Cumulus Media announces its 2nd Annual WNSH NashFM 94.7 Boots on the Boardwalk end of summer bash, giving its loyal listeners the best summer ever and a chance to party one last time this summer season!
This free event will be held on Friday, August 31, 2018, from 3:00pm-7:00pm at Jenkinson’s Pavilion in Point Pleasant Beach, New Jersey.
Boots on the Boardwalk will feature live performances by country artists Maddie & Tae, Walker Hayes, Travis Denning and Jimmie Allen. Country music fans will have the chance to win VIP experiences, meet all of the artists and enjoy a great summer send-off this Labor Day weekend!
Chad Lopez, Vice President/Market Manager, Cumulus Media-New York, said: “This summer has been great for Cumulus-New York and NashFM 94.7 with a lot of activity live from the Jersey Shore, where we can give back to so many of our listeners with these types of events. We opened the season at Jenkinson’s Pavilion and now are closing out the summer in a big way!”
John Foxx, Program Director, NashFM 94.7, said: “All summer long, the Jersey Shore is home to so many memories and traditions - The return of Boots On The Boardwalk down the shore is a great way to say thank you to our listeners and really sets the stage for one huge celebration of summer!”
At the 2019 Barrett Sports Media Summit in Los Angeles, BSM President Jason Barrett has announced it will introduce new awards to permanently recognize the important contributions of pioneers in Sports Radio.
The first award to be announced by Barrett Sports Media is The Jeff Smulyan Award. This award, which is named after WFAN’s founding father, and the current CEO of Emmis Communications Jeff Smulyan, will be given to a chosen member of the radio industry who has demonstrated a consistent ability to lead, take risks, and produce results. BSM will announce the inaugural recipient of this award on a later date. Plans are for the award to be distributed on an annual basis at future BSM Summit’s.
Jeff Smulyan
“If Jeff Smulyan hadn’t rolled the dice to launch an all-sports station in New York City in 1987, and stuck to the plan when it made no sense to do so, sports radio may never have received a second chance,” said Barrett Sports Media President Jason Barrett.
“Jeff’s ability to lead, combined with his willingness to take risk, not only benefited WFAN, but it remains the driving force behind Emmis Communications’ success. As new threats for the sports fan’s ear emerge from outside industries, it’s important to remember who paved the way to make this possible, while recognizing those who continue to blaze new trails to help us secure a prosperous future.”
“I’m incredibly humbled and honored that this award is being named after me,” added Emmis CEO Jeff Smulyan. “It’s so gratifying to see the remarkable growth of sports radio since the launch of WFAN. I’m also very pleased that the award is being named in my honor….not my memory!”
A total of four awards are scheduled to be distributed at the two-day event to deserving industry members who best exemplify the meaning behind each honor.
The BSM Summit is an industry only event, taking place inside the Clive Davis Theater at The Grammy Museum on February 21-22, 2018. To inquire on how to attend the event, speak at the event, or become a sponsor, email Jason Barrett at JBarrett@sportsradiopd.com.
Entercom has announced a two-hour live commercial-free broadcast special to raise awareness around mental health and suicide prevention as part of its multi-platform “I’m Listening” campaign.
The “I’m Listening” broadcast will air across all of the company’s stations nationwide on Sunday, September 9 at 7:00 a.m. in their respective time zone, and via their livestreams on Radio.com, to mark the start of National Suicide Prevention Week. The year-long campaign also includes suicide prevention PSAs, on-air promos and a dedicated website with information and resources to end the stigma around mental health discussions.
B-J Shea
The special will be led on-air by BJ Shea, on-air personality for KISW 99.9 FM in Seattle, and will highlight personal stories from artists and celebrities. Guests will include medical experts Dr. Chris Nowinski, co-founder and executive director of Concussion Legacy Foundation and Dr. Ursula Whiteside, clinical psychologist, CEO of NowMattersNow.org. Listeners will have the opportunity to participate via a live call-in option and interactive website.
Musicians and celebrities connected to the cause will also join the conversation about mental health. Guests scheduled to join the program include Mike McCready and Stone Gossard, Pearl Jam; Michael Phelps, Olympic swimmer and 23-time gold medal winner; Mike Shinoda, Linkin Park; Alessia Cara, Grammy Award-winning artist; Jared Leto, Academy Award-winning actor and lead singer of Thirty Seconds To Mars; Bebe Rexha; Charlie Puth; Stone Temple Pilots; Brantley Gilbert; Lzzy Hale, Halestorm; Stephan Jenkins, Third Eye Blind; and Conor Mason, Nothing But Thieves, among others.
“’I’m Listening’ is one of our signature productions meant to save lives, while simultaneously creating awareness for this truly lethal silent threat,” said Pat Paxton, President of Programming, Entercom. “The number of people impacted by mental health issues is staggering. The effect it has on their lives, and lives of their friends and families is devastating. If we help save just one life or help remove the stigma around mental illness, our time will have been well spent. We can’t solve this issue during one program, but we can be part of a vast network working every day to help and serve those affected.”
In addition to celebrity guests and medical expert interviews, the special will feature discussions around how to discuss mental health and suicide with family and friends, what all of us can do to prevent suicide, what to do if you or someone you know is struggling with depression, how to get involved in suicide prevention in your local community and where to go for help.
According to the Center for Disease Control (CDC), suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in the U.S. More than 50 percent of people in the U.S. will be diagnosed with a mental illness or disorder at some point in their life. Approximately one in five U.S. adults experience mental health issues in a given year, and one in five children have experienced or will experience mental illness in their life. Mental health affects everyone regardless of culture, race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation.
If someone you know is going through a crisis, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255) or contact the Crisis Text Line by texting TALK to 741-741.
Journalist Barrie Dunsmore was a familiar face to national television audiences for 30 years, covering international news for ABC. For seven years he served as the network’s senior foreign correspondent.
Barrie Dunsmore
Dunsmore died Sunday at the age of 79.
He filed reports on many of the historic events of the last half of the 20th century, including the fall of South Vietnam, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Dunsmore reported most extensively from the Middle East, covering its wars and the changing fortunes of peace efforts there.
Dunsmore, who was born in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada, is survived by his wife Whitney Taylor and by his children Timothy, Leeanne and Campbell, in addition to four grandchildren. He is also survived by two brothers.
Breaks my heart to hear veteran ABC News correspondent Barrie Dunsmore has died. At one point he worked TV in Cornwall On before moving on to Ottawa & Montreal. He followed fellow Canadian ABC News anchor Peter Jennings(RIP) to USA https://t.co/u8nMcWNrz4
There will be a memorial service for Dunsmore on Saturday, Sept. 8, from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. at the National Press Club, in Washington, D.C. The memorial will be livestreamed through the organization's website.
➦In 1922...WEAF New York airs first commercial ("This program brought to you by..."). Announcer H.M. Blackwell spoke about Hawthorne Court, a group of apartment buildings in Queens, New York. The Queensboro Realty Company, of Jackson Heights, bought 10 minutes of commercial air time for $100.
The first radio advertisement (actually a roughly 10-minute long talk anticipating today's radio and television infomercials) which promoted an apartment development in Jackson Heights near a new elevated train line.
➦In 1954...“That’s All Right (Mama)” b/w “Blue Moon of Kentucky” became Elvis Presley‘s first hit single on local charts in Memphis. Local DJ Dewey Phillips had debuted the single on his “Red Hot and Blue” radio show on WHBQ.
➦In 1961...“Cousin” Brucie Morrow starts at 77 WABC.
Morrow's first stint in radio was in Bermuda at ZBM-AM, where he was known as "The Hammer."
Morrow began his stateside career at New York Top 40 station WINS in 1959. In 1960, he moved to Miami for a brief stint before returning to the New York airwaves the following year on AM 770 powerhouse WABC, another Top 40 outlet. Morrow's return to New York City came at the precise moment that rock and roll music was exploding across the Baby Boom demographic and Morrow found himself on the most powerful radio station on the East Coast. His main competition came from his previous station WINS, which featured "Murray the K."
"Cousin Brucie" quickly became a success on WABC's teen-oriented evening shift in the 6:15 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. slot. Morrow became a commercial radio powerhouse and household name through his ability to maintain a rapport with his listeners while smoothly mixing the diverse musical genres of the time (Motown soul, pop, hard rock, surf music, novelty records), and then seamlessly segueing into commercials for youth-oriented sponsors and events such as concerts and drag-strip races.
He served at WABC for 13 years and 4,014 broadcasts until August 1974, when he jumped to rival station WNBC.
➦In 1966...the Beatles played Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. It was their next-to-last live performance. The Beatles performed in front of a crowd of 45,000 people. After the show, their attempt to escape the stadium in an armored truck went awry when they reached the main gate and found it locked. The Beatles had to spend two hours sitting in the back of the truck before they could leave the stadium.
➦In 1967...WCBS 880 AM flipped to all news.
By the early sixties, WCBS had evolved into a Middle of the road (MOR) music and personality format, which included limited talk programming. Personalities included legendary morning host Jack Sterling, Bill Randle and Lee Jordan. Like many MOR stations at the time, WCBS did mix in softer songs by rock-and-roll artists, as its ratings at the time were ordinary compared to the higher ratings at WOR and WNEW, both of which also had MOR formats and more distinct identities. Through it all, the variety show "Arthur Godfrey Time" remained a weekday mid-morning staple. Eventually, WCBS gained a foothold in local news coverage (WOR and WNEW's strengths) bolstered by its standing as CBS's flagship radio station.
During the 1960s, CBS chairman William S. Paley was concerned about the station's low ratings, and that concern started a process that would lead to the creation of a news radio format that would become known as "Newsradio 88". This format debuted on August 28, 1967. Its original roster of anchors included Charles Osgood, Ed Bradley, Robert Vaughn (not related to the actor of the same name) and Pat Summerall. Later anchors included longtime anchor Lou Adler, and others like Jim Donnelly, Harvey Hauptman, Bill Lynch and Gary Maurer.
Initially, the station ran news in the drive time periods but maintained an MOR format during the midday and overnight hours, and within a couple of years, it ran all-news programming for much of the broadcast day except for overnights. "Newsradio 88" began its transformation into an all-news format in 1970, when the overnight American Airlines-sponsored Music Till Dawn ended in January of that year, and completed the process in 1972, when Godfrey's weekday morning variety show came to an end. The station built a reputation as an all-news powerhouse during the 1970s, and has continued with an all-news format to this day.
Although 1010 WINS has usually received the higher Arbitron ratings of the two all-news stations, WCBS has had the stronger ratings in the outlying suburbs because of its broadcast-signal pattern. Its traffic reports and news coverage includes more of Long Island and the northern and western suburbs of New York City than WINS, and it occasionally allows room for longer interviews and analysis pieces than does WINS. The station is less tightly formatted than WINS, and formats at a half-hour cycle instead of a 20-minute cycle.
Newsradio88 debuts inauspiciously on its little-heard FM Station on August 28, 1967, because a small plane demolished the transmitter tower on High Island in a fatal crash, knocking the AM station off the air. Interestingly, the debut begins with a staff announcer reading the WCBS-FM sign-on, followed by the "Star Spangled Banner." Then, anchorman Steve Porter reads an account of the air crash. Pat Summerall delivers the sports, Gordon Barnes the weather. The rather ponderous presentation includes few if any commercials, and virtually no news audio. Charles Osgood takes over from Steve Porter at 6:00 A.M. The producer of the broadcast was Mike Ludlum, the editor was Al Wasser. Audio courtesy of Bill Tynan, Manager of On-Air Promotion, WCBS.
30th ANNIVERSARY BROADCAST WCBS's LET'S FIND OUT -- 8/3/97. Hosted by Rich Lamb, this special broadcast looks back at 30 years of Newsradio88. With Charles Osgood, Lou Adler, Art Athens. First of two broadcasts. Audio courtesy of Bill Tynan (30:00) Part One:Click Here.
30th ANNIVERSARY BROADCAST WCBS's LET'S FIND OUT -- 8/10/97. Hosted by Rich Lamb, this special broadcast looks back at 30 years of Newsradio88. With Jim Donnelly, Harvey Hauptman, Rita Sands, Gary Maurer, Ben Farnsworth, Bill Fahan, Neil Busch. Second of two broadcasts. Audio courtesy of Bill Tynan (30:00) Part Two:Click Here
➦In 1987...Superjock Larry Lujack knew it was time to go. ABC had already bought out Lujack's contract amid sliding ratings and on Friday August 28, 1987, after a slew of televison cameras, newspaper and magazine reporters joined him for his farewell, a tearful Larry Lujack signed off from radio and from WLS. His tenure at the station spanned three decades.
Larry Lujack 8/28/87
Despite Lujack's cynical on-air persona, he was actually quite easy to work with, his former boss John Gehron said.
"He was a professional, worked hard at what he did," Gehron said. "He was one of those personalities that surprisingly didn't cause any problems. His feeling was, you pay me and I'll do the job for you, and he worked very hard at it."
After ten years in morning drive, Lujack had moved to PM drive in 1986. Lujack signed off thanking listeners "not just for listening, but also for caring."
➦In 2012…Boston radio personality (at classical station WCRB for 57 years) David MacNeill, "the voice of the Boston Pops," died at age 80.
➦In 2016...83-year old Charles Osgood announced his retirement from hosting CBS-TV’s Sunday Morning after 22 years. His Osgood File daily CBS Radio show would continue.
Westwood One in response to the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (published in July), is continuing to urge ALL major commercial broadcast radio stations to register their existing C Band downlinks with the FCC before the Commission evaluates the 3.7-4.2 Ghz C Band for additional mobile broadband data services.
These potential services could create insurmountable interference to programming that thousands of stations receive by satellite. The deadline for registration is now October 17, 2018.
Typically, registration requires a Frequency Coordination Study ($1,500) plus a $435 filing fee. During the 90-day window, the FCC waived the first fee and only the $435 filing fee applies. It is possible the FCC will later charge the $1,500 study fee. Westwood One’s satellite provider, SES, has set aside a pool of funding to reimburse those broadcasters for whom the $435 registration fee is a hardship. This reimbursement is subject to the terms set by SES for earth stations registered between July 25, 2018 and October 17, 2018 in the continental United States. For questions, contact SES directly at FCCregistration@ses.com or by phone (609) 987-4300.
“The FCC has stated that in order to receive any interference consideration, your station must be registered,” said Eric Wiler, Westwood One’s SVP Technology and Operations. “With SES making a fund available to assist broadcasters, the expense hardship can be removed.”
Stations may register using FCC Form 312, by completing a hard copy of the form, completing it online at http://licensing.fcc.gov/myibfs, or engaging a third party for assistance. Satellite Engineering Group is a third-party resource and can be reached at (913) 375-1114.
WEEI, Boston Red Sox and NESN Come Together to Raise over $4.4 Million This Year
Entercom has announced the results of its Boston station’s annual “WEEI/NESN Jimmy Fund Radio-Telethon.”
This year’s event raised over $4.4 million for The Jimmy Fund, which brought the donation total to over $53 million since the radio-telethon’s inception.
The radio-telethon was started by WEEI (WEEI-FM), The Jimmy Fund and the Boston Red Sox in 2002. New England Sports Network (NESN) joined the event in 2003.
“The Jimmy Fund makes significant contributions to those battling cancer in the Boston area, and we are proud to support its efforts through this yearly event,” said Mark Hannon, Regional President and Market Manager, Entercom Boston. “It is an honor for our team to give back to the community by raising funds on behalf of the organization and we are blown away by the incredible generosity of WEEI listeners who make this event so successful year in and year out.”
The event was part of a 36-hour live broadcast during WEEI weekday programming, “Kirk & Callahan,” “Dale & Keefe,” and “Ordway, Merloni & Fauria” on August 21 and 22. The three shows, which were simulcast on NESN, combined to welcome Dana-Farber Cancer Institute patients and their families, doctors, researchers, nurses, Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker, Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, ownership from the Boston Red Sox, Boston Bruins, Boston Celtics and New England Patriots, athletes including Patriots quarterback Tom Brady and NFL Hall of Fame quarterback Jim Kelly and local celebrities to share stories of inspiration and hope.
Additionally, the radio-telethon was broadcast on the WEEI Sports Radio Network and NESN during two Red Sox game broadcasts and postgame programming.
Founded in 1948, The Jimmy Fund supports Boston’s Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, raising funds for adult and pediatric cancer care and research to improve the chances of survival for cancer patients around the world.
iHeartMedia Minneapolis announced today the debut of KFAN Plus, Sports Radio K244FE 96.7, dropping its Pride Radio format.
KFAN Plus, an expansion of KFAN 100.3, will broadcast exclusively on HD2 Radio (via KQQL 105.7 FM HD2) and can also be streamed digitally on iHeartRadio.
KFAN Plus will broadcast both local and national sports news, including programming content from iHeartMedia Minneapolis’s sports partnerships. The station will also feature a renowned weekday lineup from Fox Sports Radio favorites, such as on-air personalities Dan Patrick and Colin Cowherd.
“We’re thrilled to bring the Twin Cities some of the biggest and well-known national names in sports radio,” said Chad Abbott, Program Director for iHeartMedia Minneapolis’s KFAN, Twin Cities News Talk and KFAN Plus. “KFAN Plus will be a great expansion of KFAN Programming, providing our listeners with even more, around the clock, exclusive sports news content that they love.”
Mike Francesa came out of retirement and went back to WFAN 660 AM / 101.9 FM in New York in April. He said then that his primary reason for un-retiring was the development of an app that would feature all of his content. That app, “Mike’s On,” is now available.
The price for a subscription is $8.99 per month, or $98.99 for an annual subscription. The app and coinciding website will feature exclusive unique content for a price that is quite expensive compared with similar products, according to Forbes.
For example, Sirius/XM’s app is $13 per month. That features Howard Stern’s library, play-by-play of all major U.S. sports leagues, and Francesa’s old partner Christopher “Mad Dog” Russo.
Netflix and Hulu each start their pricing at $7.99/month. Amazon Prime charges $12.99/month (and includes free shipping on other products).
The NYPost reported that Francesa alone decided on the price; CAA Sports and Entercom, which are partners on the project, did not weigh in.
The app will indeed have exclusive content. Francesa will host an NFL show on Sundays from a studio at his house exclusively on the app. He hosted a Sunday morning NFL show for nearly 30 years on WFAN but now will do so only on the app.
Mike Francesa: Celeste Sloman for The New York Times
Meanwhile, in an interview with NY Time Magazine, Francesa talked his preference for radio rather than TV.
➤You left behind a TV career to do radio. What potential did you see in radio back then? What radio does more than any other medium is it allows you to really get close to your audience. When you do TV, they acknowledge you, they nod their head. But when you do radio, they feel like they know everything about you. They feel like they’re your best friend — or maybe your worst enemy, if they don’t like you.
➤Do you have any theories about why that is? A couple. They hear every emotion that you have. They hear the days you’re really happy, the days you’re really angry, the day you might be without a care in the world. But more than that, they can take you everywhere. They’re in the car with you — on the way to work, on the way home. They can take you with them when they’re lying there ready to go to sleep, when they get up in the morning, when they go to the beach, when they’re on the couch. When I’m talking, I think of myself talking to each person. I envision people on the highway. I envision people in their cars. I envision how people are listening. I envision a lot of them, but I envision them one at a time.
➤Which did you like doing better? Do you like the show by yourself, or did you like doing it with the Mad Dog? “Mike and the Mad Dog” will probably be regarded forever as the No.1 sports talk show. I mean, I’ve never met anyone who doesn’t think “Mike and the Mad Dog” wasn’t a great show. I would say they’re very different shows. I would say I enjoyed doing both of them equally.
➤Politics occupies a much bigger place in sports media than it did back when you started, and in a much more upfront way. How do you feel about that? The reason every story is about President Trump is because it sells. Yes, you’ll turn on Fox News and they’ll be pro-Trump, and you’ll turn on MSNBC and they’ll be anti-Trump, but the reason it’s about Trump every minute of every day is because the audience is demanding it. I think everybody in media has to realize this might just be a once-in-a-lifetime phenomenon, a comet across the sky, rather than something that is changed forever now.
➤Everyone has this nightmare where they can see the point in the future where they realize that they’re washed up. What does that moment look like for you? That moment’s never happening. Washed up to me would mean that my ratings were no longer good. If my ratings started to really fail, they wouldn’t have to say, “Go.” I’d go.
Jemele Hill, the outspoken ESPN host and commentator who drew fire for calling President Trump a “white supremacist” on Twitter, is leaving the network next month, reports philly.com citing multiple reports.
ESPN expert and bestselling author James Miller was first to report the news of Hill’s departure, noting on Twitter she was offered an “amicable” buyout of her $2.5 million per year contract after a meeting she requested with new ESPN president James Pitaro. The news was quickly confirmed by The Athletic’s Richard Deitsch and Variety’s Brian Steinberg. Hill’s last day at ESPN is expected to be Sept. 1
Neither Hill nor ESPN immediately responded to a request for comment.
Hill’s departure comes after Pitaro made it clear he wants less politics intermixed with ESPN’s sports coverage. Among other things, Pitaro has told the NFL the network won’t air footage of the national anthem prior to ESPN’s Monday Night Football broadcasts due to players’ continued protests of racial injustice on the sidelines.
“If you ask me is there a false narrative out there, I will tell you ESPN being a political organization is false,” Pitaro told reporters at a media event earlier this month. “I will tell you I have been very, very clear with employees here that it is not our jobs to cover politics, purely.”
Hill, a one-time Philadelphia Inquirer intern and reporter for The Orlando Sentinel, has worked at ESPN since Nov. 2006, when she joined the network as a national columnist. Hill is currently a senior columnist and corespondent for ESPN’s The Undefeated after stepping down from SC6, a failed attempted at a personality-driven version of SportsCenter that executives reverted back to a more traditional edition of the show.
Nearly one year ago, on Sept. 11, 2017, Hill called Trump “a white supremacist who has largely surrounded himself [with] other white supremacists.” Though it broke ESPN’s social media rules about commenting on politics unrelated to sports, then-network president John Skipper failed to suspend Hill. The White House called for Hill to be fired.
A little more than a month later, Skipper decided to suspend Hill after she criticized Cowboys owner Jerry Jones’ anthem stance by tweeting, “Change happens when advertisers are impacted. If you feel strongly about JJ’s statement, boycott his advertisers.” She was off television for two weeks. ESPN called it a second offense. Hill said she regretted that she had “painted ESPN in an unfair light.” (NYPost)
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Tavis Smiley can't force PBS to turn over documents related to every romantic relationship a network supervisor has had with a subordinate since the early 2000s, a judge has ruled.
Smiley in February sued the network after it dropped his show amid sexual misconduct allegations. PBS in March filed a countersuit that claimed Smiley violated the morals clause in his contract and sought to reclaim nearly $2 million it had paid him.
A Washington, D.C., judge has denied Smiley's request for a motion to compel PBS to hand over certain documents as part of a discovery request the network challenged as overbroad.
In its opposition, the pubcaster argued that he was requesting documents that dated back more than a decade and weren't relevant to the contract issues at hand, including the network's sexual harassment policies since 2000 and any records of PBS managers having a relationship with a subordinate and the resulting disciplinary actions, if there were any.
Judge Anthony Epstein found PBS responded reasonably to Smiley's discovery requests.
"TSM is not entitled to conduct a fishing expedition concerning all romantic or personal relationships between superiors and subordinates within PBS or within companies with which PBS did business," writes Epstein. "However, if TSM has information that PBS tolerated behavior inside PBS or within one or more of its partners that is comparable to the behavior in which Mr. Smiley is alleged to have engaged, or if other discovery in this case shows that PBS compared Mr. Smiley’s conduct with conduct of other people with whom it did business, targeted discovery may be appropriate."
Smiley also sought information related to PBS' decision to cancel his show. He contends the sexual misconduct allegations were a smokescreen and claims the network is "racially hostile." PBS disputes the claim but argues that it had the contractual right to cancel the show for any reason, including a racially discriminatory one, and therefore documents concerning its motives are irrelevant. Epstein isn't entirely convinced.
Two-time CMA Awards Entertainer of the Year Luke Bryan, four-time CMA Awards nominated duo Dan + Shay and five-time CMA Awards Vocal Duo of the Year Sugarland will reveal several of the final nominees on “Good Morning America” Tuesday, Aug. 28 live from Luke’s 32 Bridge Food + Drink, Bryan’s brand-new restaurant and bar on Lower Broadway in downtown Nashville.
Carrie Underwood
Nominees in select categories will be revealed on the top-rated morning news program. The highly anticipated announcement will also be available via livestream on ABCnews.com/live.
Immediately following the show, the remaining categories, as well as the CMA Broadcast Awards nominees, will be revealed live on GoodMorningAmerica.com as well as “Good Morning America’s” Facebook page through Facebook Live and simulcast on “Good Morning America’s” YouTube channel.
Brad Paisley
CMA will then release and post the full slate of all CMA Awards nominees to CMAawards.com and service a CMA Awards Nominees Video Highlights Package (VHP), which includes footage of the nominee announcements on “Good Morning America,” interviews, and music video clips.
“The 52nd Annual CMA Awards” nominees and winners are determined by more than 7,400 professional members of CMA, which is the first trade organization formed to promote an individual genre of music in 1958 and celebrates its 60th anniversary in September.
Country Music superstars Brad Paisley and Carrie Underwood return to host “The 52nd Annual CMA Awards,” Country Music’s Biggest Night live from the Bridgestone Arena in Nashville Wednesday, Nov. 14 at 8/7 PM CT on the ABC Television Network.
Westwood One has announced that Westwood One News Correspondent Michael Toscano has been named the new host of its First Light morning show program.
Mike Toscano
Toscano has been a regular guest host of the show, in addition to anchoring Westwood One newscasts and special programming. He is a former host of the Wall Street Journal radio afternoon news program The Daily Wrap.
Toscano will begin his tenure at First Light on Monday, August 27, replacing Even Haning, who has decided to step back but will continue as a part-time Westwood One News anchor and First Light fill-in host.
Mike Moss
Westwood One News also announces that Mike Moss is taking on the role of full-time news anchor. Moss has been an integral part of Westwood One News’ operation since joining as a part-time anchor and fill-in guest host earlier this year. Moss is well-known in the nation’s capital from his many years as morning drive anchor at the top news station in the country, WTOP/Washington, DC.
Westwood One News will air updated versions of the summer news specials, 1968: The Year that Shook America and 1968: Turn on, Tune in, Change Channels, on Labor Day weekend. The programs, hosted by Toscano, will replace The Week in Review and America This Week on September 1-2.
Find out what Westwood One News can bring to your station. For more information about First Light, Westwood One News programming, and the summer news specials, contact Jim Jones at jimjones@westwoodone.com or (202) 840-7933.
A Venezuelan TV mogul who has amassed a real estate fortune in South Florida and New York is now at the center of a $1.2 billion money-laundering investigation — put there by a Swiss banker who has admitted guilt and is helping Miami prosecutors build a criminal case against him, reports The Miami Herald.
Raúl GorrÃn, owner of the Globovisión network in Caracas, is suspected of steering $600 million from the country’s state-owned oil company to a European bank to enrich himself, the three stepsons of President Nicolás Maduro and other members of Venezuela’s politically connected elite, according to new court records and multiple sources familiar with the federal probe in Miami.
Krull faces up to 10 years in prison, is in custody in Miami in the new money-laundering case.
Krull has promised to assist prosecutors in their broadening case investigating GorrÃn, Maduro, his stepsons and other Venezuelans.
In his plea agreement, Krull has promised to cooperate with Assistant U.S. Attorney Francisco Maderal and Homeland Security Investigations, including testifying before a federal grand jury.
Gorrin, who bought TV news channel Globovisión in March 2013, is considered to be one of the wealthiest businessmen in Venezuela largely because of his close connections with key members of the Maduro regime, including the presidential family, and his predecessor, the late President Hugo Chávez.
The sale of Globovisión was a big blow to the opposition in Venezuela, shutting down the last TV channel that challenged government censorship. The station’s programming changed dramatically after the sale, as prominent journalists resigned when the new owners tried to impose a gag rule.
➦In 1910...James McCurdy sends first aircraft-to-ground wireless message.
➦In 1960…After almost 12½ years on the air, the series "Louisiana Hayride," known as "The Cradle of the Stars," presented its last performance on radio station KWKH in Shreveport, Louisiana.
Gracie Allen
➦In 1964...actress/comedienne Gracie Allen, co-star of radio & TV’s George Burns and Gracie Allen Show, died of a heart attack at age 69.
High Island as seen from Orchard Beach, Bronx County, NY
NY Times story
➦In 1967...An airplane knocked down transmitting tower on High Island, NY (Bronx County) shared by WCBS 880 AM and WNBC 660 AM (now WFAN).
The pilot died and a passenger died. The crash destroyed the antenna taking WCBS and WNBC off the air. The mishap occured just hours before WCBS was to have dropped its full-service format to go all news, challenging Westinghouse's two-year-old 1010 WINS format.
WCBS, WFAN Doghouse
The news format debuted instead on WCBS 101.1 FM, which had itself been readying a new "Young Sound" format. WNBC found a temporary home back in New Jersey, diplexing into the Lodi tower of rival WABC 770 AM, whose audio could be heard not so faintly behind WNBC's on 660 for a time.
WCBS accepted an offer from WLIB 1190 AM to use the site along the East River in Astoria, Queens that it had just abandoned in favor of a site in Lyndhurst, N.J. Within a few weeks, WCBS and WNBC were back on the air from High Island with a temporary tower; it would be the end of the year before both were back to 50 kilowatts from the current tower.
The taller of the towers is 548 ft. The shorter tower is 300 ft and was built in 2001 to replace the emergency tower erected in 1967. Click Here for more details
➦In 2003...Jinx Falkenburg, personality on WEAF/WRCA/WNBC died.
Eugenia Lincoln "Jinx" Falkenburg was an actress, expert swimmer and tennis star, and one of the highest-paid and most ubiquitous cover-girl models in the United States during the 1930s and 1940s - one of the first supermodels. She married journalist and influential publicist Tex McCrary in 1945.
Known as "Tex and Jinx" to most American households, the glamorous couple pioneered and popularized the talk-show format, first on radio and then in the early days of television. They hosted a series of interview shows in the late 1940s and early 1950s that combined celebrity chit-chat with discussions of important topics of the day.
In 1941, Liebmann Brewery, the maker of Rheingold beer, decided it might sell a lot more of the brand if each year it bestowed on some attractive young woman the title Miss Rheingold. Miss Falkenburg was the first. It was a plum for any model, since, for starters, it put her name and face in every store in New York that sold beer.
Falkenburg first met John Reagan "Tex" McCrary when he came to photograph and interview her for a military publication after she opened in Hold On to Your Hats. He was a Lieutenant Colonel in the Army Air Forces. They were about to be engaged in 1942 but World War II intervened and, after a globe-trotting romance during the hostilities, they married on June 15, 1945, in a civil ceremony conducted by New York Supreme Court Judge Ferdinand Pecora, famous for investigating the 1929 stock market crash and its aftermath.
During the war Falkenburg traveled extensively on USO tours entertaining troops. The most arduous was a 42,000 mile 80-stop series of shows in the rugged China-Burma-India theatre of operations. In 1945 she was awarded the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal for her contributions.
Backed by some of his well-connected friends like millionaire statesman Bernard Baruch, McCrary convinced David Sarnoff, the chairman of RCA which owned NBC, to give the couple a morning show on the network's New York radio station, WEAF. The show was called "Hi, Jinx" and first aired on April 22, 1946. Reviews ranged from "sprightly" to "rather intense discussions of foreign affairs." In a cover story about the couple, Newsweek wrote: "A soft-spoken, calculating Texan, Tex McCrary, inched up to the microphone and drawled 'Hi, Jinx.' A voice with all the foam substance of a bubble bath answered, 'Hello Tex.'" Over time they came to be known as "Mr. Brains and Mrs. Beauty."
The McCrary's radio show was broadcast five mornings a week on New York radio station WEAF, and became a hit with critics and the public for tackling controversial issues like the A-Bomb, the United Nations and venereal disease along with talk about theatre openings and New York nightlife.
McCrary wrote the scripts and taught Falkenburg the art of interviewing and the basics of broadcast journalism. Over time she was considered the better interviewer, eliciting candid responses, often from the show's more intellectual guests. Her technique was to ask questions until she understood the answer and so presumably, did all the housewives at home listening to her.
In January 1947, McCrary and Falkenburg had their first network TV show, Bristol-Myers Tele-Varieties, also known as Jinx and Tex at Home, broadcast Sunday nights on NBC. The program combined film and live interviews of celebrities in their residences. In May 1947, The Swift Home Service Club combined household tips with breezy interviews. Another radio show, Meet Tex and Jinx got such a big audience that in 1947 and 1948 it became a summer replacement for one of radio's most popular shows, Duffy's Tavern.
Falkenburg informally retired from broadcasting in 1958.
She died in 2003 at the age of 84
For her contributions to the television industry, Jinx Falkenburg has a star on the Hollywood Blvd. Walk of Fame at 1500 Vine St.
➦In 2016…Clinical psychologist/talk radio host Dr. Joy Browne died at the age of 71.
Her syndicated show was one of the longest-running call-in therapy shows in the United States.
Browne took a no-nonsense approach to callers, trying to zero in on a problem without getting caught up in a caller's long stories or digressions. Browne was also known for her "one-year rule", which states that people who have lost a spouse or long-time partner due to break-up, death, or divorce should wait at a minimum one year before resuming romantic relationships.
Browne's call-in therapy show was heard for two decades at WOR 710 AM in New York and was syndicated to other cities. She was released by WOR on December 20, 2012, after iHeartMedia bought the station and brought in its own network hosts.
