I seriously doubt many people care about this, but I do.
AM 1360 WYOS in Binghamton went off the air just before the start of the new year. Management explained the station couldn't find enough advertisers and there are transmitter problems.
I grew up on AM radio. I chose a career in broadcasting because of the magic of AM. Of course, WARM was coming out of my transistor radios more often than not when I was a kid. I was lucky enough to work there for nearly eleven years. The now defunct WSCR pumped out a good product for a while. The legendary Kevin Jordan had the WILK news department humming for a few years.
I loved dialing around, especially at night. WBBM, KDKA, WABC, WNBC, KYW, WBAL, WKBW, CKLW, WBZ, WOWO, WLS...
An AM radio station died, and I'm sad.
WYOS tried everything over the years: country, talk, oldies, business news, adult hits... It carried CBS Sports Radio in its final days.
The owner has a year to put it back on the air or surrender the license. The same company also took two other AM stations off the air this week, one in Maine and the other in Connecticut.
Friends, this doesn't end well.
By the way, it is a total coincidence that this blog entry hits on National DJ Day. Yes, I did plenty of that early on, and it was exceptionally valuable experience. You learn to develop a sense of time, and, of course, you pick up some ad lib skills along the way. To my radio brethren, enjoy your day!
