Interview with Denny Nugent, January 22, 2014

JF: --. there we go. Okay, now, I think we're going now. Yeah, okay, thank you. It's a good thing Charlie was here, see?

DN: Testing, testing.

JF: Testing. All right, Denny, well, I'll just ask you a few questions and we'll just roll a little bit and we'll have a good time, okay?

DN: All right, I'll do my best.

JF: All right. Let's see, this is a Wednesday morning, I believe, January 22nd, 2014. I'm in sunny but cold Louisville, Kentucky. But Denny Nugent-

DN: You think it's cold there.

JF: .... is in an even colder Chicago. Again, please?

DN: It was minus four when I got started this morning.

JF: You're in Chicago. Denny is the National Program Director for Moody Radio there in Chicago. But he has ties, of course, to WHAS, and we want to talk about that in just a second. Although, Denny, you were here in Louisville at WHAS. I think you went to Cincinnati and then you were in, what, Phoenix? And then...

DN: Phoenix briefly, then Cleveland.

JF: Cleveland.

DN: For about 15 years.

JF: Yeah, but you have ties back here in this area. You're from this area, aren't you?

DN: Oh yeah, yeah, that's kind of my home stomping grounds. I was a river rat, grew up in Tell City, Indiana, about 80 miles downstream. And so, I grew up watching Channel 3, and later Channel 11. We couldn't pick up Channel 11 at our house until they put their tower on Floyd's Knobs. So I didn't see much CBS stuff back in the 50s but once they fired up the new transmitter we were watching Channel 11 and ended up watching Milton Metz do the news back when I was a teenager.

JF: How about that? Now, you-

DN: Or actually the weather, Milton was doing the weather.

JF: He did the weather, yeah. Now, you were a young man in Tell City. Did you ever listen to WHAS radio?

DN: I was aware of it. I can't say that I listened a lot because I was growing up more listening to WAKY than [crosstalk]

JF: Sure, yeah, WAKY was the thing. Now, this would have been in what? What years for this you were in Tell City as [inaudible] radio?

DN: Oh, gosh, well, I grew up in the 50s and 60s, graduated from high school in 1970. So it really would have been the 60s when I was becoming radio aware.

JF: Yeah, radio aware, did listening to WAKY or other radio stations beget a desire in you to have a career in broadcasting?

DN: Oh yeah.

JF: How did that happen?

DN: Oh, yeah, like a lot of radio folks. I think there were three primary stations that I listened to that really got me jazzed about radio, and WAKY was certainly one of them. I remember Johnny Randolph very well. When I ultimately met Johnny when I was working at WHAS it was like a thrill, it was like meeting an icon.

JF: Yeah, yeah.

DN: Of sorts. I also listened to WJPS in Evansville, which is closer to Tell City, because I was far enough away that none of the stations really came in super, super good. And then, also at night I would listen to WLS up here in Chicago, like a lot of people did around the country. So those three stations, I 3:00really enjoyed and kind of got into, along with just listening to my hometown station, WTCJ in Tell City, the proverbial 1000-watt radio station there on the hill.

JF: Is that where you started?

DN: [crosstalk] where they gave me a start at the ripe young age of 15.

JF: Oh, wow.

DN: Big one. I was actually playing Light My Fire by The Doors when it was new, if you can believe that.

JF: What was that like? What were your duties like then?

DN: I was on the radio. I mean, it was small-town radio, and everything from taking out the trash to playing records from 7:00 until 11:00 at night. I remember I did the Sunday morning shift, so I opened up the radio station on Sunday morning at 7:00 and signed it on and played the religious stuff, and then 4:00came back in from 1:00 to 5:00 and played Top 40 records all afternoon on Sunday.

JF: Wow.

DN: I was probably doing, I don't know, probably 20, 25 hours a week, off and on, through high school.

JF: How about that? And then, after high school what took you there?

DN: Well, you know, after being in radio for three years by the time I graduated I figured I knew everything there was to know about radio by then, so I should go to college and study something that was complimentary, and actually that made a lot of sense but I certainly didn't know everything there was to know about radio, but I originally thought I'd go the electronics route and went to Purdue for a year studying electronics engineering and ultimately realized that's really not what I wanted to do.

DN: So I made a much smarter move and switched schools and ended up graduating from Indiana University in Marketing and Advertising, and that just a perfect 5:00complement to the programming aspects of radio.

JF: Yeah.

DN: That's really what we do in radio, is market, creating a product for an audience, and I've been doing that ever since.

JF: So the seeds were borne then, how about that? Now, where had you worked in radio, in addition to Tell City, where had you worked prior to coming to WHAS as Program Director? What year was that?

DN: Let's see, not really a lot of places. I graduated from IU in '74. I had worked, the station in Tell City was owned by a family called the Brewer family, and they also owned a station in Richmond, Indiana. I'd actually worked there the summer between my junior and senior year in college, and got to know some of the people there. They basically had always said, "You've been working for us a long time. When you graduate, we'll have a job for you."

DN: So I went to Richmond and actually started in sales at the Richmond station. 6:00And a month later, their morning guy left to go to another station. So I ended up doing mornings and selling for this WHON in Richmond and stayed there for two years doing mornings.

DN: That what that period in my career when I was the big fish in the little pond. That was the only time I was really kind of star status. It wasn't a big town, but it was very cool playing in celebrity basketball games and that sort of thing.

DN: After that, I went to be the small fish in the big pond where I went to a daytime AM station in Columbus, Ohio, which barely showed up on the ratings radar, but learned a lot and it got me to Columbus. After two years, I ended up moving to go off the air and be more on a back scenes role, more a desk jockey 7:00than a disc jockey. I ended up being Music Director at the number one station in Columbus for Taft Broadcasting, WTVN.

JF: Oh, yeah.

DN: [inaudible] news, talk, music, sports, Buckeyes, all of it. So started out as Music Director, ended up as Assistant Program Director. Did a lot of fill-in, got to know a lot of people. Learned a lot from the Taft Broadcasting people. And after five years, that's when I went for the opportunity to be Program Director at WHAS, I think largely because of what I had learned at Taft, and what must have been a fabulous interview with Mike [Crusham 00:07:42], I'm not sure.

JF: Yeah, Mike Crusham was Station Manager at WHAS then. This would have been-

DN: But that was my first programming job, WHAS.

JF: Really? I didn't realize that. Although you'd been well prepared, it looks like, from all the different aspects that you had been through. Many guys come to that route and they're just on the air disc jockeys or something, but you had 8:00a wide background. And that really showed in what you did at WHAS. That would have been what year, about 1983 or '84, somewhere along that-

DN: Spring of '83. March of '83.

JF: When you had applied for that job, were you surprised you got it? I mean, you came from a very good station in Columbus, Ohio, to a 5,000-watt station there in Louisville. Did that make any impression on you, or you think, "Well, this is just kind of a lateral move," or what?

DN: No. I was very excited and impressed and surprised. I mean, you don't really expect for a station of that caliber, and maybe I may have made it bigger than it really was, just having grown up in Tell City and WHAS and Channel 11, and that was just really the big time to me, even though having worked in Taft at Columbus for a while.

DN: But still, no, I was pleasantly surprised and very excited because you 9:00wouldn't just wouldn't expect a major station like that to give a shot to-

JF: To your first programming job.

DN: ... to a 31-year-old kid.

JF: Yeah, interesting.

DN: As a programmer.

JF: Well, it turned out to be a very good move for both.

DN: Well, and I'm thankful for that, certainly was blessed that Mike Crusham saw some potential in me. And, again, I remember coming to the interview very prepared. Even though I was in Columbus, I remember for several weeks listening to WHAS through the static as I was getting ready for work and as I was going to work, and just listening intently to the station and coming up with a game plan. And so, I remember when I initially talked to Mike, I felt like I knew what could be done. I actually presented that as a way for WHAS to take the next step.

JF: Well, that was kind of an interesting timing too. I can't remember how long Mike had been the Station Manager, but Mike was a young guy also and looking for ways to keep things fresh. He was in sales but very interested in programming and very involved in promotion and all that sort of thing, as I remember.

DN: Exactly. And willing to take some chances and some risks, and that's really what the station needed. It needed to be shaken up a little bit.

JF: Yeah, it was. You were there with Hugh Barr, and I can't remember who had come after Hugh but probably it was an era where it needed just some tweaking and some moving on to a new direction. We'll get to a step you took along that route in just a minute.

JF: Mike Crusham was the Station Manager. Do you remember who else was there, sales, and who was on the air and all that sort of thing?

DN: Oh, wow, I certainly remember the on-air team when I first there. Certainly Wayne Perky was doing mornings. And as I recall Joe Donovan had been moved to middays at that point. Bill Cody was doing afternoons. And then evenings were kind of a jumble, because Milton was doing talk... Or maybe there was sports 11:00talk. I think Van Vance was doing sports talk.

JF: Probably so.

DN: And Milton did some talk show, but then there was a news block in the middle of Milton's show, and then he came back later. And then, I think as I recall there was network programming all night. I think it was mutual, Joe Bohanan or [crosstalk]

JF: ... wasn't on the air then, was he?

DN: I don't recall that name. In my mind, coming in there I felt, "What a waste to be sending out your signal to 30-plus stations in Canada and put on a network program that's available everywhere already."

JF: That's kind of habit. It's come back to that again now, unfortunately.

DN: In a lot of places-

JF: Not [crosstalk] WHAS but many, many stations across the country.

DN: Well, even here in Chicago. There's five clear channel, 5,000-watt stations here in Chicago, and not all of them take advantage of really been live and local.

JF: That's interesting, because I'm like you, as a young guy... I'm from Evansville, of course, but I would listen to WLS in Chicago and pick up all the disc jockeys and everything. Are they doing anything live and local these days in 2014 overnight?

DN: Well, at WLS they're not.

JF: Yeah, that's what I mean, yeah.

DN: It's satellite starting at 6:00 PM on WLS.

JF: Wow, interesting.

DN: So, Big 89 does local mornings and they do local from 9:00 to 11:00 and then they do local from 2:00 to 6:00, but everything else is pretty much satellite.

JF: That's interesting. Well, let's go back: You came in, in 1983. You were a 31-year-old whiz kid here. You've got a pretty much green light from Mike Crusham.

DN: Yeah.

JF: You've got a morning man who's been on for some time and a lot of programming elements that probably need to be tweaked. What kind of obstacles 13:00did you run into?

DN: Wow. I don't recall too many honestly. I think Mike allowed me to come in and just do those tweaks. I think I came in with an appreciation for the legacy of WHAS. So I wasn't willing to take anything too far. But I think I recognized the need to just shake things up a little bit and do things a little bit differently.

DN: And as I recall, I think I really wanted to put the right people in the right places to make the most impact. That's probably, as I got started, the thing that made the biggest difference to most people.

JF: But you come in with a fellow like a Wayne Perky or a Milton Metz who've been there a long time. You're a 31-year-old guy, and how do they react to you, as you recall?

DN: I recall been welcomed.

JF: Yeah, I think you're right there.

DN: Wayne was great and Milton was great. Interestingly, I got a good start with Milton quickly because one of my first duties after starting was hitting the road, I think it was with the Cardinals at the time because they were in the Final Four [inaudible].

JF: Yeah.

DN: So I think the Sweet 16 regionals, as I recall, was in Albuquerque. So in addition to the team going out and the play-by-play guys and everything, we sent Milton out to do his talk shows live from Albuquerque surrounding the basketball. I went along to kind of produce and just learn and meet people and that sort of thing, and ended up rooming with Milton. Poor Milty go so sick out 15:00in Albuquerque that I ended up kind of serving as his mother for a while. I think he always appreciated that and we made it through the weekend and we got the broadcast out of the way that we needed to do, but that was really the start between Mr. Metz and myself, spending the weekend in Albuquerque.

JF: Which was a good way to get it started really.

DN: Exactly.

JF: Milton would be a good ally.

DN: And the week after that we, as I recall, headed to the Final Four. So basketball was a big part of what we were doing back then.

DN: Talking about Wayne, what a talent, what a gifted guy and still is. It was just a privilege to work with him and learn from him. My goal was just let him do what he does well. I think we just put a little different structure into the 16:00morning show in terms of the clocks and in terms of the flow and what was on when, but basically my goal was to stay out of Wayne's way and let him be great.

JF: Fred Wiche, was Fred doing farm reports?

DN: Yes.

JF: [inaudible]

DN: Fred was still there, doing the farm reports and weekend things, and the gardener features and that sort of thing. So yeah, he was still around. And Cawood Ledford was just about bowing out. He was kind of wrapping up his career at that point.

JF: And Paul Rogers was coming on strong.

DN: Paul was coming on strong, that's right. In fact, Paul was just getting a handle on the horse race calling at the time.

JF: Oh, yeah.

DN: [inaudible] that off.

JF: You have some Derby memories, I'm sure.

DN: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Oh, that was certainly the highlight of the year, because then I had the greatest job in the world on Derby day because, as you 17:00recall and they may still be doing it, I don't know, but WHAS just really owned the Derby in terms of live programming. It was just... And I had nothing to do with it. I mean, it was set up long I came. We just kept it going.

DN: But to be live from Churchill Downs all day with Wayne anchoring and Cawood and later Paul doing the calling every race and having somebody on Millionaire Row and somebody on the infield and people everywhere, and what a great broadcast that was.

JF: It was, and you were free to roam around wherever you wanted to go to.

DN: As the Program Director, I had an all-access pass and could go anywhere I want and had absolutely nothing to do, so it was great.

JF: Well, the buck stopped there but at least you had fun with it, that's good.

DN: That's right. We had everybody ready to go. And so, I could enjoy the day.

JF: What about the news department? Do you recall much about the news dept? It was a strong element of WHAS.

DN: It was huge, and honestly that was one area that didn't really need a lot of 18:00work. Now, there probably would have been some things I would have liked to have instituted but that in my career that was the one station that I programmed that I really did not oversee the news department.

DN: So Brian Rublein was the News Director, and of course news was so very important to WHAS given the history with the newspaper and the television station. So they were pretty autonomous. The news department really was pretty much on their own, and I was able to format where the newscasts were and how long they were and that sort of thing. But with regard to the operation of the newscast, they were great people, they did a great job. And, again, I just kind of stood back and let them do the job.

JF: Well, that was really, as you look back on it, quite a bit of wisdom from a 31-year-old guy to come in. That's a tribute to you really, to recognize what was good and what needed to be tweaked, but letting things run. That was good.

DN: Well, and again, I think it was important to respect the legacy of the place because it had been around so many years. Even though it hadn't had huge success in those past years, still it was so obvious that the potential was there. The people were there. There were talented people just in the background there who really weren't allowed to do all that much.

JF: Talk about some of those, what were you thinking of when you say that?

DN: Well, I'm thinking specifically of Kim Scott and Doug McKelvin, both of whom were really behind the scenes doing production and I'm not sure what all they were doing at the time. But I remember they were so talented but yet they really didn't have regular on-air-

JF: Yeah, kind of floated around, did everything, whatever needed to be done, yeah.

DN: And so, I think some of the big moves I did fairly early was to put Kim 20:00Scott on the air from 9:00 to noon, and again, really talented and very gifted, and just was under-utilized.

DN: Then I put Doug on from noon until 3:00. Again, utilizing the resources that were available. Joe Donovan, who was so gifted with his oldies and his huge library and his knowledge of music, I moved him back to all nights, which some might consider a demotion but in his case, to put him back on the clear channel signal where he was booming out across the country, I always felt that he was glad to get back-

JF: Oh, that was exactly what he wanted. He always wanted that. And just as a side here, you don't know this, this is Wednesday the 22nd of January, but Joe 21:00passed away on this past Sunday.

DN: I did not know that.

JF: Well, I'm sorry. I know you didn't know that, but we're recording it here, but Joe passed away this past Sunday. He had some complications and passed away. But he loved that all-night show. He was so happy when you put him back on there.

JF: Joe and I had [crosstalk] worked together at Denver and KOA, which was a 5,000-watt station there. That's when he started his oldies show. He would get out, again, they were the golden voice of the West, you know?DN: Mm-hmm (affirmative).

JF: And so, the attraction to come to WHAS in the 70s was this 5,000-watt all-night signal, where you get out all across the country. And so, he had that. And to get back to that, that was a great move for you and for him both. It was [inaudible].

DN: Well, again, it was utilizing people to their best advantage, really recognizing what people were strong at and letting them do that. It really made the job easy.

JF: Oh, good.

DN: Remembering Joe, that is so sad to hear.

JF: Yeah, it is. I just wanted to insert that here for the archives, that this was a-

DN: One of my distinct memories down there, I think I visited Joe's house once or twice when I was there, but to see he had an entire bedroom with nothing but 22:00shelves full of 45s.

JF: Yeah, there were close to 30,000 of them according to his obituary this morning. You could attest to that, I'm sure, but being there.

DN: They were there. It was amazing.

JF: Well, it's interesting because Facebook and all the social media now are just filled with tributes to Joe from across the country because of that signal. As you said, it went out across the country late at night, so he's got tributes to that all over.

DN: Well, I appreciate knowing. I'll look some of them up and reminisce.

JF: Yeah, very good, very good. Well, what about the sales staff? Who was the sales manager? Of course, Crusham had a big influence on that.

DN: Right.

JF: But you remember the sales staff?

DN: I think Bob Sherer was... Or was it Jerry Solomon? Perhaps it was Jerry Solomon? Those names kind of faded away a little bit but I think maybe it was Jerry Solomon who was the manager and Bob Sherer was the manager later, and [inaudible] was the general manager.

JF: As I recall, and this keeps coming out in all these interviews, one of the elements of WHAS was the sense of community within the building; the sales staff, the news department, the sports [inaudible 00:23:16], the on-air people, all seemed to feel a sense of community. They weren't fighting each other over territory. They were all looking out for each other and working together. Did you feel that while you were there?

DN: Absolutely, absolutely. And I respect that, it was just really a team. It was a great team. In fact, one of the promotional things that I had put together while I was there, and this always amazed me because this was back in the day when the billboard companies actually painted the billboards. And we did a series of billboards back then called Join the Winning Team. The billboard company made these huge billboards with the '84 WHAS logo kind of 3D and gave them a bunch of pictures of all the people on the staff. Not so much the sales 24:00people but all the on-air people. They painted every face in about six billboards and it was amazing.

DN: But that really was the genesis of that concept, was the fact that it really was a team. It wasn't just the on-air folks and the news folks, it was the back office. I mean, Anne Hubbs-

JF: Anne Hubbs, yeah, and Helen Huber

DN: ... Helen and just the whole gang. Everybody worked hard but had a good time and got along great together.

JF: Sounds like your marketing background came into effect then. That was another element of it, wasn't it? It's very effective marketing.

DN: Yeah, and thankfully the station had a marketing budget and advertising and I think we used it pretty effectively.

JF: Now, they were just under the Bingham aegis at that time, weren't they?

DN: Yes.

JF: Any contact with the Bingham family per se?

DN: I had absolutely none, absolutely none. I mean, the highest I went was talking with Bob Morse occasionally.

JF: Who was the general manager of radio and television.

DN: Yeah. But no, I never met any of the Binghams.

JF: Which says something about their ownership really. They were not meddlers. They, again, found good people and said, "Go to it," I guess.

DN: Exactly, as far as I could tell.

JF: Yeah, good. Well, let me ask you about one of the moves that you made that had a significant impact on bringing WHAS, again, up to date. I recall being... You had Liz Curtis on the air at that time. Tell me about Liz Curtis. How did you find Liz Curtis-DN: Lizzie, yeah, that was another, oh gosh, excellent find. Certainly I had respected her and enjoyed listening to her doing mornings over at WAKY. And Kim Scott, hated to lose her but she and her husband Dan Deely who 26:00was over at, I forget the call letters, but 102.3 the rock station.

JF: WLRS

DN: LRS. So Dan and Kim were married and they knew a programming guy up in Cleveland, who I later got to know. He hired them as a married team to go up and do mornings in Cleveland. And so, we lost Kim. So, having heard Liz on the air and just recognizing the sheer talent that was there, I remember touching base with her carefully and subtly...

JF: Because she on the air at WAKY.

DN: Yeah, she was on the air at WAKY.

JF: A rival in town, right.

DN: So we somehow got together. I don't recall that there was any kind of non-compete clause or anything, but was able to hire her to do much... I felt give her an opportunity to let her personality shine more.

JF: So you sort of picked that up just by listening to her and knew that was there?

DN: Oh yeah, I've always been, I think, a pretty good judge of talent, just listening to what they do, and when I talk to people one-on-one just to kind of sense what's there. She was just brilliant with regard to her ability to communicate in a likable way, in a warm, friendly way. It was a joy to get to know her.

JF: A great move, yeah.

DN: And I still keep in touch with her because now that I'm in Christian radio and she's been a very successful Christian speaker and author.

JF: Internationally, yes.

DN: Yeah. So I still see her now and then at conferences.

JF: Well, that was a great move for her to be able to come from... WAKY was doing just a different thing, to come to sort of an adult radio station here and that kind of audience was a good move for her too.

DN: Yeah, it was. She was perfect, so that 9:00 to noon slot was... Kim did a great job and I think Lizzie took it to the next level.

JF: She did. Well, that reminds me of another move then because I remember I had been gone from the station. I left in '76 or something, still around town doing some voiceover work. Mike Crusham was my neighbor. Mike said, "You ought to get back on the radio here." And I said, "Well, I'm doing some other things." He said, "Well, we might have a Saturday-morning slot. I want you to talk to this program director, Denny Nugent," who I did not know, I had not met.

JF: And I don't know how it all came about but we met, and I started in 1984 doing Saturday mornings, which was all I needed to do at that time. But in January of '85 I recall we were at Lizzie's house at a Sunday brunch or something. And you said to me, "I may have a change in my afternoons and would you be available to do afternoons for a while if I needed you?" I don't know if you recall that or not?

DN: I don't recall that, but I...

JF: And you hired me to do afternoons while you were searching for your next 29:00stroke of genius there. Do you recall who that was?

DN: Well, it was not just while I was searching. It would have been knowing that I would had to sit out a six-month non-compete because I was talking to Terry Minors, who was over at QFM, playing rock records, and I think being very frustrated doing the morning show over there, kind of the bad boys of radio.

DN: I really give Stephen Lee Cook a lot of the credit, because Stephen was the one who told me because he knew Terry. I didn't know Terry at all. I heard them. And again, I always sensed... I didn't listen to those guys a lot because that wasn't what I enjoyed, but I could really tell that Terry was the talented one.

DN: When Stephen suggested that Terry might like to do our kind of radio, it got me thinking and ended up talking with him. He did have a contract, had a six-month iron clad non-compete. To WHAS' credit and a lot of credit to Sandy 30:00Gamblin, who was the general manager at the time, he was kind of a bulldog but he really made it happen to where we were allowed to pay Terry for six months to sit on the sidelines while we were waiting out the non-compete. And that's where Jack Fox came in.

JF: Yep, I started in January.

DN: I knew I needed somebody to fill in during that interim period until we could put Terry on the air. The irony was that by the time Terry got on the air, I had actually moved on, because had an opportunity to go back to my old company, Taft Broadcasting, to program their flagship station up in Cincinnati.

JF: Yeah.

DN: So that was one of my big frustrations of my Louisville days, not really getting to work with Terry.

JF: Well, Terry is still on the air there. That was 1985.

DN: [inaudible]

JF: Almost 30 years now.

DN: Unbelievable.

JF: And still going strong, so that was a good move. Stephen Lee mentioned Terry, but what made you think he would work in that format? Of course, Sandy was evidently sold on it. Did you have to sell any other people, because there was public reaction to Terry coming over.

DN: Well, a lot of people thought I was crazy.

JF: Right.

DN: Because of his rock 'n roll image, because I think some of the things that they had done over at QFM were not exactly family-friendly. But, again, listening to them a little bit I really could tell that he was brilliantly funny, just a natural sense of humor and also an ability to create humor, in terms of writing and delivery.

DN: And again, Stephen Lee I think kind of indicated to me that that's not really the kind of radio that Terry really wanted to do.

JF: Now, Stephen was on staff as a sales guy at that time, is that right?

DN: He was a sales guy, right.

JF: And he did a little on-air stuff from time to time.

DN: That's right.

JF: But he was a sales guy. He had come from WAKY himself.

DN: Exactly. He'd been out, I think he was from Shelbyville or something.

JF: Yeah.

DN: But I love Stephen.

JF: Yeah, still around today and he's your best buddy.

DN: Yeah, yeah. But once Terry and I got to talking, again, I just sensed that he would be great in that role, especially with the legacy of Gary Burbank in that afternoon slot.

JF: Yep.

DN: And the success that he had during his time, I just felt that Terry was kind of in that, he was his own guy and he certainly wasn't trying to do anything that Burbank used to do, but he was capable of coming in and really making a mark, and that's exactly what he did. And for him to have survived this crazy world of radio ever since just is a credit to him.

JF: Survived and done well. Well, that was a good move for both because he replaced Bill Cody and Bill went on to WSM in Nashville. He's been there for a 33:00long, long time, doing their morning down there.

DN: Yep, and I've kept in touch with Bill.

JF: Good.

DN: Because in the 90s I ended up in country radio.

JF: Oh, yeah.

DN: In Cleveland, and so, Bill and I have kept in touch, and I've been to Nashville a lot over the years. And generally when I visit Nashville I try to get together with Cody boy.

JF: Oh, good. Very good. Let's see, you left when in 1985? What month, do you recall?

DN: It would have been probably late October of '85.

JF: Okay. My point is you were there then during the spring of 1985 when we had several big things happen. I remember we had a little mishap with our tower. Do you recall that?

DN: Oh, wow, I still have pictures somewhere.

JF: Tell me about that now.

DN: I'm looking, in my office I have two souvenirs from that. I have a red beacon cover of one of the lights, and then I also have a nut that's about three inches in diameter that came off the tower that went down that spring. I think 34:00they called it a microburst or something, but it sure must have been tornado-like winds that brought the tower down.

JF: I remember. I was on the air that afternoon. I was on, I remember 4:03 and Ken Schulz had just done the weather. We had our listener hotline, people called all the time. And somebody called and said... We knew we were off the air, said, "Do you know your tower is out here on Flat Rock Road, is on the ground?" "What?" It was true, and of course we called you and other people, and it took off from there. It was crazy.

DN: And we went out. I do, I have some pictures of just the crumpled mess of metal of the tower on the ground. To see the engineering staff go in for a day 35:00or two, we actually were on the air. You couldn't pick us up very far away, but I remember they ran copper wire from the transmitter out through the window to the top of like a 20-foot small tower that was out in the backyard. We were actually on the air on this copper wire for a while.

JF: From a blowtorch to a Bic lighter or something. Wow.

DN: And then, I remember for probably, what, two, two-and-a-months, we were at low power on a temporary tower when they built the new one. And I remember putting together a huge promotion, a full power kind of a promotion when we went back to 5,000 watts and tried to make the best of a bad situation.

JF: You talked about Joe Donovan. I interviewed Joe for one of these, and he talked about he was on the air when the station came back on, you know that wire hanging out the window. And he tells the story about saying, "Is anybody out there?" And he got a call from a guy in New Jersey. He said, "It was that clear 36:00channel stuff."

DN: Oh, wow.

JF: And he said, "We can't get you very well like we normally do but I'm listening to you," and so Joe was off and running after that. Amazing.

DN: That's remarkable.

JF: Remember who the engineering staff was that performed all those miracles?

DN: Yeah, I don't remember a lot. You had mentioned earlier Charlie Strickland and he's the name that I remember the most.

JF: Probably Larry Baysinger may have been involved in that, I don't [inaudible].

DN: That name comes back.

JF: Well, good, very good.

DN: It was a small staff but they were really-

JF: They knew their stuff, yeah. Again, part of that team that made things happen.

DN: Exactly.

JF: We did a lot of remote broadcasts because of those guys. I think were you using Martis then? Is that where we were using Marti?

DN: Yeah, in fact that's one of my distinct memories about WHAS is how well-equipped it was, because I've worked in a number of stations over the years, not as many as some guys, but have worked at a number, even big companies like Taft out of Cincinnati. And no station I've ever worked at had the kind of remote equipment that WHAS had. And we used it. I mean, I really feel that was one of the keys to success over the years, being involved in the community and 37:00getting out there and doing remotes.

DN: So we had big Marti's and little Marti's and all sorts of transmitters that would go on the air. I remember we had a couple that you could walk around. I remember taking those out and we did a lot of Derby stuff from downtown.

JF: Oh, yeah.

DN: Where we could just go on the air from anywhere, with one of these little handheld jobs.

JF: Yep.

DN: Today, a lot of that stuff's done with cellphones, but back then, to do what WHAS did was remarkable. I mean, live from balloons.

JF: Yeah, the Derby Festival with the balloon races. Did you go up on a balloon, by the way?

DN: I went up. I wasn't on the air in one, but yeah, I got the chance to do at least one balloon ride during my-

JF: It's ironic you talk about the Marti. I just saw on Facebook last night a fellow named Paul Miles, who's a current news man at WHAS, has been there for probably 25 years. But he had a picture. He said, "This is the Marti I used when 38:00I started." It's an old beat-up thing now, you know? Many people didn't even recognize what it was, but they were a life saver back then, weren't they?

DN: They were. I mean, even when I started out in the 60s, Marti was around then. I mean, the little transmitters with the little bitty antennaes, and even in small towns like Tell City, Indiana there were those little transmitters that you could do remotes with.

JF: Sync back to your regular transmitter, they'd boost it up and put it on the signal. One other element that I think, well, I know you were there when this happened, WHAS was the voice of Kentucky basketball and football.

DN: Oh, yeah.

JF: But in the spring of 1985 something happened. Do you remember what happened then?

DN: Well, I mentioned earlier Sandy Gamblin being a real supporter of bringing in Terry Minors, and that Sandy was kind of a bulldog. Well, he was too much of a bulldog I think and did not recognize the importance of UK sports. I wasn't 39:00aware, don't remember the details, but there was some sort of negotiation going on that apparently he didn't want to go along with. I don't know if UK was asking for too much or whatever, but he basically was willing to walk away from UK sports. And at the time, UK was primary over U of L on WHAS.

JF: Yes.

DN: And so, for WHAS to lose UK sports was just huge. And, again, I really wasn't part of that. I don't even remember the details of it and the fact that Sandy kind of lost it. And ultimately, when we got it back UK was secondary to U of L on the station.

JF: Yeah. You recall public reaction to that?

DN: Oh, it was backlash.

JF: Yeah, very much so.

DN: Backlash in a big way. And that's how, ultimately, I don't think Sandy was around much longer after that.

JF: Yeah, I'm sure that had something to do with it.

DN: And Bob Sherer came in as manager, I think that's when we were able to put the thing back together. Because UK still wanted to be on WHAS because of the signal. They would ultimately rather be on WHAS most of the time than none of the time.

JF: I have to tell you a story. I was on the air during that time, and I couldn't even answer the phone after a while because of the backlash. One guy called me, says, "Wait, you guys don't understand what's going on here. My father is from Kentucky, a diehard UK basketball fan. He lives in Florida. And he has to listen to the Cats in Cawood on WHAS. And one night he was out, 10:00 at night. The only way he can get the signal is to get in his car. And he's in the middle of a very nice subdivision with his lights off and his car running and listening to the radio, listening to the ball game. And a policeman raps on 41:00the window and said, "Sir, may I ask what you're doing here?" He said, "Well, Officer, you won't understand but there's this radio station in Louisville, Kentucky, University of Kentucky basketball, Cawood Ledford." The guy said, "Oh, I understand completely. You're the third one I found tonight. There's another one over the hill." So then we really realized how important that was.

DN: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. And, again, I wished I could have stopped it but I had nothing to do with that one.

JF: Well, Denny, you were there just a relatively short time, a couple of years, but big impact from the Liz Curtis' and the Terry Minors and just the stamp that you put on, again, big part of the community, following the basketball team and doing things like that. You must be pretty proud of that part of your broadcasting career.

DN: I've often called it a Camelot in my many years doing radio, because it was like the perfect time and a perfect place. It was kind of going home for me 42:00because I was close to my hometown where my mom and dad lived at the time. It was great people, who've I've been able to keep in touch with many of then over the years. A chance to spread my wings a little bit, learn a lot but yet make a few mistakes but yet come back and fix them. There were just so many memorable things through that two-and-a-half, three years that just set me really on my road.

JF: Well, I was going to say as a young guy that must have given you a lot of confidence then, because you've had a very nice career since then. You left WHAS and went to WKRC in Cincinnati, back to Taft, is that right?

DN: Right. Right, and I was there similarly about three years. Then a brief stint in Phoenix that I don't want to talk about, because it blew up in my face. But then there was another similar situation in Cleveland, Ohio working for Nationwide Communications that was just the right place at the right time, and huge success. Just like WHAS, we were able to take it it to number one in the 43:00market for the first time in a long time. Great people putting the right people in the right places.

DN: So, I've really been blessed to have two of those situations in my career, and just thankful to have been part of the WHAS for a short while.

JF: So you went from Cleveland then to Moody Radio, is that right?

DN: Well, not immediately. This is whole other story, but back in the mid-90s, late-90s, I guess, when the telecommunication law changed and the big companies were allowed to get huge, and the big companies started gobbling up the little companies and just the whole landscape of radio changed in terms of how business was done. And all of a sudden, the big companies were running the little companies and starting to fire people and doing so much more on satellite and voice tracking. Radio wasn't the way it used to be.

DN: And so, I actually got out of radio for a while. As a Christian I honestly 44:00was fed up with what I saw going on in the radio business, and ended up taking a huge step backward in salary to get into ministry as the head fundraiser for a rescue mission in downtown Cleveland. And so, I spent five years doing fundraising for this ministry. I was doing some incredible work; homeless shelter and youth ministry and recovery programs for homeless men and women. It was an amazing time and I learned a lot and met a lot of people.

DN: But always through it, I'd always been intrigued by Christian radio, thinking, "Wouldn't it be neat to use my radio background and serve the Lord with it," and ultimately this role at Moody Radio here in Chicago opened up, to 45:00where I'm simply using my programming background, many of my connections and also my fundraising training to oversee and just handle a lot of programming aspects. We have radio stations around the country. We've got a full-time, 24/7 satellite network that feeds about 700 affiliates. We're getting into Internet radio. We're doing a lot things and it's an exciting time here. I feel like God is using all of those different backgrounds and all those different places and people to serve Him at this time.

JF: Interesting how it all works out, isn't it?

DN: Indeed. It's all the pieces are fitting together.

JF: That's great. Well, thank you for taking the time on a cold morning to share some warm thoughts with us about your time at WHAS. This'll be part of the archives and folks will be glad to hear this.

DN: Well, it's always a pleasure to keep up with you, Jack. When I connected with you a few years back after all those years, it was fun to just touch base, so I'll trust we'll keep in good touch.

JF: My pleasure. Hold on, just a second here...

DN: All right.

JF: I want to...