So, that's the question now? Where did I start?
Well, Knoxville and WKGN was my sixth stop. That was in 1969.
My
first on-air job was at WTHI-FM in Terre Haute, IN in 1962. I had
just turned 17 and was a rising high school senior. I think you could
have shot a cannon through that station's audience and not even winged
anyone. It was an AM-FM-TV combo, the only TV in the market, and they
were baling money. Channel 10 was, for a time, the highest per capita
grossing TV in the country. Any leftover attention (and there wasn't
much) went to radio and 99.9 percent of that went to AM. Staffers
enjoyed the comparison because FM was on 99.9 Mh. Not to worry; I was
only there for a month. I got hired in July and by mid-August the FM PD
was wondering aloud how many hours he could give me because his college
students would be back in town, expecting airtime. I went down the
street and worked for the No. 4 AM in a three station market, until I
got hired a few months later by the market leader. I was on my way.