the day WHDH ended

[Kevin Vahey]

I can't even fathom what it must have been like to go from working for
CBS (when it WAS CBS) to Papa Gino's Pizza. It was like CBS just
wanted to destroy everything they had built in Boston.

I am a little fuzzy on the timeline but did Mugar at first try to sell
both channel 7 and 850 as a package or did he just sell both separate.
I am guessing Ansin wanted no part of radio but was he even offered
the chance? I know Ansin has been at war with his neighbor in Miami
WIOD for years.

The cold reality is both the histories of WEEI and WHDH were flushed
down the drain when the dust settled in 1994. The HT built WHDH pretty
much from scratch after WW2 and the station was so important to so
many people in the post war years. I will take an educated guess that
WHDH becoming a power forced WNAC to do something drastic ( buying
WLAW ) to survive.

Somebody must have the WHDH archives locked away. Bob and Ray, Jess
Cain, Bob Clayton, Fred B. Cole, Norm Nathan and many others something
must have survived.

There was a gentleman (was his name Carlo?) who was the 'office
manager' of HDH at least through the Stuart St years and long before.
If anybody saved something it would be him. I wonder if he is still
with us. ( anybody who worked at Stuart St would know who I mean but
his name escapes me )



On 1/4/09, chris2526 <chris2526@comcast.net> wrote:
> During the WHDH talk days including their stint as CBS all news
> in addition to the board op they had an engineer on duty at the studio
> from 6:00 AM until 6:00 PM. (Pat Carol was the only winner from this
> stint landing herself morning drive on WCBS when WHDH's all news
> went away).
> During this period and when they went talk I was their daytime engineer on
> duty at 7 Bulfinch Place.
> I was on duty with Howie Carr the last day when the sale was held outside,
> It was one of the saddest days in Boston radio history beaten only by
> tortureous drawn out demise of WEEI Newsradio 590 when sold by CBS.....just
> heartbreaking. WEEI was by far the better product when held up against the
> sloppy unpolished sound of todays WBZ.
> When under Papa Gino's ownership I remember a weekday show at 9:00 AM by
> Lottie Mendelson talking about blenders for an hour...after
> hearing that I knew the end was near.
>
> Chris Hall
>
>