National Radio Day

 

My 1955 Granco radio

I'll note my 34th anniversary in radio broadcasting in a few weeks.

But today is National Radio Day.

I love TV. In fact, I love all forms of broadcasting. That's why I embraced internet streaming also. From a talent perspective, a lot of things remain the same in terms of how we present games and shows.

There are obvious differences in terms of the vehicles we use. 

But radio, much like baseball, was my first love.

Turning an AM radio dial and picking up Atlanta, Charlotte, Pittsburgh, Chicago, Boston, and Washington D.C. during the overnight house always fascinated me. St. Louis, Toronto, Detroit, and Cincinnati were among the other far-off places I could get late at night.

There was a time when I had to rely on a radio station in Wheeling, W.V. to listen to the Steelers. WWVA had a 50,000-watt signal that I could pick up in Mahopac at night. However, day games couldn't be heard that far off.

But my radio story begins with WABC, the famed music radio station. It also included listening to Yankees games and other sports.

I was enchanted.

Eventually, I caught on to Don Imus On WN...hold on...WNNNNNNNNNNBC.

Then along came Z-100 in the formative years of the 1980s. What I wanted to do began to crystallize.

So it came that I found myself behind the microphone at Majic 105 as Sep 2, 1990 began. 

I was where I belonged.

But it was never that easy. I was fortunate to get my foot in the door but, as we know, the broadcasting business is rough and tumble. Politics, egos, and the grind are just a couple of pieces of the story.

And so it was that I was actually out of broadcasting for a few years. I used the time to work and continue going to school.

A fateful phone call in 1996 brought me back into the business at WREF in Ridgefield. As my corporate career was closing due to our jobs relocating to Chicago, I thought I had found a radio home.

I was wrong. WREF was sold just a few months after I started working there part-time. I helped close things by being their "assistant general manager." I was the last radio voice heard at the studios on Route 35 in Ridgefield.

It took a story in the Ridgefield Press, handed to me during that air shift, to find out that we were done.

But friends from WREF recommended me to another radio station and shortly after I began at WGCH.

I've been there for 27 years.

Since then, I've been heard on a lot of other outlets like Z-93, WLNA, WBNR, WVIP, WGHQ, WLIE, WMVL, WICC, and so many others as part of networks that I got to be on. Plus, of course, all of the internet work I've done, most notably on Robcasting.

It remains a joy. A happy place. A place to forget my troubles.

I know the pitfalls of radio. I know how programming frustrates me and, believe me, I'm happy to have at least a small say in the events at WGCH. I think I've earned that after all these years.

We can still do radio -- or audio broadcasting if you will. It needs to be live, local, and relatable. 

And it needs support.

It doesn't need the same three songs played every hour. It definitely doesn't need to be network programming delivered via a studio hundreds of miles away.

Radio is still meant to be a pace of information and discovery.

A place of community.

And it still, in my opinion, matters.

Sadly, I won't be on the air anywhere today. I'll be doing PA announcing for the Renegades on "Bhutan Night" at Heritage Financial Park. I suppose, in that way, you'll hear me on the Renegades Baseball Network broadcast.

But I'll be back on the air soon enough to talk sports or The Beatles or call a game. Or maybe I'll be needed for news (it's been a while).

You never know. That's part of what I love about it.

To the many who have enriched this wild ride of a career, I wish you a happy National Radio Day.

Turn it on and leave it on.