Wow, what a memory jog! In 1971 (I think it was that year,) I did weekend work on WHIM AM & FM. My full time gig was 1450 WSVP during the Drake format changeover with Bill Hennessy at the consulting helm, along with Chuck Morgan, Jack Casey, and Bob Laurence. My name at WSVP was Jay Sean Connors, but Norm, who was the PD at WHIM at the time, wanted something different and chose Clarke Davis, which I use today. They divided Sunday up into two different shifts, and David Frost did the morning, and I did the afternoon/evening. It was a pretty long shift, from 2:00 PM in the afternoon until midnight. AM & FM was simoulcast then, from Eastern Avenue. I used to have to shut down the AM transmitter at sundown, and keep the 50,000 watt FM going til midnight. Surprisingly, I used to get some "fan mail" from as far away as Cape Cod. The studio was one of the nicest I had ever worked in, a kidney shaped desk with four very quick turntables, and one of the largest monitors I've ever seen anywhere. Pappy Philbrook did a really great job outfitting that place up.
Because I grew up listening to Joe Thomas, Chuck Stevens, and Jim Mendes, I had some pretty unorthadox role models and I had no idea how unique each of those broadcasters was, until I moved out of the market. There was something magical and very "Big Time" sounding about WHIM compared with other stations in the market that got better ratings, and had a bigger signal. Ken Garland did mornings there before going to WIP in Philly after a brief time at WJAR. I loved working at WHIM, because the reverb made everyone sound better, and they had an automatic time tone on the hour that sounded better than NBC's, a rich languid tone that Pappy must have fine tuned himself somehow.
All in all it was an excellent broadcast experience, even if it was just part time weekends. WSVP made major ripples in the Providence market from all the way over in West Warwick, and it was fun to be a part of the changeover from a WYRE, Annapolis clone to a WRKO clone. I remember being schooled in all the techniques, "It's eight ten", not it's ten after eight, etc. At the bottom of the hour, we had to say under the tymps "It's nine-thirty at the Golden 1450" then Johnny Jann singers would come in with WSVP, West Warwick. I worked with Big Ange when he did mornings on WYNG, Warwick as "Jack Andrews", and thought Joe Thomas and Chuck Stevens were the best DJs in Rhode Island. I remember them both being on WICE on Sunday nights for a while, and Joe was absolutely the worst board guy ever on 1290. He did much better on WHIM, and later WPRO. Chuck was just a one of a kind, throw away the mold, total Rhode Island personality unlike any before, or after. I remember Joe Thomas being on WPAW before it changed to WXTR and played oldies all day long. Guess I'm revealing my age here, lol.