Peoria Radio: WMBD's Dave van Camp Airs From Guam

“The Markley & van Camp Show” on news/talk WMBD 1470 AM / 100.3 FM in Peoria might sound a little different this week. That tends to happen when one of the hosts is more than 7,300 miles away.

Dave van Camp, who with Jamie Markley co-hosts the four-hour weekday-afternoon radio show, arrived Monday morning in Guam, a United States territory in the western Pacific Ocean, according to pjstar.com.

From a radio station on that island, van Camp is to perform his usual on-air duties with Markley on WMBD and the four other outlets on which their program is heard. Van Camp also is to provide perspective from the flashpoint of the latest conflict between the U.S. and North Korean governments.

North Korea officials say they are devising plans to fire nuclear missiles that would strike near Guam. That might seem almost as unlikely as a radio-show host from Peoria venturing there on a spur-of-the-moment work trip.

The plan to send van Camp to “where America’s day begins” — the island is 15 hours ahead of Peoria — was hatched late Friday afternoon, according to WMBD senior vice president Mike Wild. WMBD officials were brainstorming show ideas with counterparts from the “Markley & van Camp” affiliate in Portland, Ore.

“This Guam thing is going on, what if we sent the show over there?” Wild said about how the conversation went. “We took a couple of big gulps about what the flight was going to cost, but we said, ‘This is going to be a really good opportunity.’ So we did it.”

Wild declined to reveal the expense, other than to say “A lot.” An internet search Monday morning showed the cheapest round-trip Peoria-to-Guam air fare is $2,303. Connections would be made in Detroit and Tokyo for about 28 hours of travel, including layovers.

Van Camp’s trip took about 21 hours and included stops in Chicago, San Francisco and Hawaii, according to Wild. Van Camp departed from Peoria late Saturday or early Sunday.

“I know he hasn’t had much sleep,” Wild said.

Van Camp’s first broadcast from Guam was to begin at 2 p.m. Monday (5 a.m. Tuesday, local time) and continue daily through at least Thursday. He has arranged to interview Guam Gov. Eddie Calvo and other officials, as well as local residents, according to Wild.


Besides Peoria and Portland, “Markley & van Camp” also is aired on radio stations in Anchorage, Alaska; Orlando, Fla.; and Oklahoma City. Wild acknowledged van Camp’s long-distance voyage is good publicity for the show and for WMBD, but the journalistic rationale is paramount.