➦In 1854....Edward Willis Scripps (Died – March 12, 1926). He was a newspaper publisher and founder of The E. W. Scripps Company, a diversified media conglomerate, and United Press news service. It became United Press International (UPI) when International News Service (INS) merged with United Press in 1958. The E. W. Scripps School of Journalism at Ohio University is named for him.
Both E. W. and his half-sister Ellen worked with his older half-brother, James when he founded The Detroit News in 1873. E. W. started as an office boy at the paper. In 1878, with loans from his half-brothers, E. W. went on to found The Penny Press (later the Cleveland Press) in Cleveland. With financial support from sister Ellen, he went on to begin or acquire some 25 newspapers. This was the beginning of a media empire that is now the E. W. Scripps Company.
In 1907, Scripps created United Press Associations, later the UPI news service, from smaller regional news services. Scripps later said "I regard my life's greatest service to the people of this country to be the creation of the United Press", to provide competition to the Associated Press.
➦In 1905....James Kern Kyser born in Rocky Mount NC (Died at age 80 from a heart attack – July 23, 1985). Known as Kay Kyser, he was a bandleader and radio personality of the 1930s and 1940s.
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| Kay Kyser |
Although Kyser and his orchestra gained fame through the "Kollege of Musical Knowledge," they were a successful band in their own right. They had 11 number one records, including some of the most popular songs of the late 1930s and early 1940s.
The band scored more than two dozen top 10 hits, including “Three Little Fishes”, “Jingle, Jangle, Jingle”, “The Old Lamplighter”, “There Goes that Song Again”, “Ole Buttermilk Sky”, “Managua Nicaragua”, “On a Slow Boat to China” & “Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition.” One of his singers, Mike Douglas, went on to be a star of daytime TV.
➦In 1908...Bud Collyer born Clayton Johnson Heermance Jr. in NYC, (Died – September 8, 1969). He was was a radio actor/announcer who became one of the nation's first major television game show stars. He is best remembered for his work as the first host of the TV game shows Beat the Clock and To Tell the Truth, but he was also famous in the roles of Clark Kent/Superman on radio and in animated cartoons, initially in theatrical short subjects and later on television. He also recorded a number of long-playing 33 1/3 R.P.M. record albums for children. Some of these had Bible stories, in keeping with his strong connections with his church & deep spirituality.
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| Bud Collier |
Collyer got his first helping of game shows when he co-hosted ABC's (the former NBC Blue network) Break the Bank with future Miss America Pageant mainstay Bert Parks; and, when he was picked to host the radio original of the Mark Goodson-Bill Todman team's first game, Winner Take All. Collyer went on to host the television versions of both shows.
➦In 1911...Sportscaster Russ Hodges (June 18, 1910 – April 19, 1971) was an American sportscaster who did play-by-play for several baseball teams, most notably the New York and San Francisco Giants.
Born in Dayton, Tennessee, Hodges began his broadcasting career in 1934. He was sports editor of WBT, Charlotte, North Carolina until October 1941, when he moved full-time to WOL in Washington, D.C., where he had already been doing play-by-play for the Washington Redskins.[2] He worked for the Chicago Cubs, Chicago White Sox, Washington Senators, and Cincinnati Reds before landing in New York City with the New York Yankees and New York Giants, who during much of the 1940s only broadcast home games and shared the same radio team — lead announcer Mel Allen and No. 2 man Hodges.
From April 14, 1948 to April 22, 1949, Hodges hosted the 15-minute DuMont series Scoreboard, also known as Russ Hodges' Scoreboard. In 1949, Hodges became a No. 1 announcer when the Giants and the Yankees separated their radio networks to each broadcast a full, 154-game schedule. He would be the voice of the Giants for the next 22 seasons on both coasts.
Hodges was at the mike for Bobby Thomson’s 1951 home run, the so-called ‘Shot Heard Round the World.’ “The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!” He suffered a sudden & fatal heart attack April 19 1971 at age 59.
➦In 1939… the CBS radio network first aired radio drama The Adventures of Ellery Queen.
With Hugh Marlowe in the title role, Ellery Queen moved to NBC radio in 1942, airing until 1944. From 1945 to 1947, it was heard once again on CBS, returning to NBC in 1947 and then moved to ABC radio (1947–1948). The premise was that a mystery would be dramatized, but then interrupted when a panel of celebrities would attempt to solve it.
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| Dave Garroway |
If "Monitor" had failed, NBC Radio would have disappeared decades before it did. But it worked -- indeed, it was a smash hit with listeners, advertisers and critics. It quickly became NBC Radio's biggest moneymaker and kept NBC in the radio business. Simply put, "Monitor" became the biggest thing in radio.
➦In 1961…CBS Radio aired the final episode of "Gunsmoke." In the late 1940s, CBS chairman William S. Paley, a fan of the Philip Marlowe radio serial, asked his programming chief, Hubell Robinson, to develop a hardboiled Western series, a show about a "Philip Marlowe of the Old West". Robinson instructed his West Coast CBS Vice President, Harry Ackerman, who had developed the Philip Marlowe series, to take on the task.
Ackerman and his scriptwriters, Mort Fine and David Friedkin, created an audition script called "Matt Dillon Goes to Gouge Eye" based on one of their Michael Shayne radio scripts, "The Case of the Crooked Wheel" from the summer of 1948. Two versions were recorded. The first, recorded in June 1949, was very much like a hardboiled detective series and starred Michael Rye (credited as Rye Billsbury) as Dillon; the second, recorded in July 1949, starred Straight Arrow actor Howard Culver in a more Western, lighter version of the same script. CBS liked the Culver version better, and Ackerman was told to proceed.
The radio series first aired on CBS on April 26, 1952 with the episode "Billy the Kid", written by Walter Newman, and ended on June 18, 1961. The show stars William Conrad as Marshal Matt Dillon, Howard McNear as Doc Charles Adams, Georgia Ellis as Kitty Russell, and Parley Baer as Dillon's assistant, Chester Wesley Proudfoot.
➦In 1965...The call letters of KYW-AM, Cleveland, Ohio returned to Philadelphia.
After clearing regulatory hurdles, the swap went into effect on February 13, 1956.
According to phillyradioarchives.com, NBC changed the 1060 call letters to WRCV and Westinghouse moved the KYW call letters to Cleveland.
NBC had been interested in acquiring a VHF TV station in Philadelphia for years, the largest market in which it did not own one. After being rebuffed more than once, NBC (according to Westinghouse) threatened to drop its network affiliation (and programming) from WPTZ and Westinghouse's Boston TV station unless they agreed to the trade.
Not long after the station swap in 1955, the government started an investigation into the transfer that ultimately led to a bitter and complex 10 year skirmish for control of the stations. The battle involved a large list of government and corporate players including the FCC, Congress, Department of Justice, RCA, Philco, Westinghouse and RKO-General. Ultimately, the swap was reversed, and Westinghouse regained control of the stations, renaming them KYW TV and KYW AM.
In September 1965, KYW 1060 AM became an all-news station.
➦In 1975...WNBC-FM becomes WNWS (Now WQHT 97.1 FM)
➦In 1975...NBC News & Information Service debuted.
Not surprisingly, NIS achieved clearances on NBC's FM stations in New York (WNBC-FM, which became WNWS), Chicago (WJOI, the former WMAQ-FM which was renamed WNIS) and San Francisco (KNAI, the former KNBR-FM). WRC-AM in Washington DC also picked it up, migrating their Top 40 format onto FM sister station WKYS (which would be blown up weeks later in favor of disco music). Other major affiliates for the NIS service included WBAL-FM in Baltimore, KHVH in Honolulu, and KQV in Pittsburgh.
The NIS service attracted several dozen subscribers, but not enough to allow NBC to project that it would ever become profitable, and it was discontinued after two years.
➦In 1984...Alan Berg, a combative radio talk show host at KOA 850 AM in
Denver died of multiple gunshot wounds after being ambushed outside his
condominium. The 50-year-old Berg had reported death threats to police several times.
From KGMC, which changed its call sign to KWBZ, Berg moved to KHOW, also in Denver. After being fired from KHOW, Berg went back to KWBZ before it changed to an all-music format and he again lost his job. The unemployed Berg was courted by both KTOK in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and Detroit, Michigan. He was lastly hired by KOA and debuted on February 23, 1981. He worked at KOA until his death.
At about 9:30 p.m. on June 18, 1984, Alan Berg returned to his Adams Street townhouse after dinner. Berg stepped out of his black Volkswagen Beetle and gunfire erupted. He was struck twelve times. The murder weapon had been illegally converted to an automatic weapon, was later traced to the home of one of The Order's members by the FBI.
Berg was on a death list according to a former producer because he was Jewish and he challenged on the air the beliefs of an author who wrote that Jews were from the family line of the devil.
Four members of The Order were ultimately indicted on federal charges: Jean Craig, David Lane, Bruce Pierce, and Richard Scutari. However, only Lane and Pierce were convicted, though neither of homicide (which is a state crime). Rather, they were convicted of racketeering, conspiracy, and violating Alan Berg's civil rights (which are federal crimes). Both were sentenced to what were, for all practical purposes, life terms; Lane's sentence was 190 years; Pierce's was 252 years.
WKBW was founded in 1922 as a religious station, operating at the frequency of 1380 kHz. As the story goes, founder Clinton Churchill applied to the Department of Commerce for a license to operate under the call signs WAY. That call sign, however, was being used for a ship at sea, so instead, Churchill chose the letters "WKBW," which were next in the random assignment pool. Churchill proclaimed the call letters to stand for "Well Known Bible Witness"; later usage referred to the middle letters "KB" standing for King of Buffalo (alluding to its 50,000 watt broadcast power).
On July 4, 1958, WKBW radio abandoned its adult approach and was converted into a personality-driven full service Top 40 music radio station, featuring foreground personalities, a tight playlist of current hits and an aggressive local news department, which it continued to program with great success for over 20 years. It was one of the first stations to present traffic reports in cooperation with police and state and local authorities. Capital Cities Communications, then known as Capital Cities Broadcasting, purchased the WKBW stations from Clinton Churchill in 1961.
During the late 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, WKBW became a major force in pop radio over the East Coast. KB had a 50,000 watt transmitter at their transmitter site in Hamburg. This high power with a direction signal caused WKBW to blanket the entire eastern U.S. with top 40 music every night, and the station actually had a better signal at night in the western Boston suburbs than Boston's own top 40 station, WMEX, located at 1510, right next door to WKBW.
From 1970...
Disk jockeys included future Price is Right announcer Rod Roddy, Dick Biondi, Danny Neaverth, Jack Armstrong, Joey Reynolds, Steve Mitchell, Bud Ballou, Norm Marshall, Tom Shannon, and the Amazin' Jim Quinn. Irv Weinstein, later Buffalo's most popular television news anchor, served as news director.
➦In 2002…Sportscaster John Francis "Jack" Buck died from Parkinson's disease at age 77 (Born - August 21, 1924). He was best known for his work announcing Major League Baseball games of the St. Louis Cardinals. His play-by-play work earned him recognition from numerous Halls of Fame, such as the National Baseball Hall of Fame, the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and the National Radio Hall of Fame. He has also been inducted as a member of the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum.
Buck was born in Holyoke, Massachusetts, he dreamed of becoming a sports announcer with his early exposure to sports broadcasting coming from listening to Boston Red Sox baseball games announced by Fred Hoey.
After completion of his military service in 1946, Buck enrolled at (and graduated from) Ohio State University. His early sportscasting career included work for the minor league affiliates of the St. Louis Cardinals. In 1954, he was promoted to radio play-by-play of Cardinal games on KMOX, a position that he maintained for nearly all of the next 47 years. He was known in St. Louis for his trademark phrase "That's a winner!", which was said after every game that the Cardinals had won.
➦In 2002…Sportscaster John Francis "Jack" Buck died from Parkinson's disease at age 77 (Born - August 21, 1924). He was best known for his work announcing Major League Baseball games of the St. Louis Cardinals. His play-by-play work earned him recognition from numerous Halls of Fame, such as the National Baseball Hall of Fame, the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and the National Radio Hall of Fame. He has also been inducted as a member of the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum.
Buck was born in Holyoke, Massachusetts, he dreamed of becoming a sports announcer with his early exposure to sports broadcasting coming from listening to Boston Red Sox baseball games announced by Fred Hoey.
After completion of his military service in 1946, Buck enrolled at (and graduated from) Ohio State University. His early sportscasting career included work for the minor league affiliates of the St. Louis Cardinals. In 1954, he was promoted to radio play-by-play of Cardinal games on KMOX, a position that he maintained for nearly all of the next 47 years. He was known in St. Louis for his trademark phrase "That's a winner!", which was said after every game that the Cardinals had won.
➦In 2014…Johnny Mann died (Born - August 30, 1928). Mann was an arranger, composer, conductor, entertainer, and recording artist.
Johnny Mann and his vocal group The Johnny Mann Singers were involved in several classic rock 'n' roll and rockabilly recording sessions for Johnny Burnette (including "God, Country and My Baby"), The Crickets and several 1957–1958 sessions with Eddie Cochran, who was also signed to Liberty Records in Hollywood.
As bandleader with the Johnny Mann Singers, he and the group recorded approximately three dozen albums, hosted the TV series titled Stand Up and Cheer (1971–1974), and was the musical director for the 1967-69 ABC-TV late night talk show, The Joey Bishop Show. He was also musical director of The Alvin Show, and was the voice of Theodore. Mann was also choral director for the NBC Comedy Hour.
The Johnny Mann Singers' instrumental "Cinnamint Shuffle (Mexican Shuffle)" hit the US Pop chart in 1966. Their next single, a cover version of "Up, Up and Away", became the hit version of the song on the UK Singles Chart, over taking the US hit version by The 5th Dimension. The version also won a Grammy Award in 1968 in the Best Performance by a Choir of Seven or More Persons category. In total, Mann was nominated for five Grammys, two of which he won.
Mann wrote a number of radio jingles, the most famous being the "Sound of the City" jingle for KSFO in San Francisco, California. This jingle became as requested as many of the songs played by KSFO in the era of Don Sherwood, and it was adapted by Mann for other radio stations around the country which included KFRC (AM) in San Francisco and CKLW in Windsor, Ontario.
In 2019...CBS Corp., Cox Enterprises Inc., E.W. Scripps Co., Fox Corp., and Tegna Inc. all agreed to consent decrees barring them from sharing certain competitively sensitive information for the next seven years, to settle Justice Department charges that they had illegally coordinated on sales of local advertising spots.
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| Paul McCartney 1965 and 2021 |
- Musician Paul McCartney is 82.
- Actor Constance McCashin (“Knots Landing”) is 77.
- Actor Linda Thorson (“The Avengers”) is 77.
- Actor Carol Kane is 72.
- Actor Isabella Rossellini is 72.
- Actor Brian Benben (“Private Practice,” “Dream On”) is 68.
- Singer Alison Moyet is 63.
- Keyboardist Dizzy Reed (Guns N’ Roses) is 61.
- Country singer-guitarist Tim Hunt (Yankee Grey) is 57.
- Singer Nathan Morris of Boyz II Men is 53.
- Singer-songwriter Ray LaMontagne is 51.
- Rapper Silkk the Shocker is 49.
- Actor Alana de la Garza (“Law & Order”) is 48.
- Country singer Blake Shelton is 48.
- Guitarist Steve Chen of Airborne Toxic Event is 46.
- Actor David Giuntoli (“Grimm”) is 44.
- Drummer Josh Dun of Twenty One Pilots is 36.
- Actor-singer Renee Olstead (“The Secret Life of the American Teenager,” “Still Standing”) is 35.
- Actor Jacob Anderson (“Game of Thrones”) is 34.
- Actor Willa Holland (“Arrow”) is 33.
✞REMEMBRANCES
- In 1992..Peter Allen, entertainer (Legs Diamond), dies of aids at 48
- In 2002..Jack Buck, American sports announcer (St. Louis Cardinals), dies at 77
- In 2011..Clarence Clemons, Saxophonist, known as "The Big Man" (The E-Street Band), dies of complications from a stroke (b. 1942); flags in New Jersey are lowered to half-mast
- In 2014..Johnny Mann, American music director (Johnny Mann Stand Up & Cheer), dies at 85
- In 2020..Vera Lynn, British popular music singer, known as 'the Forces' Sweetheart' ("We'll Meet Again"; "The White Cliffs of Dover"), dies at 103
- In 2022..Mark Shields, American political journalist and commentator (PBS NewsHour, 1988-2020; CNN Capitol Gang, 1998-2005), dies of kidney failure at 85.
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