September 21 Radio History

➦In 1943...WNYC-FM call letters debut.

WNYC began regularly scheduled broadcasts on the FM band on March 13, 1943 at 43.9 megacycles. Known originally as W39NY, the FM outlet adopted its present WNYC-FM call letters and its present frequency of 93.9 MHz within a few years.

➦In 1948..."Life With Luigi" debuted on the CBS Radio Network. It continued to March 3, 1953.

➦In 1965..KYW 1060 AM in Philadelphia flipped to an all-news format.

KYW began in 1921 in Chicago, Illinois. It was jointly owned by Westinghouse Electric Corporation and Commonwealth Edison. Westinghouse later bought out ComEd's share and became sole owner of the station.

In 1927, Westinghouse aligned its four radio stations (KYW, KDKA in Pittsburgh, WBZ in Boston and WBZA in Springfield, Massachusetts) with the NBC Blue Network, which originated from former sister station WJZ (the present-day WABC) in New York City. Westinghouse had been a founding partner of the Radio Corporation of America (RCA), NBC's original parent company.

On September 21, 1965, shortly after Westinghouse regained control of 1060 AM, the newly rechristened KYW once again dropped its NBC radio affiliation and was converted into one of the first all-news stations in the country.  Newsman Steve Porter read the first newscast. It had been edited by Fred B. Walters, the former Harrisburg bureau chief and eventual Executive Editor.

Five months earlier Westinghouse Broadcasting converted 1010WINS, KYW's New York sister station since 1962, from a Top-40 format to all-news.  A similar move was made three years later at another Westinghouse-owned station, KFWB in Los Angeles.  KYW has been one of the highest-rated radio stations in the country since that point and has been the market leader in Philadelphia for much of that time. The Westinghouse all-news trio, meanwhile, revolutionized and defined the all-news format. KYW's early format elements were shared with WINS, such as the distinctive teletype sound effect playing in the background, and the slogans "All News, All the Time", "The Newswatch Never Stops", "Listen 2, 3, 4 Times a Day" and "You Give Us 22 Minutes, We'll Give You the World".

KYW's present format runs on a 30-minute cycle. Regular segments include contains traffic and mass transit reports from Metro Traffic every ten minutes on the "twos" (six times an hour), sports updates every quarter-hour (twice an hour, at :15 and :45), weather reports as much as six times an hour (four regularly scheduled reports at :07, :14, :37 and :44 past every hour with breaking weather news plus special forecasts for the New Jersey Shore and the Poconos), and business news from Bloomberg twice an hour (at :25 and :55). When breaking news warrants, KYW will break format to provide continuous coverage of any event.



Its television sister took advantage of the radio station's popularity by incorporating a version of KYW's musical sounder into its news themes from 1991 to 2003. In addition, a television program entitled KYW Newsradio 1060 This Morning aired from 5 to 8 a.m. on sister station WPSG (channel 57) in the early 2000s, adapting KYW's "clock" to television. The show was popular among local cable programming in its daypart, and in late 2004 was usurped (due in part to a new affiliation to Traffic Pulse) by television staffers and assumed the name Wake UP News.

Westinghouse Electric announced its purchase of CBS in 1995, and upon its completion KYW became a sister station to its long-time rival, CBS-owned WGMP (1210 AM, now WPHT). That station, under its original WCAU call letters, attempted to compete with KYW in all-news programming during the late 1970s but failed, dumping the format after only three years. Today, the news format continues and the station is owned by Entercom.

KYW is currently the easternmost station in the United States whose call-sign begins with the letter K. It is also one of three such stations in Pennsylvania, the other ones being KQV and sister station KDKA, both in Pittsburgh.

➦In 1968...Harry Harrison air his last show at WMCA 570 AM. In 2-days he started at 77WABC.

From '65...

➦In 1970...Bob Grant aired first show at WMCA 570 AM as WMCA flipped from Top40 to Talk, calling itself "Dial-Log Radio."

➦In 2012... Michael Rye died at age 94.  He was born  John Michael Riorden Billsbury; March 2, 1918) and his decades-long career spanned radio, television, animated cartoons and video games. Aside from his voice over work, Rye also acted in on-screen television roles as well, including parts in Dr. Kildare and 77 Sunset Strip.

Michael Rye

He began his career during the 'Golden Age of Radio' when radio programming was at the height of its popularity. Rye, who broadcast from Chicago, participated in an average of forty network radio shows per week.

He was cast in numerous lead roles for radio shows, including Gary Curtis for the NBC soap opera, Ma Perkins; Tim Lawrence on Guiding Light; Jack Armstrong on the radio adventure series, Jack Armstrong, the All-American Boy; and Pembroke in the soap opera, Backstage Wife.

He starred in radio productions produced and broadcast from Hollywood, including the ABC crime drama, This is Your FBI; the radio anthology series, Lux Radio Theater; the radio drama, The Whistler; the CBS radio comedy, Meet Millie; and the CBS drama, Suspense. He also provided the narration for the world's first full-length recorded book, the 1969 audio adaptation of The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin