1090am WCAR

[Ben Zonia]

History Card.

https://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/prod/ ... r_id=50846

It seems like there was another set of call letters along the way, but up until 1980, they only have WERB, WTAK, and WCAR. 500 watts Night was added around 1980.

Further research reveals that it was WIID in 1979. There was a "love song" type format at one point, probably the late 1960s to early 1970s, and was promoted a lot on TV.

There was an application to move WOAP 1080 to Waverly, MI, near Lansing, with six towers, 50/4.5 DA-2, and use the Night 6 tower array of WCAR 1090 with 1000 watts Day.

Birach instead spent their money wisely by building the move of WMFN 640 Zeeland, MI to Peotone, IL, in far suburban SW Chicago, and now covering Chicago's South Side quite well. Chicago's best new AM facility in decades.

[Mega Hertz]

All Foghat, All the Time.

[Deleted User 16173]

Ozzy Radio 24/7.

[edj]

Someone did lease it out several years back. “The Switch” playing rap and hip hop. I think it lasted a month.

[Colonel Flagg]

Someone did lease it out several years back. “The Switch” playing rap and hip hop. I think it lasted a month.

I remember that.

I also remember "Bonds & Fisher" (both R.I.P) on in the afternoon for a season or two, with help from Rachel Nevada.

[Deleted User 16173]

Someone did lease it out several years back. “The Switch” playing rap and hip hop. I think it lasted a month.

I remember that.

I also remember "Bonds & Fisher" (both R.I.P) on in the afternoon for a season or two, with help from Rachel Nevada.

What ever happened to Rachel Nevada? She was kinda hot.

[edj]

I remember the Bonds and Fisher debacle. Horrible audio and never heard a single caller.

I think Nevada left the business after that. Could be wrong.

[ChrisWL1980]

My great-aunt was an avid WTAK listener, except for Paul Winter who was a bit too liberal for her. (To illustrate how much better the station got out at that time: she lived in St. Clair Shores.) Winter, of course, was a former WXYZ radio personality and went on to be the voice of WTVS 56 for many years.
Art Vuolo's 1971 History of Detroit Radio documentary had a segment on WTAK and why the talk format was dropped, and apparently it had a lot to do with the station losing advertisers due to the controversial nature of some of the topics being discussed, with some businesses even being picketed. If my timeline is correct, WTAK became WIID about 1969 or 1970 and featured an MOR (or as they called it in the documentary "wall to wall music") format initially, which I think had evolved into mostly ethnic programming by the mid-'70s.

[ConstipatedListener]

I remember listening to 1090 WIID (in the early 70s), and they were playing instrumental music. Similar to what was being played on WQTE 560, but maybe with a little less Perez Prado. (i have no problem with P.P.)

[ChrisWL1980]

With so many Beautiful Music stations in Detroit at that time and most of them being FM Stereo operations, how they thought a 250-watt AM station could compete with that is beyond me. WQTE had the advantage of being at a low dial position and getting into the format before the market was heavily FM penetrated.
One WIID story I remember from the documentary - the GM(?) told about hiring some "pretty girls" to accost patrons at a nearby shopping center and ask permission to set a button on their car radios to the "good music" format at 1090kc. A humorous aside to this was that a lot of people apparently didn't know how to use the preset buttons themselves.

[Ben Zonia]

Bob Liggett/Bob Layne came to Mid States FM and the WGMZ "FMbassy" as corporate PD in the late 1960s and changed it to AC, and a lot of the older people were upset. You couldn't get WQTE 560 on most radios because it was on the image frequency of WKMF 1470. A teacher at my HS had reel to reel tapes of WQTE that he duplicated and gave to the other teachers to listen to during breaks and before school started. So there was a certain age group cult apparently that preferred WQTE. Maybe the teacher had a Delco Radio with a 262 kHz IF in his garage and taped it from that. A lot of car tinkerers had old Delcos in their garage with speakers.

Delco 262 kHz IF Transformers for sale.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/195487216240

[Deleted User 15924]

I think Nevada left the business after that. Could be wrong.

Looks like you are mistaken. Perused her name to see what she looks like ('cuz Marky Mark said she was hot).

She's got a 2024 page soliciting voiceover work. Looks like she is or was a regular with Mich Albom on WJR. If I read this right, she's a recipient of the Edward R. Murrow Journalism Award:

https://rachelnevadavoice.com/

[Art Van Damme]

Bring back the Tom Kopeck club. (Doubt it would happen because he’s retired)

[Deleted User 16173]

I think Nevada left the business after that. Could be wrong.

Looks like you are mistaken. Perused her name to see what she looks like ('cuz Marky Mark said she was hot).

She's got a 2024 page soliciting voiceover work. Looks like she is or was a regular with Mich Albom on WJR. If I read this right, she's a recipient of the Edward R. Murrow Journalism Award:

https://rachelnevadavoice.com/

Rachel is still looking good.

[Deleted User 16173]

Bob Liggett/Bob Layne came to Mid States FM and the WGMZ "FMbassy" as corporate PD in the late 1960s and changed it to AC, and a lot of the older people were upset. You couldn't get WQTE 560 on most radios because it was on the image frequency of WKMF 1470. A teacher at my HS had reel to reel tapes of WQTE that he duplicated and gave to the other teachers to listen to during breaks and before school started. So there was a certain age group cult apparently that preferred WQTE. Maybe the teacher had a Delco Radio with a 262 kHz IF in his garage and taped it from that. A lot of car tinkerers had old Delcos in their garage with speakers.

Delco 262 kHz IF Transformers for sale.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/195487216240

I remember when WQTE was Top 40 for one year. 1960 — 1961 my older Brother listened to “Fabulous 56” and the “Cutie Music Meter”. Those were the great days of radio.