Jerry Kristafer, 88.9 WJMJ Bloomfield (Hartford) CT | June 4, 2018

88.9 Hartford WJMJ
Longtime radio veteran Jerry Kristaffer at WJMJ

Station: 88.9 WJMJ Hartford (Wikipedia) (Website)
Format: Catholic Radio, Full-Service Oldies
Branded: “Where Faith Meets Life
Ownership: St. Thomas Seminary Bloomfield, CT
Featured Air Personality: Jerry Kristafer
Contributor: Steve West
Aircheck #1604


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Oh, clues views from my “Game with No Name” coming up at 8:20

Curator’s Notes:

The first thing you notice about this before listening is probably, “oh great, another religious station”.  Not.  This is a unique and somewhat historic radio station in that “WJMJ claims to be the first archdiocesan-operated radio station in the United States”. (Quote from Wikipedia).

This station is nothing like a typical, evangelical-type preaching station.  It plays popular music from the 50s all the way up to the 2000s, with a heavy emphasis on older music.  Also programmed in, “Father John’s Corner”, which is just a two minute or so religious commentary followed by a song chosen to enhance it.  In this case, the song in Fr. John’s Corner is “Breathe” by Faith Hill… which is followed by Jerry Kristafer’s comment about Faith and husband Tim McGraw appearing at Mohegan Sun Casino next weekend.

Chronologically speaking, the aircheck opens with the end of “El Paso” and goes into a Legal ID, then right into ABC Network News.  Kristafer comes in with local news and traffic reports following that.  Something else that is interesting.  About midway through this scoped aircheck, Gary Maholic (sp) comes in with WJMJ Religious news.  While this news feature is unique in and by itself, the voice of Gary Maholic sounds very much like ABC’s Gary Nunn.  Hmm… I’m sure that’s not a coincidence.

I’ve said enough about this aircheck.  Now, just listen for yourself.  While this is scoped, you don’t miss much.  There’s only a few songs played an hour here in morning drive and you hear ALL the content.  Also, no commercials.  This is a station underwritten by Sacred Heart University, which also operates NPR affiliate 91.1 WSHU and it’s translators.  In fact, I recorded this from WSHU-HD3 here at the Airchexx studio!