This is an Encore of a posting which first appeared on this page eight years ago.
As a preface before you read about Philadelphia’s WDVR (not the current one, which is a non-profit operation based in Sergentsville, New Jersey, and is primarily operated by 50+ volunteer DJs) and its early success, in spite of being technically disadvantaged, let me share a little personal story:
After losing my beloved wife Alicia in 2019, I decided that I wanted to move back to my native home area, Bucks County, Pennsylvania, rather than stay in the greater Washington, D. C., region – which I did a few years ago. Looking at several housing options, I finally chose a small retirement community in a very “countrified” setting. At some point, I began to occasionally encounter a lady here who was always smiling – which is not a bad thing! I’ve recently had a couple of direct encounters with this lady, whom we’ll call Peggy, so I asked her what’s behind her non-stop smiling? Her response was, “Marlin, you make me smile” – which is not fully true, as I observed her smiling long before she knew or ever met me!
All this led me to some serious thought/question … what, Marlin, has been your primary goal throughout much of your 60-year career in broadcasting? To bring Joy, Happiness, i.e., Smiles, whether visible or simply inward, to my listening audience! A decade or two back, when related to my radio programming work, my motto became: “The Listener is # 1!”
A few years ago, I happened into a small restaurant, and they were promoting their Comfort Food Thursday specials – it wasn’t long before I had created a slogan liner for our Easy Listening/Beautiful Music channel Escape: “Comfort Food for the Ears!”
NOW … let’s step back to the early 1960’s, to where it all pretty much began!
This is a portion of a full-page ad which WDVR Philadelphia ran in the Inquirer daily morning newspaper in May of 1964 … listing every song that the station would play that day between 9 AM and 11 PM.
WDVR was just celebrating its first anniversary, having begun broadcasting in May of 1963 … 55 years ago. It was the last FM station permit to be granted in the city of Philadelphia, and even then had its limitations … operating with an antenna very low in height and with low output power — which, as you may know, are both critical to an FM station’s coverage.
As you see from reading below, even though our signal strength was poor and coverage limited, we were obviously offering content and a product people longed to hear. Why else would we, after only a year on the air, have greater listenership than the several other FM stations that had larger staffs and greater resources?
As for many of those artists listed, you may not remember them … quite a few I barely remember — and I programmed them. However, there are several, such as Percy Faith, Roger Williams, Frank Chacksfield, the Living Strings, and Chet Atkins, who are still played today on SiriusXM’s Escape channel (Now on Channel 149). And, this is 55 years later! Some things, some music can and do stand the test of time.
At the beginning of my memoir, RADIO … My Love, My Passion … detailing my career and love affair with radio broadcasting, which spanned more than 60 years, I promised that I would regularly offer more stories and pictures + color versions of many of the photos appearing in the book. This is one more stop along the way of fulfilling that promise––so please stop back often.
Thank you for visiting.
So wonderful to read your posts Marlin. Fun memories of a great career. Thank you
Thank you so much, Erik! appreciate those kind words!