Your favorite era, and station that influenced you...

[Johnny Caudle]

The two stations I enjoyed the most while growing up was Mix 104.7 - WMXC and EZ 102.9 - WEZC in Charlotte.

[CrazeeCarroll1]

WOW!!! I love it when these kinds of topics come up. For me in the 80's the stations I always love to listen to that really got the "radio bug" in me was WKSF (Kiss FM) and WROQ, Z100, and WBCY. Hearing the likes of Brother Bill on Kiss with the balls to the wall attitude and hearing John Boy & Billy on WBCY or Hearing Kahuna, Animal and the rest really showed me how magical radio could be... Radio back then was fun and really put that "I can do it" attitude in me... I am not sure how the teens of today will look at radio 20 years from now, but I am willing to bet that the generation will not have the same passion in the biz the way we did or currently do... CC1

[Kent Dorsey]

I think we can all admit it was a neat way to grow up in your teens working for a station...
Things that seem primitive now, like turning on the tower lights manually when I signed the AM station off... seeing static electricity off of a tower after a 4:30am thunderstorm...
I got my first job when I was 14, by the time I was 19 I just knew I couldn't do this when I was 40... but it sure was a fun thing to do at that age (and the equipment was fun back then...) and a different day when people depended on the local station more...

[quadraphonic]

Growing up one of the first things I can remember is listening to WFLB 1490 Fayetteville on the way to my Termite League ballgames. Must have been the summer of '76 cause I remember the Bicentennial was everywhere, and they played "Sara Smile" a lot. On the way to the games, we drove right by the station [up behind the McDonald's] in the Dart and saw the dj in the window, heard the pop-top 40 in the ledge in the back window [seat belts, who needed 'em?], Climax Blues Band, Firefall, James Brown, Hall & Oates, whatever was popular. They always seemed like they were having fun. I can only remember Dr. Larry "Records" Cannon as a dj, off the top of my head now, but I remember they did things that made you want to keep listening. And the bumber stickers were all over town.

During the late 70s-mid 80s I almost always listened to WFLB.
Then Q98 WQSM decided to drop their automation and throw on some top-40 with dj's that were more exciting than the automation. And it was no static at all. They let us listen to them when we got to listen to the radio at school. I still listened to WFLB a lot until they changed format in the later 80s.

I would however cheat on them for the couple of years when 94Z WZZU was around, and for the couple of years D103 was playing rap from Dunn.
Mid80s I would also listen to WDCG G105 and WGNI 102.7 and 93-DLX WDLX sometimes, for some variety.
My uncle lived in Charlotte and when we'd go there I'd always try to listen to WBCY.

Those were good times for radio, and I can't really remember any personal attachment to any radio stations since then.

[Kent Dorsey]

Thanks Quad... I interviewed with Larry Cannon at WFLB when I left WXIK to go to school in Fayetteville. At the time he asked me if I would consider part time work. I was not major market material but must have thought I was at that time, and I told him I wasn't interested.
I have regretted that years later that I didn't atleast try to get on part time there to "expand my horizons"... but I was probably tired of radio by then and didn't pursue it.

[The danimal]

95.7 WXRC in the late 80's-early 90's.  They were one of the most well rounded rock stations of all time mixing old and new rock with metal and alternative (before both those genres were so mainstream).  WRFX was OK, but way to tightly formatted.  'XRC wasn't afraid to take risks back then breaking new artists and playing bands and songs you couldn't hear anywhere else on the radio at the time.  If only they could be like that again and be truly 'independent'.

[fortmill]

When I first came to the South Carolina, I lived about 65 miles SE of Charlotte (Sandhills of Chesterfield CO.) way out in the country, and there I was a 21 year old suddenly cut off from pop culture.  Thank god for 61 Big WAYS which came in like a local (at the time I didn't realize I was in the main lobe) and made my life bearable.  My GE tube radio was glued to 610AM.  A few years later, I went to Columbia and brought home one of those new-fangled Sony SOLID STATE AM/FM table radios with genuine walnut case.  I planned to listen to the new WROQ, but found it a bore (automated).  Instead I found WFIG-FM101.3 (now WWDM) broadcasting from Sumter (60 miles out) with 3000 watts.  WOW, what a revelation--I couldn't get enough R&B---my listening habits were changed forever....   

[Richard Howard]

I also remember Nashville's 1510 WLAC with Ernie's Record Mart being advertised as the source for the great music of the era in the late 50's, also I recall WKBW 1520 from Buffalo while at an USAF tech school at Syracuse University back in the very early 60's.

What I do remember very well from growing up in north Florida during the 40's, 50's, and 60's was the original WAPE 690 in Jacksonville.  There were two brothers, Dan and Cyril Brennan, from Birmingham I believe, who built three powerful stations. One was a 50KW daytimer, WBAM "The Big BAM", on 740 in Montgomery, and the still operating high power WVOK in Birmingham.  The third was WAPE - the Brennans got the 690 frequency licensed for northeast Florida and built a 25KW daytimer based in Orange Park, Florida which is just southwest of Jacksonville.  I remember seeing the original transmitter cabinets at the "Radio Country Club" on US 17 along the St. Johns River.  The transmitter seemed to be a "home brew" rig that I suspect the Brennans designed and built, using two large glass envelope tubes in the final RF stage that were each about the size of a large Freon cylinder.  I recall that at morning signon during the few seconds of final tune-up before audio was applied, one could hear a faint amount of AC ripple in the carrier as the plate DC voltage was brought up to designed level.  The single tower's ground system was in a marshy area that experienced some salt water as that area of the river had tidal influence from the Atlantic ocean.  This helped the 25KW signal reach well up into coastal South Carolina.  This was the station that originated the Big Ape Calls, no doubt from a cartridge machine, many times each hour and of course with station IDs.  There was a special afternoon program around 4PM to 4:30PM each weekday that used the tune "Flip Flop and Bop" as its intro... if that didn't get you jumpin', nothin would!

The arrival of the "high power" 25KW WAPE - The Mighty 690, marked a turning point in northeast Florida radio which up until that time had only 5KW stations including WPDQ 600, WJAX 930, WJHP 1320, and WMBR 1460.  WIVY, a 1KW daytimer on 1050, came along somewhere in that period.

The original WAPE transmitter site, albeit now with a 50KW transmitter and probably with the third steel tower (the salt water and high average humidity seemed to shorten the lifetimes of towers there) is, I believe, still the the home of the current WOKV's strong daytime non-directional signal.   

[coolone]

I believe the original WAPE daytime tower was directly behind the studio on Highway 17 in Orange Park.  Sad that the building doesn't exist anymore.  Not sure exactly where the current daytime tower is.  Back in the '60's and '70's, driving from Columbia to Myrtle Beach on Highway 378,  we would listen to "Big WAYS 61" (cool jingles) from Sumter to Conway. Then we'd switch to the Big Ape.  At night at the beach, we could pull in Professor Sonny Eppes on WQOK 1440  in Greenville. Great radio back then, no doubt about it!!

[thecarolinascoop]

OK guys. I moved to North Carolina in 1986. Growing up in Flint/Davison, Michigan, I always listened to the full-service 1330 WTRX during the late 70s and early 80s. My dad, meantime, listened to cross-town rival 1470 WKMF, which played a mix of old and "current" country....

After moving to Mooresville, I got hooked on 95.1 WROQ. I used to sleep in a recliner listening to "The Q."  College days, I'd be home listening to Kiss 102 (hey Droopy!) and eventually Magic 96....

I feel like I had a great radio career while in college and for several years after graduation. WBZK AM/FM; The Piedmont Superstations; WHYM/WSIC, WLON...I've been blessed to have the experiences in radio I have had....

Today, I like to listen to WKBC and (most of the time) CDs I burn....

Radio today doesn't have the imagination it used to. We can thank computers and automation for that....