And just think....15 year old Ed Myers....and lucky youngsters like him all over the country....were experiencing the thrill of having their voices magnified and sent to homes throughout their communities........
"There may be thrills greater than that, but I don't know of any of them." -Ed Myers/Lee Shephard
Ed Myers began his career in broadcasting in Charlotte, NC at WGIV....one of those many "independents" that popped up after WW2. Those were "go go years" for just about everything, particularly radio. There weren't enough Networks to go around....so all those new stations started playing records...all day long. It was very "different" at the time....Imagine, music ALL DAY LONG! No soap operas, no dramas...."Music, wherever you go!"
Ed Myers
It wasn't long before DJ's began to rule the airwaves. Television was coming along then .....and that killed what was left of drama on radio. Playing records on radio....was very successful.....so thats what everybody did during the 50's and 60's.
WGIV in 1951 The station was founded by Francis Fitzgerald. The call letters stood for We are GI Veterans.
Bernie Prewitt, Francis Fitzgerald, Ed Myers.
Francis Fitzgerald was a very bright and farsighted man. He seemingly came up at least 10 good ideas for sucessful enterprises a week; many of them very successful. But radio, and WGIV was his first love.
We always called him "Mr. Fitz," and personally I never had a boss that I was more fond of, or had more respect for.
<WGIV 1953 Sales brochureWatch Julian and Ed in a 1991 interview. CLICK HERE
Nationally known broadcaster OWEN SPANN who recently died, also worked for WGIV. He was there in the late '40s. His show was called, OWEN SPANN, THE MORNING MAN.
Ed AND Owen....were in high school when they worked for WGIV.
As this article from the Charlotte News of 1953 shows, Myers' days at Central High were quite busy.
WGIV's success was due to...not only the fact that it was the first and only independent station in Charlotte...and was playing music all day long (it was a daytimer....sign off was whenever the sun went down) but....WGIV was also the FIRST station to openly appeal to the blacks of the area. Genial Gene was a dynamic, natural showman.....who left his job as principal of Billingsville Elementary school to become the most popular morning radio personality in Charlotte. He was one of the "Original 13," the first group of full-time black radio announcers in the South. Once Genial Gene became established.....the future of WGIV was assured. In the 50's WGIV's on air staff was totally integrated: half white, half black. Some of the names of the times were: Chattie Hattie, Joy Boy, Friendly Frank (that was Fitz..when he occasionaly filled in) Eric Dehlin, Johnny Surratt, Pete Toomey, Henry Poole, Julian Barber.....and of course, the chief engineer, Bill Lineberger.
GENIAL GENE (Samuel Eugene Potts)
The music being played then was of the standard variety....and WIDELY varied. In any half hour segment you might hear anything from "top pops" ("top forty" hadn't been heard of yet) to popular standards to rhythm and blues (the term "rock and roll" hadn't been coined yet either)...to an occasional hymn. Cleveland DJ Alan Freed is credited with popularizing the term "rock and roll," but it's unclear where the term came from. One of the best guesses, in my opinion, is that it's from a 1951 song called "60 Minute Man" by Billy Ward and His Dominoes; they sang, "I rock 'em, roll 'em all night long"......you get the drift. Similarly, the etymology of the word "Jazz".....also had it's roots deeply embeded in ...shall we say.....basic human desires and fantasies.
Remember, everything was still aimed at the "general" audience in America. The movie ROCK AROUND THE CLOCK...with Bill Haley....was the first movie that was aimed at a "target" market. That came out in 1954. Gene's selections leaned heavily in the rhythm and blues and gospel genre.
Chatty Hattie (Hattie Leeper) Now in the Black Radio Hall of Fame
AND................WGIV SIGNS OFF
AM stations have been struggling for a long time now...since FM began dominating the radio waves in the early 80's. Many have "bitten the dust," and the first of December, 2003.......WGIV signed off for the last time.
The Charlotte Observer paid tribute to WGIV's groundbreaking accomplishments in race relations and highlighted its importance to the entire community over its lifetime.
I was honored to be remembered along with two of my "heros" in the broadcasting industry, "Genial Gene" Potts and Julian Barber....in a letter to the editor.......by one of the outstanding leaders of the Charlotte community, Obie Oakley.
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(May I digress for a moment...........)
The good folks in Charlotte, NC will immediately know what I'm talking about....provided they're old enough to have been around that town in the 40's...but for the rest of the world......There was a hillbilly band that broadcast on WBT....called THE BRIARHOPPERS. Every afternoon at 4:30....a voice would ask....."Do you know what time hit is?"................"Hit's BRIARHOPPER time!" That would be followed by the band striking up "Wait til the sunshine's Nellie......and the clouds go drifting by........"
Briarhopper time is arguably the main reason for the great sucess of WBT in the golden years of radio. (The other reason was, of course, CBS.)
"Whitey and Hogan"......on guitar and mandolin.......were two of the primary mainstays of the Briarhoppers.....and at this writing....two of only three original Briarhoppers still living.
Personally, I fell in love with radio......listening to the Briarhoppers as a five year old kid.......so, imagine the thrill I received when I happened to meet Whitey...(Roy Grant)...quite by accident recently.
I think part of me is still 5 years old. And I like it that way.
WCHL Chapel Hill North Carolina
WCHL was one year old when Ed joined the staff in 1955. He replaced Charles Kuralt...who decided to devote all his spare time to the DAILY TAR HEEL.....the student newspaper at the University of North Carolina. He had become editor....and as Kuralt stated in one of his books....being editor of that small paper...and watching it roll off the press each night....was the happiest time of his life. Ed joined Charlie at the DTH as a reporter.
CHARLES KURALT at the editor's desk of UNC's DAILY TARHEEL
WCHL was a rather exceptional local radio station...mainly because of the large pool of talent available from the huge student population in the town of Chapel Hill. Sandy McClamroch owned the station and was known for his kindness to everyone who ever worked for him. Sandy was always one of the most respected business owners in Chapel Hill, and later served several terms as Mayor.
Ty Boyd, Barry Clark, Hank _________, Big John, Ed Myers, Patsy Owens (above)
Ty Boyd later replaced the legendary Grady Cole as Morning Host at WBT in Charlotte. Ty went on to become one of the country's leading motivational speakers and media trainers. (Photo courtesy of Alexa Press, publisher of VISIONS by Ty Boyd)
Ty and his wife Pat are still teaching..and motivating....many top executives...and future executives..at the Excellence in Speaking Institute in Charlotte. Boyd's new book is called, Million Dollar Toolbox
Andy Griffith and Ed in Chapel Hill.......1958WSOC-TV Charlotte 1958
Ed was the first regular11pm news anchor for WSOC-TV. (Prior to Ed's arrival, the duty was shared by various announcers.) After at least a 10 year head start, WBTV (word on the street was it was given those call letters instead of WBT-TV because saying "TT" was not considered proper in mixed company) WSOC-TV, an NBC affiliate, admittedly played second fiddle in the ratings. The first president of the station was Larry Walker who was well known as a pianist....for several popular musical groups...one of which was the Johnson Family Singers who were mainstays on WBT's golden days of radio....along with the Briarhoppers and Arthur Smith.
Bob Provence came down from Cinncinatti as program director. An announcer named Brooks Lindsey dressed up as "Joey the Clown".......and became perhaps the best loved children's performer in the country. Jimmy Kilgo, who had a huge audience of young people when he was with WIST radio in Charlotte, brought his act to TV and was an immediate hit on local TV.
I recently learned of Brooks Lindsay's passing.
Levis Brooks Lindsay
Levis Brooks Lindsay, of Charlotte died Monday April 28, 2003. Born on June 7, 1925, Mr. Lindsay attended Central High School in Charlotte, served in the Navy in WWII and was an Erskine College Graduate.
Mr. Lindsay had a long and notable career in local radio and television and was widely known for his twelve-year children's program, "Joey the Clown". He was a long time member of Trinity Presbyterian Church and also spent a short but memorable time as a member of First Presbyterian Church of Monroe. He was an active member of the US Power Squadron and a founding member of the Lake Norman Marine Commission. He served as a volunteer with countless charitable organizations and continued to work with the public after his retirement as an information agent at Charlotte Douglas International Airport. He was a revered member of the Elwood P. Dowd Society.
He was the husband of the late Shirley Kennedy Lindsay and is survived by daughters, Janice and Cynthia Lindsay and his son, Brooks Lindsay.
A memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. on Friday, May 2nd, at Trinity Presbyterian Church in Charlotte with visitation following immediately in the church parlor.
In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the J.D.F./Diabetic Research, 10724 Park Road, Suite 301, Charlotte, NC 28210-6496
Published in the Charlotte Observer on 4/30/2003.
RIP, Brooks.
In 1961 Ed Myers joined
WTOP Radio and TV
..................................and became
LEE SHEPHARD
From United States Air Force's Serenade in Blue album jacket....1965
I talked with my old friend John Alexander today. John is probably the leading authority on the Ghost stories of Washington, DC.....of which there are many. John has a great ear for a good story, so naturally I was flattered that he would ask me to participate in a book he was writing. (This goes back a long way....it was the 70's, I believe). I became John's official photographer for the book. What a hoot! We walked over 100 miles of Capitol landmarks.....wandered through old abandaned building and houses....and cemetaries....searching the National archives......doing research and taking pictures.
Life is GOOD.....when you have interesting friends like John Alexander.
Anyway........the book became a fantastic success. It was, and probably still is, being sold at most National Parks nationwide.
A lot of people have asked me about the picture on the Cover of John's book. It's a very dramatic picture.........and not one that's easy to forget. It is of a tombstone in an old cemetary in Georgetown......(part of DC). John and I were looking for a particular tomb....when I came upon that sad face.....with the one hundred and fifty year old weather beaten raindrop/tears.
I can only imagine the sadness suffered by the family of the little boy..........the name last name was "Randall".....I did a little research....and discovered that the father was a reporter for one of the New York papers....and he lived at the "Arlington House.."
That's about all I learned. I didn't even need to know that.
To me......it's just a reminder...that life is full of great happiness................and great sadness.
Remind me to tell you about the Lincoln Chair.....at that same cemetary.....which is Oak Hill......near Dunbarton Oaks in Georgetown.
THIS JUST IN.........from the Charlotte Observer
:--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted on Wed, Dec. 03, 2003
Black radio dynamo fades away
WGIV's sound transformed from R&B to gospel to silence
MARK WASHBURN
TV/Radio Writer
One of the South's most admired voices fell silent this week at age 56, snuffed out by the flick of a switch.
In life, Charlotte's WGIV radio became one of the nation's powerhouse black radio stations, captivated teens of both races and hatched the careers of radio greats like "Chatty Hattie" and "Rockin' Ray" Gooding. Once it even captured a killer.
Sunday, the station went silent at 11:59 p.m., the victim of low listenership and changing demographic tastes, says its owner, New York-based Infinity Broadcasting.
"We're all saddened by the station going dark," said Terri Avery, operations director for Infinity's WPEG-FM ("Power 98" 97.9), WBAV-FM, ("V" 101.9) and the late WGIV (1600 AM).
"But it's kind of like a sign of the times with the way business goes these days. ... It hadn't received much in the way of ratings, which equals listenership, which equals revenue."
WGIV was a product of the postwar baby boom and came of age in the turbulent era of Southern integration. In midlife, it struggled against powerful competitive currents in the ever-changing radio industry and spent its last days in the harness of religion, radiating the power of Southern gospel music.
WGIV was born in a two-car garage in 1947, one of the first broadcast licenses issued after World War II. The call letters stood for "We're G.I. Veterans."
Its founder was Francis Fitzgerald, who had an uncanny knack for finding talent. His first discovery was "Genial Gene" Potts -- never just "Gene," not on the air anyway.
In 1948, he sent Potts to host a broadcast from the old Excelsior Club featuring a vocal group named the Calypso Four.
Potts nailed the gig and was soon hosting gospel and soul programs, then became the station's morning announcer, a shift to showcase his ability to chatter in verse.
"We're setting the pace for others to trace," Potts would ad-lib. "This is Genial Gene on the air; have you got 15 minutes to spare?"
Potts took to rhyming in order to overcome a stammer that vexed him. He collected synonyms to replace words that would not come and his rapping became his trademark.
He would go on to join the Original 13, the first group of full-time black radio announcers in the South.
Once, a man sought for killing a police officer strolled into WGIV. He proposed a deal: Play a song for my mama and I'll surrender. Potts played it, then dialed the cops. The man went peacefully.
Attracted blacks, whites
WGIV rippled the segregationist fabric of the 1950s and '60s when white teenagers started tuning in to hear Hank Ballard & the Midnighters, Ray Charles, James Brown and other influences of the emerging -- some grown-ups called it corrupting -- rhythm and blues movement.At its heart, WGIV reverberated with personality.
There was William B. Sanders, who started out running errands for Potts and was so eternally optimistic that Potts nicknamed him "Joy Boy."
Potts teamed "Joy Boy" with "Hot Scott" Hubbs on the morning show in the early 1960s. Sanders was black; Hubbs white. They became the first integrated morning radio show in the South and for a while, the hottest show in town.
There was F.P. Toomey who went from broadcasting sock hops in the 1950s to a spot on the Charlotte police force.
And there was "Rockin' Ray" Gooding, who worked at WGIV from 1960 to 1968 and went on to WBT-AM to host the old "Sunday Night Hall of Fame."
Chatty Hattie's rise
Perhaps best known to this day is Hattie Leeper, who went to work for Potts as a high school student in the mid-1950s, doing odd jobs. Potts had her before the microphone before long and soon she was a regular part of WGIV's schedule known as "Chatty Hattie."
After the death of Fitzgerald in 1967, the station was sold, the first of many ownership changes. Facing foreclosure in 1982, the station went up for auction.
In a single decade, AM radio had lost half its listeners to the powerful and clearer FM. WGIV's influence was ebbing.
By the early '80s, WPEG-FM dumped its disco format and started down the path to primacy in the Charlotte market with its mix of jazz, rock and rhythm and blues, effectively stealing WGIV's core audience.
WGIV eventually adopted a gospel format and became indispensable to Charlotte's black religious matrix. With personalities like Altheresa Goode-Howard and Beatrice Thompson, it forged a powerful bond with listeners.
Listener misses WGIV
Avery said she was notified Nov. 24 that Infinity intended to pull the plug at WGIV. A 10,000-watt license the station held for the frequency at 1660 AM was salvaged and activated Monday to provide a second transmitter for Infinity's sports-talk station WFNZ (610 and 1660 AM).
"It was sad to just see it go so fast," said James Barnett, who came to Charlotte in the 1960s and knew the station at the apex of its influence. Barnett wondered why Infinity couldn't sell it to someone who would keep it on the air.
"I think those in the black community should be asking some questions," he said.
"As a church musician, I depended on WGIV as my cup-of-coffee radio station in the mornings," Tony McNeill, music minister at Friendship Missionary Baptist Church said Tuesday.
"It made it bearable to sit in traffic."
-- STAFF WRITER WOODY MITCHELL CONTRIBUTED TO THIS ARTICLE.
-- MARK WASHBURN: (704) 358-5007; MWASHBURN@CHARLOTTEOBSERVER.COM
My old friend from Central High School, Obie Oakley told me about the demise of WGIV. He was kind enough to write the Observer to tell them that they had left out a couple of things:
Here's what he wrote:
As a teenager growing up in Charlotte during the early 50’s, I have very fond memories of WGIV and especially “Genial Gene”, so I view the station’s signing off as the passing of an era.
However, in addition to the personalities cited in the article, I feel there are two other WGIV alumni who deserve mention. Ed Myers, Central High student leader and Shrine Bowl quarterback, was an “on air” DJ who went on to make a name for himself in broadcasting in the Washington, DC Area.
Julian Barber was the station’s news director in the early 50’s and he later became a top rated TV news anchor who won 3 Emmys.
WGIV can be proud of its service to the Charlotte community.
s/ Osborne Oakley
Charlotte, NC
Very nice, Obie. Thank you.
Everytime Julian and I got together...we would talk about those days.....for hours. He never forgot anything! He could even name all the little urchins...who lived out there on Toomey Ave (next to the dump) who used to hang around the station. (My daddy used to bring those kids presents on Christmas. He'd go by Stanleys on Christmas eve....and whatever toys old Doc Stanley hadn't sold....he'd let my Dad have them at cost...so he could give them to those kids. He carried on that tradition for a number of years, even after I had left for college. My dad's favorite was a little fellow they called "Little Bill."
My Dad passed away on Chrismas Eve, 1957. Around noontime the next day, there was a phone call......... from Little Bill....wanting to know where Mr. Myers was.
I regret that I didn't have the presence of mind that day to try to somehow get some toys to those kids....and carry on my father's tradition.
But most of my memories of WGIV are happy ones! If you ever see any old WGIV memorabilia for sale.....let me know.
Thanks for letting the Observer know that there was more to WGIV...than what they wrote about.
-Ed
(I just went on the internet and ordered 2 cases of Cheerwine.....and when it arrives....I'm going to drink myself silly toasting ....and saying goodbye ......to WGIV!)
I got a letter!
I'm very flattered to get such a nice note! Thanks, Miriam.
-Ed
Dear Sirs:
I write to share my grateful sentiment for the collection of briefings just run across while surfing for references to "The Original 13" in black radio. What I discovered was your beautifully-unburied treasure of tales from Radio's Glory Days -- which I find endlessly fascinating for a couple of reasons, if you care to count them: :>)
I am no longer a Charlottean nor a native Tar Heel, but I live in NC and have long held an abiding affection for this state and that region -- dating back to my college years. I graduated Livingstone College in Salisbury in 1978 and shortly thereafter, launched what would become a 24-year career in radio and television news -- and I still cherish the memory of my first years living and working down there as a budding broadcast journalist (which explains my interest in this history of the Queen City's laudable role in the "Early Age of AM Radio"! :>) Among my fondest memories are those of learning my craft as a general assignment reporter for "NewsRadio 93", as WSOC-FM then billed itself. I later made the transition to TV news and spent a couple of years in Florida followed by nearly 20 years as reporter and anchor at WTVD-TV, the Disney/ABC owned-and-operated affiliate in Raleigh-Durham, which I left in November, 2001. I am now "doing my own thing" as a media specialist/PR consultant in the heart of North Carolina.
In short, I owe much to the exhilirating experience of my time in Charlotte -- where our real-life role models included some of the talented titans to whom your website pays homage.
Thank you for sharing some of the lore we all love -- some of which I'd never even heard until now! Sounds like radio in the '50's set firm ground for the half-century of radio that followed. Your anecdotal accounts underscore Charlotte's rank in the world of broadcasting and must certainly evoke for many other people the kind of marvelous imagery it sketches for me, thanks to your shared stories.
Best Regards,
Miriam Thomas
PHOTOGRAPHY
I've always had a special love for photography. As a kid, I remember thinking what a miracle it was that you could capture a moment in time..........in such a way.
But, like most of my hobbies, I ran hot and cold....and never had much of a plan, or method....so over the years, I got a few good shots.....and missed a whole lot of great moments.......so...as I run across some that I like, I'll post a few. These are from my many trips to NY City in the 80's:
