Monday, August 08, 2005

Card-Carrying Radio Listener

I knew that, if I looked hard enough, I would find this gem from around 1968 (I was 12), I think. I was a card-carrying member of the Early Bird Club, signed by Brian Wilson, when he was on Brand X radio. You won't catch me listening to them today, though, and I don't think I am in very good standing with them, anymore. LOL.
I never worked at WIBR, though Brian certainly did work at WJBO, in the mid-70s. He and Ross Brittain made quite a splash as the Ross & Wilson show in 1977-1978 on WJBO.
Their show also featured David Hartman (not that David Hartman) & Beverly Lauren doing tag-team news, Andy Leopold on sports, before he was on WBRZ-TV, and Mike Graham did the weather forecast. He, too, was on Channel 2, at the time. Yours truly was Kevin McKay in the Skywatch plane.
Somewhere, around here, I have a tape of the show when Brian got arrested by Mike Graham. In addition to his weather duties, Graham was also a Baton Rouge Police Officer, at the time. It seemed that Brian had been seen tossing litter out of his car window. It was all in fun, and kicked off a new, anti-littering campaign.
Does you remember when WJBO gave you gas? In 1979 gasoline prices were skyrocketing (sound familiar) and, in order to give Baton Rouge drivers a break, WJBO sold gasoline for 11.5 cents-a-gallon (get it... 11 50) at Simple Simon's place on Airline @ South Choctaw. We had cars lined up all the way back to Florida Boulevard.

1 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I think the most memorable media event in Baton Rouge during that time frame was television, not radio - Andy Leopold's huge mis-interpretation of the responsibility of "reporting the news" before the US/USSR Olympics hockey game. Makes my blood boil to this very day, especially coupled with his arrogant defense of himself during the commercial break. The station manager took over after that.

2/03/2008 08:20:00 PM  

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