PBRTV - Pittsburgh Area Radio/TV Mailbag PBRTV - Pittsburgh Area Radio & TV

PBRTV Mailbag April 13-30, 2001

eric, jim snyder hired my father, al, at kdka in 1955...and my father missed his first day of work at kd becoz of MY birth! he was supposed to start 10/17/55, but i screwed things up by being born! my mother went down to d.c. last weekend for the funeral...she has stayed in close contact with jim and "boots"(jim's wife) for years and years...the last time i saw jim snyder was at my father's funeral in 1994...i remember afterwards telling him how nervous i was doing my father's eulogy and he said to me, "i'm pretty sure the whole room was on your side!" a great man and a great guy...sean mcdowell (April 30, 2001)
Eric: I just heard yesterday of the sale of my old station, 1080 am (WWNL-AM) being sold to an interest from South Carolina. Initial word is that the Contemporary Christian Music format will be dropped, and that the station sold for $900K (making it pretty much a financial wash for Mr. Mortensen and co.). Anyone with details or a yea or nay? Appreciate the help. Blessings, Greg McAtee (April 29, 2001)
I am writing from Lisbon Ohio 55 Miles west of Pittsbrugh Pa. I am in the Youngstown Ohio Market! I can pick up WBZZ 93.7 WKST 96.1 WSHH 99.7, WXDX 105.9,WAMO 106.7 and WDSY 107.9. Froggy 94.9/98.3 are hard to pick in this area. Maybe when WOGI moves to Pittsburgh I might be able to pick it up. Has anyone heard about WOGH 103.5 moving closer to the Pittsburgh Market? I would listen to Froggy 103.5 if they move their tower to Pittsburgh I probably won't be able to get it. I guess we will have to wait! 98.7 WOVK is hard to here because of WMXY 98.9 in Youngstown Ohio. Their power isn't much I guess there Transmitter must be high. Also why doesn't have a another country station. I think WZPT 100.7 FM should be country. Froggy 94.9 is simluscast off of 98.3 and that isn't a good way to get ratings. Maybe Pittsburgh will change!!! (April 27, 2001)

Eric's Response: You might recall that 100.7 was country in the early 1990's when it was known as K-Bear. That station failed because Country Powerhouse WDSY had also owned 104.7 which was WXRB - The Rebel. They beat K-Bear out very quickly and the pressure caused K-Bear to switch formats to all 70's. (Soon after 104.7 became WNRQ - Alternative.) Ironically enough WZPT and WDSY are sisters now. Actually Froggy on 98.3 is a simulcast of 94.9 and it's a fine way to get ratings for those stations. They are lower power and serve different portions of the southern part of the Pittsburgh Market. If 98.3 ultimately ends up moving to Pittsburgh (actually Duquesne) then there might be SOME competition for WDSY, but somehow I think WDSY will still have more of an audience. I have also heard of 103.5's supposed move. However I think the rumor behind that is more so to market the station to Washington County with the pending move of 98.3 to Pittsburgh.
Eric, Was it me that told you Ch35 was in Westmoreland? If so, I apologize. As you remember, information was sketchy then. I have figured it out for sure though, upon contacting the technical director of WONT-LP, that they are in Allegheny County, Channel 62 is the STL, and their transmitter is located on WQED's tower, in the Oakland section of Pittsburgh (then again, what isn't on wqed's tower nowadays??). I apologize for any previous sketchy information. Take Care and "73" --Josh (April 23, 2001)
Eric Please pass on to your Readers. Jim Synder who grew up in Greenfield attending Duquesne University,A news writter with KDKA Radio in the 1940's, KDKA News Director 1954 to 1959 Leaving to Manage the Westinghouse News Bureau in Washington D.C.,Then on to V.P. of Post Newsweek TV Stations, passed away on April,19,2001. Thank You. Phil (April 23, 2001)
Eric, The Pittsburgh station Don Bombard worked at was WKTQ (13Q). He started the Sunday night oldies show, playing Pittsburgh tracks with the help of Dave Goodrich, the doctor of rock and roll. He did an LP recreating the Sunday night show. He went to New York and did fill-ins at two different stations: he was Don Bombard on one, Bob Shannon on the other. He got hired full-time at oldies WCBS-FM and legally changed his name to Bob Shannon. He's the afternoon drive personality on CBS-FM. His website downsized and merged with another but can still be accessed at: www.bobshannon.com. VS (April 19, 2001)
Gil Lucas...now, that's a name I haven't heard in a long time! We used to raise a little heck many years ago. Paul (April 19, 2001)
Your listing for channel 35 says that the Eastland Mall studio is in Westmoreland county. It is in N. Versailles in Allegheny county. gary stewart (April 18, 2001)

Eric's Response: I knew N. Versailles was in Allegheny, but someone once told me that Channel 35 was in Westmoreland! DOH!
Just found your "Where are they Links." Great and interesting. I was in the business way back . Helped put WPGH-53 on the air. First Cable person to be elected President of PRTV Club and founder of KBL Sports Network. I am now retired and living in Florida. Gil Lucas (April 18, 2001)
It's been a week that the "LITE" went to "LITE ROCK" any coments????? (April 18, 2001)

Eric's Response: Mild changes. Note the slight change in some of the music. I heard "Life is a Highway" yesterday.
If you've been in broadcasting as long as I have, you'll get a chuckle out of this web page: http://www.wvwa.com/ Enjoy! (April 17, 2001)
Scott Fybush's Northeast Radio Watch website has a section on Pittsburgh radio. There are pictures of the WQED, WAMO/WXDX, and WJJJ/WZPT/WDSY towers. Also there is a small piece about the demolition of the old Conrad Garage. Check out http://world.std.com/~fybush/nerw.html#spcl --Steve C (April 17, 2001)
Ref TV stuff: So That's why there is a dearth of ABC television stations around here. I live in Garrett County, Md. and don't mind watching WTAE; however, when the Sporadic-E propagation occurs, the lower channels get obliterated. With CBS/KDKA, I can tune to Channel 10 in Altoona, but the only alternative I have with ABC is Channel 3 from Harrisonburg, Va which suffers the same problem. Which brings me to a question which someone may be able to answer: The current TV database shows Altoona's channel 23 listed twice with the newer listing showing a significant increase (~6dB) in power and with the antenna's main lobe pointed south instead of northwest. Is this happening, going to happen or what? It would be nice to have an ABC station which isn't affected by Sporadic-E (if I can drag it in from 75 miles away). Thanks. (April 16, 2001)
Eric ~ I had read the e-mail from someone else in the Erie Market. He reffered to The New Kiss 106.9 from Lakewood, New York. I have picked it up where I live south of I-90. It wasn't too bad for a 5k signal. They & the Forever "Kiss" stations @ 99.3 & 104.5 are adult leaning CHR stations playing the hits going back to the 80's as well as today's hits. Yes 99.3 when it was WFRA did use the same Satellite service as WREO 97.1 but since the format flip, 99.3 WOXX does simulcast with 104.5 WXXO (Formerly WAQM). As for Star 104, it had a killer signal dating back to the K-104 days. They used to pound everyone else in ratings, partly because of the 50,000 signal. That & the other Top 40 station was WJET 1400 which tried everything to compete with K-104 including going AM Stereo. It took Jet switching to 102.3 FM (Formerly WSEG & WMDI) to really gain an advantage over K-104. That & more formats coming into the market Like AC on FM & AOR commercially to attack that old warship. (Classic Rock was on WMCE 88.5 when they first signed on, filling the hole until Rocket debuted in ' 89.) Take Care & Hello to Pat Campbell shaking up the Ohio Valley from "The Burb of Burgh" Tom L. (April 16, 2001)
Eric, Pat Cloonan (who was at WNCC around the same time I was consulting WBXQ in Cresson) brings back some memories. I remember those short broadcast hours on WJNL-TV, probably rivalled only by the even shorter hours of WOPC-TV (channel 38) in Altoona, which was located with WHGM 103.9 Bellwood (now WALY) on top of Wopsononock Mountain. It's amazing that these two stations survived on UHF in such hilly terrain, with two strong VHF signals (6 and 10) in the market. I suppose in a more perfect world, Channel 3 in Clearfield would have been the area's ABC station if it had not been reserved for educational television. When Channel 8 was allocated to Johnstown, they sought the ABC affiliation, but faced objections from WTAE-TV, and ABC instead went to the Altoona UHF station (which had moved to Channel 23). WTAE has historically had a huge regional reach (east to Johnstown/Altoona, south to Weston/Clarksburg, and west to Wheeling/Steubenville) which they have fought hard to protect. Regards, Clarke. (April 14, 2001)
Following up on Clarke's comments on WJNL ... Toward the end of its tenure as a CBS affiliate, WJNL-TV only broadcast a few hours each evening, with a five-minute sign-off news capsule recorded at WJNL radio and run with a slide in front of the camera. If memory serves me correctly, that was more of a factor in CBS pulling the plug than any objections from WTAJ. (You may remember this was still an era when CBS might have up to three affiliates in an area, as it did in Harrisburg, York and Lebanon ... with the Lebanon station at the time a sister station to WTAJ, by the way ... or ABC up to two in an area, as it did in the Cleveland and San Francisco markets, with ABC also on stations in Akron and San Jose, respectively). As WNCC (my station 1976-82) exchanged news stories with WJNL, my voicers sometimes aired on that Channel 19 newscast. WJNL moved its offices and studios to its transmitter building on Cover Hill (the name is correct, the pronunciation by the way is COH-ver, not CUVVER as in "cover my [whatever part of the anatomy fits]"), after the 1977 Johnstown flood, which took out its downtown Johnstown facilities ... Pat Cloonan. (April 13, 2001)
Eric, I was reading your mailbag archives - quite interesting. Most of the stuff I am going to mention is about Erie. WKZA in Warren has a pretty weak signal here in Eastern Erie County. I was in Corry last week and tried to pick it up on the scan. My car radio skipped it and got 104. Star 104's 50,000 watts carries for quite a distance. Classy 100 is at the same power but they are directionally polarized. Their antenna is pointing toward downtown Erie. They also have a lower elevation and shorter tower. As for WFRA - they play the same music that WREO out of Ashtabula plays. FRA has their own morning show and so does REO. (April 13, 2001)
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