan Club, Tice provides reminders to turn every 15 minutes, but he doesn't sound as comfortable with a five-minute newscast.

The first part of this two-parter includes hits #118 through #109, and because we're hearing the lower-ranking "All Time" hits, there's blessedly little burn-out.

WLPL was Baltimore's first FM Top 40 station, but it's not clear if they were broadcasting in stereo, or if it's just the recording that was made in mono. In either event, the fidelity is very nice for a recording of this vintage. Unfortunately, WLPL didn't have much in the way of jingles and production elements, both of which are exhausted within the first few minutes of this aircheck.



Return to the Repository

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TOP STREAM 32.0 Kbps (16 Khz)
Steve Miller, WLPL-FM Baltimore, December 1971 (48:54)

. . . Congressman Wilbur Mills says the Democrats could beat President Nixon in 1972, if they tell the truth . . .

[Description by Uncle Ricky]

Contributor Joe Evelius wrote that WLPL-FM was Baltimore's first FM rocker at 92.3 Mhz. Anyone who worked in a small or medium market in those years will recognize the Frankenstein Acapella Jingle Company offerings here. OK, so WLPL owned a few jingles of their own, and they stitched them together with some other jingles.

With the exception of Footstompin', which has audible phase error, (the only serious defect in this otherwise excellent recording) it's likely all of the music on this unscoped exhibit was from 45 RPM vinyl singles.

Holiday Alert: There are a couple of seasonal musical offerings in this unscoped 48 minutes of the Steve Miller program on a Million Dollar Weekend from a Saturday night in December, 1971. Steve also reads the news - following a muddy musical stager dating back to the early sixties! The lead story advises pregnant women to avoid emptying the cat's litter pan. Please make a note of it.

So now I wonder when did WLPL go from P/R to Top 40?


t.j.

Here is an interesting quote from RoddyFreeman:

WSID-FM did not go right from Soul to Top 40. In early 1969, the station went rock, meaning album rock. The call letters were still WSID-FM. Top 40 and the call letter change to WLPL came about a year later, with LPL standing for "Land of Pleasant Listening."

T.J.

Re: History of Baltimore Radio Questions (Help please) WCAO-FM WITH-FM

Hey Guys:

I know this is really old but would anybody know when WITH 104.3 and WCAO 102.7 signed on way back when did the simulcast there AM's or did they have seperate programming. I looked at the yearbooks and couldn't find any info.

I do know from Wikepedia that WCAO 102.7 did do Classical and WITH-FM did Beautiful Music with Jack Wells as its first announcer doing an 8 hour shift.

Thanks
T.J.

As of August 1975, Washington's "Forecast" Magazine has WCAO-FM as classical and WITH-FM is WDJQ and playing "non-stop rock".

I would like to confirm that as a student in Baltimore 1964-1969 I listened regularly to WCAO-FM, a classical music station "owned and operated by Plough, Incorporated". It seemed to be run on a tape, not live in studio. They played really fine programming from hard-to-find recordings. It was a mainstay of my student life and fondly remembered to this day.

Tony P.

thebeach33445 said:

Hey Guys:

I know this is really old but would anybody know when WITH 104.3 and WCAO 102.7 signed on way back when did the simulcast there AM's or did they have seperate programming. I looked at the yearbooks and couldn't find any info.

I do know from Wikepedia that WCAO 102.7 did do Classical and WITH-FM did Beautiful Music with Jack Wells as its first announcer doing an 8 hour shift.

Thanks
T.J.

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stevewillett said:

As of August 1975, Washington's "Forecast" Magazine has WCAO-FM as classical and WITH-FM is WDJQ and playing "non-stop rock".

Click to expand...

I would like to confirm that as a student in Baltimore 1964-1969 I listened regularly to WCAO-FM, a classical music station "owned and operated by Plough, Incorporated". It seemed to be run on a tape, not live in studio. They played really fine programming from hard-to-find recordings. It was a mainstay of my student life and fondly remembered to this day.

Tony P.

Thanks for the interesting followup. I can vouch for the professionally correct, actually quite beautiful pronunciation of the taped announcer on WCAO-FM, a gift to a classical music student in those days (1964-69).

Tony P.

DavidEduardo said:

There were some pretty primitive automation systems before the time period you mention, but I do not think that any could have handled the rather complex time variables of classical without an operator.

I ran two classical stations before 1970, one in Ecuador and one in Richmond, VA (for EZ Communications). Both played most material off records. In Richmond, we had a library of performances distributed on tape as well; the advantage being that a whole piece could be on one reel rather than across both sides of one or even two LP recordings. This allowed for a complete work to be run just as performed.

While someone at WCAO (600 AM) might have done the meter readings for the FM, I doubt they could have dealt with the complexities of changing reels and cuing them in the time that a 60's era two-minute song lasted. So I think its likely they had a board operator.

As an observation, some classical stations had board ops much of the time and had one or two announcers who did the presentations... even back when the voice tracks were on reel tape, not carts. The reason was that it was hard to find voice talent who could accurately pronounce the titles, composers and orchestra conductor names, and listeners were not tolerant of mistakes. So they voice tracked some or most of the day with real pros who could also comment from the recording liner notes, as well as HWV, BWV and other classification catalog numbers.

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Thanks for the interesting followup. I can vouch for the professionally correct, actually quite beautiful pronunciation of the taped announcer on WCAO-FM, a gift to a classical music student in those days (1964-69).

Tony P.

frankberry said:

WCAO-FM may have been running their music from tape but, in 1964, they probably had a "board operator" to take transmitter meter readings and sign the transmitter and program logs.
By 1969, program automation systems were available. The station may well have been automated at that time.

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Wlpl 1976-1977

stevewillett said:

Track down Euclid Coukouma, the former United Broadcasting Company Chief Engineer. He could probably tell you everything you need to know about WLPL.

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I was only at WLPL for June 1976 until January 1978 when I was transferred to WOOK-FM (aka OK-100) and WFAN-AM in DC. I stayed there about 8 years before I became bored with radio and became an maintenance engineer at NBC Television in DC. I posted some people and things I remeber about WLPL and a tiny amount about other Baltimore stations in another post in another thread earlier tonight.