North East RadioWatch: May 22, 1997

Back to Boston

by Scott Fybush

• NERW went back to Boston this past weekend, only to find yet another station added to the American Radio Systems megaopoly. WNFT (1150 Boston) is ARS' newest acquisition, to the tune of a reported $4.5 million from Greater Media. 1150 has been a troubled spot on the Boston radio dial for more than a decade, including stints as oldies WMEX (quashed by WODS's arrival on FM), business WMEX (killed off by the recession of the early 90s), Spanish "Radio Continental", leased-time ethnic brokered by WRCA (1330), the recent brief run as KidStar's Boston affiliate (which ended when KidStar went out of business), and plenty of interim periods simulcasting WMJX 106.7 or WBCS/WKLB-FM 96.9.

  ARS isn't saying much about its plans for 1150, but rumor has it that the station will pick up some of the sports conflicts (Red Sox/Celtics, for instance) from WEEI (850). There's also a pretty credible rumor that ARS will move 1150 to the WRKO transmitter site in Burlington, demolish the three AM towers and the FM backup tower on the WNFT site in Lexington, and build a taller FM tower there that can be leased out by subsidiary American Tower Systems. That could be profitable enough by itself to make WNFT's profitability irrelevant, in fact...time will tell.

  Elsewhere on the dial, we tuned in to Tom "Tai" Irwin's debut on WRKO's newly-renamed Clapprood and Company morning show Monday -- and didn't hear too much of Tai. Clapprood dominated the conversation for at least the first few hours, with Tai relegated to the sidekick role. Boston comic Mike McDonald is filling Tai's old morning gig at modern rock WFNX (101.7 Lynn) while a permanent replacement is being picked.

  Over at WBZ (1030), Bob Lobel and Upton Bell are again teamed up for a weekend sports show. It's a partnership that dates back to the late 70s, when the pair first co-hosted sports talk on BZ. Nowadays Lobel is the main sports anchor on WBZ-TV (Channel 4), while Bell is fresh from a stint as midday talk host on WTAG (580) in Worcester. Their show debuted last Sunday from 5-8 pm on 'BZ, pushing "Calling All Sports" over to Saturday afternoons, where it replaces the last few hours of "Sports Saturday" on the increasingly-misnamed "NewsRadio 1030."

  In the land of radio with pictures, veteran Boston anchor Gail Harris is leaving Boston University's WABU-TV (Channel 68), where she's been special projects director and talk show host for the last few years. And congratulations to WCVB (Channel 5) anchor Heather Kahn, who had a baby girl Friday morning, just a few hours after anchoring the 5:30 pm news (no, Boston Globe, it wasn't the "7 pm news"!) on Thursday.

• A few other observations from around the state: We heard WVBF (1530 Middleborough Center) with live local school baseball on Saturday afternoon, then back into their programming from the Talking Information Center. WJLT (1060 Natick) must have a pretty broad conception of "pre-sunrise authority"; the alleged daytimer was on the air before 5:30 every morning we listened. No sign of a legal ID on ARS's WWTM (1440 Worcester); the sports outlet did a strange "WWTM Sports Radio 1440 and AM 850 Boston" ID before going back into its WEEI simulcast Monday afternoon. WLLH (1400 Lowell/Lawrence) is indeed running jazz overnight; John Halbert hosts. Ware's WARE (1250) is running the same Westwood One standards format as sister station WESO (970 Southbridge), albeit with its own station IDs. And we caught a few little noncomms that are usually off the air when we're within range: WSKB (89.5) at Westfield State College was on the air late Thursday night with a phone interview that, alas, was nearly inaudible. And we heard loud rock in mono that was probably WBPV (90.1 Charlton), from Bay Path Vocational High School.

  And one more personnel note: Steve Murphy is heading west after a five-year stint as PD and operations manager at classical WBOQ (104.9 Gloucester). Steve started at classical WFCC (107.5 Chatham) in 1988, detoured into easy listening at WQRC (99.9 Hyannis) in 1990, then arrived at WBOQ in 1992. Now he's off to classical WFMI in Milwaukee, where he'll be director of broadcast operations. Steve may be taking his life in his own hands -- he's vowing to keep wearing his Patriots attire in the heart of Packer country. Steve is also a past member of the board at the Massachusetts Broadcasters Association, which has created a new award to honor the state's best broadcasters. It's called the Alan Okun Award, and it's named for the late owner of Webster's WGFP (940) and WXXW (98.9). Okun was named posthumously as the award's first recipient.

• Just a few notes from NEW HAMPSHIRE: We now know more about Fuller-Jeffrey's applications for backups for WHOM (94.9) and WPKQ (103.7) atop Mount Washington; it seems they are indeed on the mountaintop, just with lower power and a bit lower down -- but they're nondirectional, unlike the WPKQ primary signal. Down the valley a bit in Conway, say goodbye to W58AY. Paxson Communications has asked the FCC to delete this LPTV, which had been a translator of WGOT (Channel 60) from Merrimack.

• It will be licensed to New Hampshire, but the story of WLPL (96.3 Walpole) is really our VERMONT news this week: The Vermont Environmental Board is hearing another appeal to the 110-foot tower that WLPL owner Gary Savoie wants to build on Bemis Hill near Athens VT. Two adjoining landowners, Sarah Ann Martin and Veronica Brelsford, have kept Savoie tied up in appeals for several years, and in the meantime WLPL remains on hold. Meantime, WMXR (93.9 Woodstock) is crossing the border in the other direction, moving its studios from Woodstock across the Connecticut River to 52 Main Street in West Lebanon NH. And the next piece of the WVMX (101.7 Stowe) mystery has revealed itself: Sage Broadcasting has applied to sell the station to "Radio Vermont Classics," which could be related to the Radio Vermont that owns WDEV AM/FM (550 Waterbury/96.1 Warren) and WLVB (93.9 Morrisville). Rumor has 101.7 going classical eventually.

• Up in MAINE, a new station is about to make its debut. WHRR (102.9 Dennysville) has been testing its transmitter, starting back on May 12. Perhaps in response to the upcoming competition, WQDY-FM (92.7) in nearby Calais has gone to 24-hour broadcasting. Sister AM WQDY (1230) remains on a 7AM - 10PM schedule. And over in Eastport, we're told high school outlet WSHD (91.7) is back on the air after some recent weather-related antenna damage. Advising the station is WQDY news director Tom McLaughlin, a onetime Boston broadcaster on WBCN (104.1) and the old WTBS (88.1, now WMBR). Moving down the coast, LPTV W20BN in Bangor has been deleted by the FCC, in large part because it was never built. As for the 830 in "Lorring ME" mentioned last week? There's speculation that it's in the FCC database as a formality, just to remind Canada that the US has a claim on that frequency (much the same way the CRTC database contains all sorts of Canadian allocations that may never be built, but must still be protected on this side of the border).

• And so onwards to RHODE ISLAND, which seems to end up with exactly one item each week. This time it's WEGM (or perhaps WKFD, if you believe the FCC database) in Wickford. This station on 1370 returned to the air last year after several years in the dark, and now there's word that it's down to weekend-only operation. When we visited WEGM last summer, we found a bunch of folks committed to doing live local radio; we hope things work out down there.

• Over to CONNECTICUT: Yet another unlicensed broadcaster seems to have popped up in Bridgeport, where a station calling itself WSPN is broadcasting on 1630. "WSPN" has a listed phone number (203 368 2253), and is apparently broadcasting in Spanish. The WSPN calls really belong to 91.1 FM at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs NY; the phony "WSPN" ought to be a decent DX catch all over the region this winter if it's still around. TV news: congratulations to Mika Brzezinski of Hartford's WFSB (Channel 3); she's been named anchor of CBS's "Up to the Minute" overnight newscast. And yes, she's Zbigniew's daughter.

• Onwards to NEW YORK, where we find a few call letter changes, starting with Odyssey Broadcasting's New York City-area country trimulcast on 107.1. You can replace WWHB Hampton Bays (LI) with WWVY and WRGX Briarcliff Manor with WWXY; no new calls yet for the third 107.1, WZVU Long Branch NJ, although WWYY seems to be available and would be the logical choice for "Y107." Also in New Jersey, the 105.7 construction permit in Manahawkin has grabbed the WAQB calls shed by WZNE (94.1 Brighton-Rochester) last month. Up in the St. Lawrence Valley, WKGG (102.7 Cape Vincent-Watertown) is now WBDR. Also in the area, WGIX (95.3 Gouverneur) has applied to change power, height, and transmitter location...more on that next issue.

  We do know more about WODZ (96.1 Rome/Utica)'s attempts to upgrade: It seems Oldies 96 wants to move from its current site on Prospect Hill near Clinton, southwest of Utica, to the Smith Hill site northeast of town where all the big Utica FMs (along with WUTR-TV 20) have their transmitters.

• The translator apps continue apace: WPCS down in Florida wants to be heard in Middletown on 88.1, while Palmyra's WZXV (99.7) wants to add 102.7 Penn Yan and 97.1 Dansville to its translator list (these are at least in WZXV's general Rochester-Syracuse listening area). And WVOA (105.1 DeRuyter-Syracuse) is apparently trying to plug every last hole in the already-overcrowded Syracuse FM dial: in addition to the simulcasts on WNDR (103.9 Mexico) and WSIV (1540 E. Syracuse) and the 96.5 Westvale-Syracuse translator on James Street near downtown, WVOA has been granted a translator on 95.3, W237AY DeWitt (which will transmit from the WAQX 95.7 stick alongside I-481), and it's applied for 98.1 in Nedrow, south of Syracuse (which we'll bet is actually one of the Sentinel Heights TV towers overlooking the city).

  Sales: WMSA (1340) in Massena is being sold to Community Broadcasting by Forever of New York, and Seneca Falls' WSFW (1110/99.3) is being sold to Souhan Radio by BJR Broadcasting.

• A few from our "What the ?!?!?!?" department: The "Salvation Radio Corporation" has actually applied for 91.9 in Brooklyn -- yes, an attempt to squeeze another FM facility into the nation's most crowded FM dial! 91.9 has long been a popular pirate channel in Brooklyn...we'll see if a licensed operation makes it there. And down in Elmira Heights, WEHH (1590) has allegedly gone to 460 watts at night -- directional! When NERW visited the site on Latta Brook Road just six weeks ago, there was but one tower on it, and 1590 sure sounded like it was running with the licensed 17 watts non-directional at night. (Actually, it sounded like about 17 watts by day as well, but that's another story!) Also in the Elmira area, it appears WCLI (1450 Corning) has applied to move to the Davis Road transmitter of sister station WCBA (1350).

  More delays in the big 1190 switch: Both WLIB New York and WOWO Fort Wayne have been granted extensions of their construction permits to add night service and to drop night power, respectively.

  A picturesque Central New York tower will soon be coming down. Syracuse's WOLF (1490) will reportedly be tearing down its flagpole-style tower on Kirkpatrick Street next month. In its place will be a normal-looking guyed tower, with a new higher-powered antenna for WLTI (105.9) up top. WLTI will join several translators atop the Imperial Gardens apartment building (across the street from the WTVH studios on James Street) under special temporary authority in the meantime.

• TV doings: Lowell Paxson picked up another one this week, adding the not-yet-built WAQF (Channel 51) Batavia to his holdings. Once WAQF is built, it will run the InfoMall network, no doubt much to the enjoyment of the Buffalo market cable viewers who will find Channel 51 as their latest must-carry addition (the third this year, after WNYB-TV 26 Jamestown and WNGS 67 Springville). Down in Binghamton, Stainless Broadcasting (the tower-building folks) are selling Fox affiliate WICZ-TV (Channel 40) to Northwest Broadcasting. The $16 million deal also includes KTVZ (Channel 21) in Bend, Oregon.

• In print: We spend a lot of time here at NERW castigating our colleagues at places like the Boston Globe and Broadcasting & Cable (don't even ask us how B&C mangled the announcement of the sale of WJZZ 1210 Frankenmuth MI -- or is that WKNX 1250 Bay City? -- this week!), but we also single out those who deserve praise, and Dean Johnson of the Boston Herald is one of them. He was the first to get the story of the WNFT sale last week, and his analysis of WNFT's history and signal woes was accurate and concise. The Globe, for whatever it's worth, pulled up five days later with a much-abbreviated version of the same story. From the bookshelf, we've had our noses buried in The Murrow Boys, Stanley Cloud and Lynne Olson's gripping tale of Edward R. Murrow's wartime crew of CBS reporters. Yes, Virginia, there was once such a thing as real reporting on commercial radio in America...

• On the Web, a few new sites to mention: Bill Pfeiffer's AIRWAVES site is recovering from the fire he suffered last winter, and now he's brought back his FCC database search engine. This one lacks the full data you'll find on the Boston Radio Archives and radiostation.com engines, but it's searchable in some very interesting ways, including by geographic area. Check it out!

  Meantime down in Florida, Shel Swartz has been busy building a Web site that honors WRKO's glory days as a top-40 rocker. Check it out, too.

  And up in Canada, there's a movement afoot to keep Peter Gzowski from retiring from his duties as host of CBC Radio's "Morningside" program at the end of the month. You'll find an on-line petition, as well as lots of information about Gzowski (who is indeed one of North America's radio treasures) at this Web page. Gzowski's last day is scheduled for May 30.

And that's our report for this week...see you next Thursday back here at NERW Central, and in the meantime we'll be off to Toronto for the long holiday weekend (and no doubt hanging breathlessly out the window as we drive by some of those fantastic multi-tower Canadian AM directionals!)