Here’s a cool aircheck made by contributor, Tom Prestigiacomo. First posted in 2005, Tom informs us that after WAKY, he and a couple of WACKY DJ’s were hired at WMC-FM Memphis – by the former PD of WAKY. In Tom’s words: …”so FM 100 is really just a continuation of WAKY back then”.
Anyway, here’s Tom doing his thing on Wacky from sometime in 1979 – yeah check out all the disco tunes! Tom says on this ‘check he’s reading Bob Moody’s book review in the New York times. Gotta wonder if this is the same Bob Moody your webmaster met at WPOC Baltimore back in the 90s… we’ll never know, I suppose.
Just a point of clarification; There were a couple of WAKY connections to Memphis but Ron Olson was not one of them. Johnny Dark left Memphis in 1967 and changed his air name to John W. “Dude” Walker. Dude had the best pipes in the world and did afternoons and 6-10pm at WAKY in Louisville. Gary Burbank was known as Johnny Apollo when he worked in Memphis at WDIA in poduction. He came to Louisville around 1969. While Dude is, these days, retired, Burbank still does afternoons in Cincinnati.
In 1979, former WAKY General Manager Don Meyers came to WMC-FM and shortly thereafter hired Gary Guthrie. Gary hired me to come to Memphis in September, 1979.
Memphis legend Ron Olson is a Memphis boy (played tuba at Oakhaven High School!) and has spent most of the last 31 years at 1960 Union Avenue. He was the afternoon host from 1974-1978. Ron came back to FM 100 in 1983 to anchor mornings and has been there ever since.
UK listeners will know the jingle heard at 2.40 as ‘the happy sound of national Radio 1’.
While attending college in Memphis in the early 80’s, I spent a lot of time enjoying Memphis radio. Tom Prestigiacomo had a real ability to connect with his audience on a personal level. Blessed with a great voice and subtle sense of humor, he also had a flair for personalizing every weather forecast, PSA or promo that he read, and never said the same thing the same way twice. I understand that Tom retired a few years ago and hope he is doing well.