The National Moment of Remembrance encourages all Americans to pause wherever they are at 3 p.m. local time on Memorial Day for a minute of silence to remember and honor those who have died in service to the nation.
Arlington is written from the point of view of a soldier who was buried at Arlington National Cemetery, and based on the real story of Marine Corps Corporal Patrick Nixon.
Arlington was inspired by Nixon’s death in 2003, written by the songwriter Scott Turnbull after he met Nixon’s father. Adkins later recorded the song, but he did not have a personal connection with the soldier.
Thank you, Ed Brown, for your vision in creating this site, and thank you for your writing. Thank you to that handful of WNEW-AM family of friends who continue to support this site.
WNEW1130.com post that April day read,
There’s Only One . . . WNEW
There was a time when most radio stations, no matter how big, were local and part of neighborhood life. WNEW-AM, where the forms of modern radio were invented and made personal, existed within a community of broadcasters and listeners who shared in life’s events and now, share memories. This blog, exists to collect as many as possible of the bits and pieces of that history. What do you remember? What part of the story can you tell?
New York Transit Museum. Photo Credit: Bernie Wagenblast
Your Metromedia Station in New York
Bernie Wagenblast, a veteran New York radio traffic and transit reporter, sent me this picture taken at the New York Transit Museum, located in the abandoned Court Street subway station in downtown Brooklyn. The museum displays many restored New York subway cars, complete with period advertisements. Bernie thoughtfully spotted this one and sent it to me.
In May of 1967, Gary Stevens told his listeners that he’d gotten his hands on new music from the Beatles that none of them had heard yet. This is what his listeners tuned in for. Decades before the internet, social media, Napster, Spotify and MTV, radio was where you first heard new releases from the Rolling Stones, the Supremes and the Righteous Brothers.
Stevens was one of the WMCA “Good Guys,” the New York station’s roster of DJs at the height of the British Invasion and the halcyon days of Motown. The Beatles had already released “Penny Lane” and “Strawberry Fields Forever” earlier in the year, but Stevens didn’t just have a new single. He had an entire album: “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.” He claimed that his sidekick—a bear named Wooly Burger—had smuggled it out of England.
“People were not just tuning in to hear music and call letters and news, they tuned in for a friend, a familiar voice that made you feel good,” said Bruce Morrow, aka “Cousin Brucie,” who competed directly against Stevens in the night slot at WABC, where he still hosts a show He added: “If you were successful, you knew the secret: how to talk right directly to an audience. Gary had that secret.”
Write to Chris Kornelis at chris.kornelis@wsj.com
Editor’s Note: Although Mr. Stevens was not a WNEW alumni, he worked with many at WMCA who later landed at WNEW, including, Edward Brown.
Fifty-one years later on March 8, 1908, women workers fought for their rights again, by marching through New York City’s Lower East Side to protest child labor and sweatshop working conditions.
Imagine the delight and pride of those courageous women, when in 1935, Bernice Judis signed on as General Manager of WNEW. And, in 2022, she received a Legends induction into the Radio Hall of Fame.
WNEW Station Mgr. Bernice Judis. Photo: NYC Radio-Arcadia
Or, in 1940, when top ranking woman tennis player, Alice Marble, signed a contract with WNEW for a series of weekend football forecasts.
Marlene Sanders August 27, 1963
Followed by a host of courageous and strong women, epitomized by Marlene Sanders who in 1962 joined WNEW Radio as Assistant News Director.
And, of course, Peggy Stockton, veteran radio reporter who spent 12 years with WNEW covering New York’s City Hall.
Peggy Stockton, Mayor Ed Koch
Honorable mention for some WNEW-FM women, who for a short time in 1966, held an all women DJ line up. Alison Steele, Nell Bassett, Arlene Kieta, Ann Clements, Margaret Draper, Peggy Cass, Rita Sands, Pam McKissick.
Yom HaShoah
From the archives of Stuart Zuckerman.
