Date of Recording: 02.xx.1993
Station: 106.1 WEGX Philadelphia, Pennsylvania USA (WZGO/WTRK/WEGX/WJJZ/WISX)
Featured Air Personality: Various
Contributor: Robyn Watts
Comments:
First in a series of trade releases from FMQB (Friday Morning Quarterback) donated by Robyn Watts is this look back at Adult Hits formatted Eagle 106 in Philly. We start right out with Lander and the morning Nut Hut… a precursor to his next gig in Boston at WBMX. The ‘check then moves on to the rest of the broadcast day.
I can pin the date of this down to January 20 1993. this composite makes several mentions of Innauguration Day which falls on January 20. Plus, there is a bit called worst Joke wednesday. January 20 did fall on a Wednesday in 1993. On another note, the history of 106.1 in Philly is really kind of a sad one. It had been a beautiful music station for many years, then flipped to top 40 in the early 80s to try to go head to head with WCAU FM. They called themselves top FM. It was a great sounding station, but I don’t think it gained any traction in the ratings. then they were called Electric 106, then eagle 106. The station always sounded good, but never seemed to resonate all that much with Philly from what I remember.
I listened a lot to Eagle 106 around this time… especially the (sleepy) summer of ’92.
Mark Driscoll did all the liners.
The Nut Hut was Lander, Patti Steele (now at PLJ), Danny Bonaduce, Elliot (now at DC101), Mr. Leonard, and Joe Stefano with traffic.
Spyder Harrison (now at Sirius) did nights… the Bed Check was must hear radio.
I can’t remember who did middays and PM drive… I think Bret Hamilton did overnights.
Lander’s next stop was Z100, before going to Boston.
Travis,
JoJo Morales (formerly Z100/NY) was doing middays from 1991 to the station’s demise under a different last name and Cadillac Jack Devile (from WAVA/Washington) handled afternoon drive during the same era.
Also, Lander’s next stop after Eagle 106 was B100/San Diego, but he was forced out after a few weeks when he got into trouble with management over a Ci Ci’s Salsa parody that had offended the Spanish-American population. Afterwards, he left for Z100.
Robyn
JoJo last name on Eagle 106 was Esposito (had to go look it up).
Every time I’ve tried to hear the audio I can’t because it’s stuck at 0:00 on both ends.
Actually, MGD, there was a soft rock format in between the Beautiful Music format and the Top 40 format of 106.1 FM in Philly. So when it went to a contemporary pop rock sound, it was initially to compete with Adult Contemporary rockers WIP, WSNI, WMGK and even AOR/AC hybrid WIOQ. In other words, the future Electric 106/Eagle 106 was AC first, *THEN* CHR, then, while still the latter format, switching to the former nickname circa 1983/1984 and the latter in the late ’80’s.
IIRC, Patty Steele also went on to Z-100. Also, Eagle 106 was the station that, ironically, launched suburban-Philly (Broomall, PA, to be exact) native Danny Bonaduce’s radio career (first in late evenings [nights, in the radio biz], then, I believe, in AM drive on “The Nut Hut”.
David:
As I remember, Bonaduce met the morning show guys, Welch & Woody, at a bar they were making an appearance at. They brought him on the show a couple times and he got his chance at the mike when they were on vacation. Fast Larry Wachs left his 10p-2a spot for another job and Bonaduce filled it for a couple years until he was arrested in FLA for buying drugs. After rehab he was give the boot and went to Arizona.