Ed...you haven't changed a bit! Photo is Ed Brantley, circa- 1973!

101 visited the "Ed and Bob Show" on WNOX 100.3, here's part of our conversation~

Guess who was #1 back in '72?

In 1982 WRJZ was purchased by Sherwood-Hennes and it went country!

Steve Bridgewater aka Dr Don West was brought in to program the station known as "My Kind of Country"...

The afternoon DJ and Music Director was Jessica James, "The Lady Outlaw" (photo).

The station sounded great and '82 was a fun year...I was a DJ there!

PS~ One of the recurring highlights was 7-12 jock Bob Ziegler describing the nightly World's Fair fireworks exploding, which were visible from the station.

Happy Birthday to WIVK's Hoss (Ron Cantwell). Only Hoss and Terry Womack have anchored the overnight show on WIVK for the past 40 years, now voiced tracked...

Here are some answers to questions from yesterday~

"The commercial remembered was for Snuffy's variety store in Jimtown, home of the Big Orange Dope. The original "this here's me for Snuffy's" was Carson "King of the Morning". When he moved on, an Oak Ridge High School student named Dave Lambert assumed the role of "me for Snuffy's." About the time he left, the Snuffster's advertising began winding down. I think Carson ended up as a veterinarian, and Dave became a big security honcho at the Oak Ridge plants. We did do a big campaign on the air when WATE-TV was going to pre-empt Saturday Night Live to show a local movie. But I can't remember who voiced all that....I've fired a few too many synapses since then to remember how that went down." (Mike Beverly WOKI Survivor)

"George, Is Marvin talking about "This is me for Snuffy's"? I loved his commercials on WOKI in the late 70's and early 80's! I'd really love to know who "me" was!" (Terry West)

"In reply to Marvin Hoffman, the character was either “Me For Snuffy’s” or “The Reverend Judge Noose Coolidge”. “Coolidge” was a creation of Mike Beverley but I forget who did “Me”. (500 MegaWatt)

Since 1980 WIVK-FM has only had 2 DJs host the 10a-3p time slot, Bob Thomas and Colleen Addair. Happy Birthday wishes to Colleen!!!

From the 101 InBox...

"First of all, I love this site! What a trip down memory lane! Now I have a question...During the ‘70s, I remember a funny on WOKI, where the voice would speak sort of like foghorn leghorn and would talk about some place in “downtown Jamestown”. Also, he would do like funny “public service announcements”. And if I’m not terribly mistaken he did an editorial about the local NBC affiliate taking off Saturday Night Live. I’m certain it was on WOKI, as that was pretty much the only station I listened to, and I remember listening to the King Biscuit Flower Hour on it. Sunday nights I believe. Anyway thanks."(Marvin Hoffman)

The 101 Audio Vault sticks with Brother John~

Brother John St John is a big part of Ktown radio folklore...for years he howled in the nighttime on WOKI FM 100 and featured "boogie check".

From the 101 Audio Vault, here's Brother John~

As you can hear, the 1490 signal at night was weak...but The Brothers still sounded strong! In this 101 Audio Vault clip they mention Barry Tucker aka...Mike Beck!

Happy Birthday to Mike!

Today we feature more from the new 100.3 including photos of Bob Thomas, me and Ed, and the new control board!

In the beginning was the word...and check out these fun words, the morning intro for "Ed and Bob" on WNOX 100.3~

I was excited to be on the air with "Ed and Bob" when I visited Ktown this past week. These are photos from their new studios for WNOX 100.3!

Page 3...

Happy Birthday to Gary Adkins!

In late '76 WOKI FM 100 had a new afternoon DJ, he was known as Bad Leroy Brown...

530-10 Johnny Pirkle
10-3 Russ Skinner
3-7 Bad Leroy Brown
7-12 Mike Beverly
12-530 JL Myers

101 has been invited to join "Ed and Bob" Friday morning on the air to talk old times! I worked with them at WIVK in the 70's!

If you are in East Tennessee tune in Friday to WNOX 100.3 FM!

BTW...I'm visiting Ktown to celebrate my niece's wedding as Christen Vavalides and Colby Fleming are getting married on Saturday!

Very few DJs have worked at one station for 30 years...one exception is Coyote Calhoun (PD) at WAMZ in Louisville. Coyote signed the station on the air in 1980 and is still a DJ working afternoon drive. You can hear Coyote via the "I Heart Radio" app...

And BTW, Coyote was Jack Diamond on WKGN. 101 heard from Coyote...

"1973 I was 19 years old and having the time of my life in a college town like Knoxville. I mean did it get any better than that!"


Today the 101 Audio Vault travels back to the 70's and Ed Brantley on WIVK~

Let's stay on the morning man theme today. From the 101 Audio Vault here's Curtis Parham in the very early days of WRJZ~

Back in the 70's when AM radio was still king, 10k watt WNOX did battle with 1k watt WKGN. Both stations sounded great and had wonderful DJ line ups.

One of the mainstays at WNOX was morning DJ and Program Director Eddy Roy~



Did you work at WNOX 990...send 101 your photographs and memories!

John Long was Kincaid at WNOX back in the 60's! These days John is involved with the Georgia Radio Hall of Fame and is cranking up the same in Tennessee.

If you're on Facebook you can send a friend request to~

TennesseeRadio HallofFame

Here's a classic moment from the 101 Audio Vault, Birdman chatting with Rick Dees on WKVQ...

101 recently wrote about the early days of automation...

"When I was at WIMZ in 1981-1982 we had a sister station playing Al Ham's Music Of Your Life that was automated with the latest and greatest equipment...a big black monster that took up an entire room. Occasionally one of, or all three of, the 50+ cart carousels would lose programming and switch between two carts as if unable to decide which to play. This resulted in a terrible clacking noise that disrupted the entire radio station. We would walk by, not miss a step...just grab it and spin it...problem solved. Sort of a pre-computer "control/alt/delete" move. We had several socially unacceptable phrases to describe what the unit was doing when this occurred. In the year 4329 AD I'm sure some archaeologist will dig that thing up, put it in a museum and wonder what it's purpose was." (Jerry Howell)

From the 101 Audio Vault we travel back to '76 again. Scott Sams was on a broadcast mission from day one at WBLC radio to WBIR TV 10 to Dallas Texas TV! Here's Scott as Night Bird on WNOX 990~

I believe the modern day verbiage is "voice tracking"...back in the 70's it was referred to as "automation" and that's how WOKI FM 100 debuted back in '74 along with the moniker "The Only One".

Bill Miller aka Suitcase Simpson is still on the radio, back in '75 he was the "automated" 3-7p jock on WOKI~

530-10 Johnny Pirkle
10-12 Russ Skinner
12-3 Chris Alexander
3-7 Suitcase Simpson
7-12 Mike Beverly
12-530 JL Myers

Knoxville radio had many wonderful DJ choices at night back in the spring of '75...

WKGN's 7-12 jock was Rick Davis, Jimmy Vineyard was the pm DJ at WIVK, Joe Crotty was at 620 WETE, Mike Beverly (MRB) anchored the WOKI airwaves, Leslie Schieler was at W-149, and that spring WNOX welcomed "The Aardvark"~



Page 3...

Happy Birthday to WIVK's Channing Smith. Channing has been behind the frog news mic for almost 30 years!

With all of this week's hoopla 101 forgot to say happy birthday to the legendary Mike Beach (on 8/2).

Mike was in Ktown radio for decades and worked at many of the dial positions including the morning drive at Rock 104 (WIMZ 103.5).

Back in April '75 the WKGN line up featured Dr. Al Adams in the morning, Frank Erwin middays, Mike from 3-7p, Rick Davis at night, and Bob Thomas was the overnight jock.

Here's Mike on WKGN~



Page 3...

Congrats to Bill Haslam for winning the Republican nomination for Tennessee Governor.

Congrats to Tim Burchett for becoming the new Knox County Mayor. 101 went to Bearden High with Tim's sister Joyce!

This is the website logo for the new WNOX-FM (click to visit the site)...

The morning team is on Twitter at Ed_and_Bob...you can find 101 on Twitter at TalkGeorge!

100.3

Versus

98.7

Knoxville radio history is made fresh daily, tomorrow appears to be a monumental day...

• 100.3 FM which is owned by John Pirkle returns to his domain
• Ed Brantley after 42 years at WIVK was hired to join 100.3 as GM and DJ
• Bob Thomas, Dave Hooker, and Terry Fair were added to the line up
• Ktown will have 2 FM talkers with excellent local and syndicated talent
• The power of one versus the other appears to be a story...100k versus 8k

101 wishes both stations the best and am glad that modern technology allows me to listen to stations via the web and apps!

Opinions are flying, 101 heard from AD (Alan Douglas)~

"I was driving down to the Tri-Cities to work on my two "peashooter" FM's there and had a chance to listen to Citadel's truly bizarre programming on 100.3 this past week. Of course, they were directing listeners to turn to 98.7 for Rush, Phil, Hannity, etc., but were also playing some absolutely horrible music, some old audio clips, and I even heard a bit of "War of the Worlds!"...Good luck to Pirkle, Ed, Bob, and company. This should be an interesting battle between a "blowtorch" and the "A-List" syndicated talkers on a lesser signal." (Alan Sneed)