Happy Monday!

So what else was happening in Ktown in early '73? Your Dave Young was working afternoons at WNOX, Allen Keller and Bud Veazy were Ktown TV personalities, Jim Clark joined WETE radio, Larry Robinson was offered a basketball scholarship at UT, and 101 went to work for the first time...at the Ivanhoe House of Beef as a busboy!

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"Is there anyway you could tell me who the DJ's were on 93.1 around 1992 or 1993 before it became Star 93.1? The station was still playing Pop but also played quite a bit of rap and hip/hop at that time. I just can't remember the DJ's, especially the Morning DJ's before Toddzilla." (Steve Hancock)

Happy Birthday wishes to "Jack Diamond"...does the name ring a bell?

Jack and his side kick "Guerrilla" invaded Ktown's 7-midnight time slot in early '73 at WKGN 1340. Jack was destined for greener pastures and moved to WAKY in Louisville Kentucky....and he's still in Louisville and still on the air.

In 1980 Jack joined WAMZ (country) and has been there ever since, he's the Program Director and afternoon personality.

Here's the WKGN line up at that time~

6-9 Bob Baron

9-12 Frank Erwin

12-3 Chris Hampton

3-7 Wayne Bernard

7-12 Jack Diamond 

12-6 Jerry Steel

Weekends- Sonny Knight, Ken Burger, and Jack Gregory

News- Walker Johnson, Jim Goodman, Joe Anderson, and Mary Glen Martin

In the fall of 1976 15Q featured Suitcase Simpson, Shotgun Kelly, The Brothers, Charlie Fox...and the zany morning duo of Chuck Baron and Eddie Beacon~

Happy Chinese New Year...it's the year of the dragon!

101 always enjoys receiving photographs and memories...this is a classic of Eddie Beacon "The Swingin' Deacon"!

This is a classic photo of Dolly and former Ktown DJ Tony Eubanks! When I joined WIVK in '76 as a weekend jock Tony was working the 7p-midnight slot. Tony now resides in Jacksonville, Florida!

Happy Hump! Here's a 101 Reload~

Today 101 takes a look back...30 years to the summer of '80!

The #1 country song as June arrived was "He Stopped Loving Her Today" by George Jones.

Celeste was the midday DJ at WIVK, soon to be replaced by Bob Thomas (of course Bob returns on 8-2 to 100.3's new morning show).

Phil Williams was working 10a-2 on WNOX 990. Other DJs there were Eddie Rogers, Randy Miller, Scott Majors, Tom Michaels, and James Maurice.

WKGN was known as "Love 13" and featured Jeff Winters, POA with a talk show from 9a-noon, Arch Bishop, and Chuck Edwards.

Bob Kagan left WRJZ for WBCY Charlotte and was replaced by JJ Scott as Operation Manager and Fred Story as Program Director.

A new country night club opened that summer in West Knoxville. It was called Sam Houston's and Jamey Kerr and I were the DJs!

In Oak Ridge WOKI's line up was Michael Henry Martin from 6-10a, Gary Adkins 10-noon, Joe Blackmon noon-3p, Mike Beverly 3-7p, Brother John 7-12, and The Brothers at midnight.

The April/May ARB ratings were-

WEZK 19.9

WIVK-FM 19.7

WRJZ 10.5

WIVK 9.9

WOKI 8.3

WNOX 7.1

WIMZ 6.1

Mike Beach was morning DJ at WIMZ but left for Kansas City...Kerry Lambert, Kim Mayo, Dave Elrod, and Carson Cooper could also be heard on Rock 104!

And in September '80 Bob Kesling left WIVK radio to become Sports Director at WBIR-TV Channel 10...

Did you use to dial twist back in the day? I enjoyed finding radio stations in Nashville, Atlanta, Cleveland, Louisville, even Chicago, etc...

The 101 Audio Vault steps out of the box today, here's an aircheck I recorded of Steve King on WLS Chicago back in the mid 70's~

The 101 Audio Vault features The Aardvark on WNOX...plus the voices of Scott Sams and Eddy Roy~

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"Hey George...As to what happened to Ann Alexander the last time I saw her was in the early 80s. She had moved back home to Wilmington, NC and was the anchor lady on one of the local channels there. By then, Ann changed her moniker back to Stella Stevens...her maiden name. Ann/Stella was a wonderful person and I had some great times with her at 62/WETE in the mid 70s!" (Bill Beason)

Happy Hump Day...time to read the 101 InBox~

"So where is Ann Alexander these days? She and J. Worthington Smith are two of the K-Town jocks that just seem to disappear." (500 Mega Watt)

"Hi George...I was wondering if you (or your readers) know what might have become of the "Stories of Christmas" wraparounds/vignettes that used to air in syndication around the country in the 70's and 80's. They were about a minute each and the narrator told of various Christmas traditions around the world. Our local station, WEZK in Knoxville, TN, used to air them and I've often wondered about them. Is it possible to get hold of any copies? Thanks!"  (Bill Edwards)

"Looking for a way to contact Jack Bean." (George Wilkinson)

Happy Monday...101 wants to hear from you, send photographs and memories to KtownRadio@gmail.com!

One month before "The New 62 WRJZ" debuted, Walker Johnson was still working afternoons at the predecessor WETE.

The 101 Audio Vault features Walker along with Mark McKinney and Ann Alexander~

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Back in the day a local teacher named Worley McKinney aka Worley Max climbed the WIVK survey charts with several songs that he wrote and performed. 101 gives a shout out to the old ball coach!!!

101 travels to July 1985...

The jock line up at WOKI-FM 100 included The Animal in the morning, Jeff Jarnigan middays, Charlie Wheeler afternoons, and Shotgun Stevens at night!

The top rated stations in Ktown were...WIVK-FM #1, followed by WIMZ, WEZK, WOKI, and WMYU.

...and the first baseman for the Knoxville minor league team was~ Cecil Fielder!

Happy 2012!

The 70's featured many "rock wars"...WNOX and WKGN were in the midst of an epic battle for listeners, both sounded great. WRJZ joined the party in late '76...and earlier that year W-149 had morphed into the major market sounding 15Q, great memories!

PS- If you noticed, these were all AM stations as FM was still only slowly becoming king of the dial...WOKI had changed everything by debuting in '74 on 100.3 FM with a booming and clear sound out of Oak Ridge.

Many great DJs planted their flags in Ktown in the 70's...Wayne Bernard aka Charlie Chase, Kid Curry on 15Q then for decades in Miami, and a guy who helped make disco famous~ Dick Winstead! A few years before the disco revolution Dick was working drive time at WNOX~

I was hired at WIVK to be a weekend DJ back in '76, same time I started UT as an 18 year old freshman...Bobby Denton was running the on air operations at that time, and he was Music Director too.

We had two turntables in our control room...actually had one control room, a production room, and the news room. A few years later the boarded up "old" control room was rebuilt into a nice AM facility.

Our formatting was simple...Bobby picked the records but the DJs on the air picked what to play...we had 5 categories, pick hits and A, B, C, and D groupings...and a back wall filled with hundreds of albums. Our conscience was our listeners who called the request line...the old "you say it and we play it" format...and it worked. I recall WIVK owned about 1/3 of the Ktown audience at that time.

Back then the station was located on Bearden Hill...and the "addition" was still a few years away. The lower level had space for a couple of offices, including Bobby's which always had stacks of records piled on it.

...and of course the sweet smell of stogies was always in the air, to this day when I smell a cigar I'm instantly returned to WIVK.

It was a good time...good people that were part of a special company!

So goodbye 2011...101 is looking forward to a grand new year! Keep the photographs and memories coming our way!!!

WKGN, circa '68~

"I remember WATO and WETQ...It was still owned by Rau Radio at the time. I got my first job in radio there in 1982 after attending Russ Skinner's Professional Academy of Broadcasting and following my stint as an Antique Photos photographer at the World's Fair. I was interviewed and hired by PD Jeff Mosier, aka J.J. Jeffries. I worked the morning drive shift, which was my first experience in going to work before the sun came up -- quite a departure from my previous life as a professional student majoring in partying! The news director at the time was (Margaret?) Fifield and the station manager was Ken Mynatt, who I think I heard was working in the sheriff's department in Kingston,TN...correct me if I'm wrong. WATO is where I became an avid Braves fan after working the boards for both Braves and UT football games. I still have dreams about being on the air in that old building on the dead end Eastburn Lane in Oak Ridge -- it was dilapidated even then! I still drive by it every now and then, which probably fuels the dreams, and it is almost in shambles. The last time I was there, the old tower was lying in tall grass in the back. A few months after being hired, WATO changed its format to Big Band/Oldies or, as it was referred to by J.J., "music by dead people." Needless to say, he wasn't very happy about the change and soon left for greener pastures -- unfortunately I lost touch with him after he left. I eventually became program director at WATO and also worked infrequently on the country side (WETQ-FM). Other people I worked with before leaving included Greg Patterson, Tommy Rowe, Melanie and David Shirk, who was hired as our news director. I left WATO in 1983 to take a job as a news anchor at U102, which was still in Sevierville at the time, working for and with Roger Hawkins (News Director), David Henley, Mike Clark and Darla Medway. I remember working in the news department the day the space shuttle Challenger blew up...very sad. I also got to meet Dolly Parton and dub the original music to cassettes used by Dollywood as the park’s background music when it opened in 1986 -- it was all Dolly Parton songs as I recall. Dolly's manager had called me (I had become production manager position by then) and asked if I could work with Dolly to dub and select the songs to be used. She was going to come by the station to do it, but he told me not to tell anyone for fear of a crowd showing up. I kept the secret, sort of...about 30 minutes before she was to arrive, I decided to at least tell PD Bill Miller and Gary Downs (station manager) about it. Somehow word spread, and a crowd showed up anyway! I remember how friendly and natural Dolly was. She put me totally at ease as we worked together in the old production room in Sevierville. I remember she put her hand on my arm as we talked -- I didn't wash that arm for weeks. U102 DJ's at the time included Dave Dunaway, Tom Van Hart, Larry Trotter, Phil Jarnigan, and Mark Herzog. Later, CP and Walker and Jeff Jarnigan also joined the staff just before the station moved to Knoxville at 8419 Kingston Pike in an old bank building in front of the BooksAMillion at Walker Springs Rd. I ended up realizing I couldn't make enough money in radio to attract a wife, given that my rugged, good looks weren't doing the trick, so I went back to school and became a software developer. Now I have a wife and 2 daughters who, thankfully, look like their mother. Sorry to be long- winded, but waxing nostalgic is fun! Love the blog -- keep up the good work." (Bill Edwards)

101 travels to April 1984...

The NCAA basketball announcers on CBS were Gary Bender and Billy Packer...college All Americans included Michael Jordan, Patrick Ewing, and Wayman Tisdale!

The Atlanta Braves infield included Bob Watson 1B, Glenn Hubbard 2B, Rafael Ramirez SS, and Bob Horner played 3B.

On the 102.1 FM dial position (U-102) the line up was 6-10 Mark Herzog, 10-3 Tom Van Hart, 3-7 Larry Trotter, 7-12 Jeff Freeman, and 12-6 Bill Bailey.

Democrats running for President included Walter Mondale and Gary Hart.

Sam Brown returned to Ktown TV and WATE from KDKA in Pittsburgh.

...and Steve Harrison joined WIMZ!

Merry Christmas from 101!

"I recently read the Dec. 12 column regarding the death of Bill Burkett. I remember him well because my father, Jerry Adams, General Manager of U102, spoke so highly of him. I am writing to add a small fact about the opening of U102 and the song "Amazing Grace" being the first song played. Dad always opened a new station with "Amazing Grace" at every radio station he managed. Dad passed away 24 years ago. Dad loved radio. He was bitten by the radio bug when he began as a young DJ in Mississippi. His career continued with Mr. Mooney beginning in Knoxville where was over programming, then on to manage WMAK in Nashville and later returning to Knoxville/Sevierville to manage U102. Due to ill health he tried to retire from broadcasting but later decided to return as an owner of a radio station in Jackson, TN.  Dad passed away a few years later. Mr. Mooney said "If there is radio in heaven, Jerry is showing God how to run it!" Dad always said "once it got in your blood you could not get away from it". My mother and sisters visited with Mr. Mooney this summer in Knoxville as my nephew was graduating from UT. I had not seen Mr. Mooney since I was a young girl riding on his boat to the Vols game. My Mom always kept in touch with him and knew he had returned to the states from Anguilla. It was such a delight to visit with him. He hadn't changed a bit...that same great smile and wonderful "radio" voice. I believe Dad was right...radio does get in your blood. Thank you for the wonderful site. It was a pleasure to read and reflect on good memories. Best regards!" (Cynthia Adams Wardell)