Tag Archives: KBOA
Gaylon Watson
Yesterday I drove to the little town of Piedmont, in southeast Missouri, to meet Gaylon Watson. Gaylon worked at KBOA back in the fifties and I have long wanted to meet him and capture some oral history from those early days of the station where my father and I once worked. Gaylon’s eighty now but healthy and sharp as a tack. His 28 years in broadcasting covered a lot of ground and we only captured some of it in this recording.
Gaylon’s eighty now but healthy and sharp as a tack. His 28 years in broadcasting covered a lot of ground and we only captured some of it in this recording. We had to leave some on the editing room floor because of the noisy restaurant. After lunch Gaylon gave me the “Chamber of Commerce” tour of Piedmont (where he was mayor for 16 years) and then took me to meet his three dogs who live in splendor on 20 beautiful acres in the Missouri Ozarks.
Tom Colvin
Tom Colvin died last night. He was one of a handful of people who thought I was amusing. We co-hosted a daily, hour-long talk show on a little radio station during the 70’s. The Grapevine was one from one until two each weekday afternoon and featured interviews, listener calls and such. But on most days we just shot the shit and it was great fun (for us). Tom had a really infectous laugh and it wasn’t difficult to get one from him. And he was a good sport. One year we drove a golf cart in the fall festival parade, dressed as Laurel and Hardy. We tossed out hundreds of photos (below) that almost nobody picked up.
Once a month (more often?) we spent our hour of airtime playing trivia with listeners. This was pre-internet so you had to know your stuff and Tom did. The guy watched a LOT of television. Here we are with the other members of our team. L-R: Jeff Wheeler, John Robison (seated), Tom, and me.
Tom was a hard-working radio news guy and loved doing play-by-play sports as well. I left the station in 1984 and Tom shortly thereafter, as I recall. He worked in a number of small markets in Missouri before failing health forced him to retire. I went to see him last September at his home in Rolla. Must have been 20 or 25 years since we’d seen each other. I’m glad I knew him. I’m glad I got to work with him.
Time for Talk: KBOA830.com
Time for Talk was (is?) a public access program on the local cable system in Kennett, MO. As I recall, it started about the same time I began working at the local radio station, KBOA.
Time for Talk was a labor of love for Dr. Russ Burcham (a local dentist) and his wife, Rosemary. Rosemary did the interviews and Russ worked the camera. Sort of Wayne’s World with Aunt Bea and Sheriff Taylor replacing Wayne and Garth.
Time for Talk was 15 minutes long, as I recall. And it was kind of big deal in our little town because it was about the only way you’d ever see your self on television without getting arrested or dying in bus crash.
Because I was “on the radio,” Russ and Rosemary had me on several times over the years. Before YouTube, the only way you’d see one of these treasures was to go to Kennett.
This one was recorded in 1998, fourteen years after I left Kennett. Rosemary asked me to talk about the website I created for the local station (my first effort at a website). Enjoy.
A quest to save AM radio
Most of my on-air time for the dozen years (1972-82) I worked at my hometown radio station was on the AM station. In the 60s (?) the station sold (at cost?) “FM converters” because so few cars had FM receivers. This NY Times story tells the tale:
“In 1978 half of all radio listening was on the AM dial. By 2011 AM listenership had fallen to 15 percent, or an average of 3.1 million people, according to a survey by Veronis Suhler Stevenson, a private investment firm. While the number of FM listeners has declined, too, they still averaged 18 million in 2011. (The figures are averages based on measuring listeners every 15 minutes.)”
“In 1970 AM accounted for 63 percent of broadcast radio stations, but now it accounts for 21 percent, or 4,900 outlets, according to Arbitron. FM accounts for 44 percent, or 10,200 stations. About 35 percent of stations stream content online.”
“Nearly all English-language AM stations have given up playing music, and even a third of the 30 Major League Baseball teams now broadcast on FM. AM, however, remains the realm of conservative talk radio, including roughly 80 percent of the 600 radio stations that carry Rush Limbaugh.”