In memoriam: Cary Simpson

We’re hearing word that longtime station owner Cary Simpson has died at age 89… just about a month short of his 90th birthday. Simpson was founder of the Allegheny Mountain Network of which WTRN (1340 Tyrone) served as the flagship. In 1947, he helped to build and went on to program WHUN in Huntingdon, PA and later put on WKBI in St. Mary’s – the first station of his group. In 1955, Simpson put WTRN on the air which was followed by WGMR-FM (101.1) in 1961. The FM was sold to Forever in 2008. Many of the Central Pennsylvania stations that Simpson owned were sold off to other owners over the 1990s and 2000s, but Simpson held on to WTRN. More as we hear it.