WCOP (was: Boston Radio Studios)

[markwa1ion@aol.com]

Mitchell used to make personal appearances in a VW Karmann-Ghia 
convertible plastered with WCOP stickers.  One of these was in July of 
1961 in Belmont Center.  Many kids had heard about the appearance and 
were on hand when the WCOP-mobile pulled in with its radio blasting 
everybody's favorite Top 40 tunes.  Mitchell tossed 45 RPM records out 
to the crowd like frisbees.  Kids got most of 'em but a number weren't 
caught and smashed on the ground.  I bet the Belmont cops loved that.  
It was an extremely hot and humid day to boot.  The vast majority of 
the records were total dogs, stuff that never got played on the radio.  
So it didn't really matter if they got smashed, scratched, or melted I 
guess.  This was likely WCOP's way of cleaning out its excess of 
records sent by labels (hoping for airplay they were not going to get). 
  Despite the mob scene, the dog records, and the punishing heat of the 
day, all the kids had fun with this encounter with their favorite 
after-school jock.

It turned out that the girl I would later marry was among the crowd in 
Belmont Center that day.  She was 9 then.  She and I didn't meet until 
9 years later at a friend's party in Boston.  Some time later we were 
talking about oldies and found out that we were both at the Eddie 
Mitchell grand tour of Belmont way back when.  In another coincidence 
her name is Mary Lou and Ricky Nelson's "Hello Mary Lou" was a hit 
around the time of the Mitchell appearance.  Not surprisingly, this was 
played at our wedding.

Mark Connelly

<<
On 2 Jun 2010 at 12:04, markwa1ion@aol.com wrote:

> WCOP was very popular at the Brackett Elementary School where some
> kids would use "rocket radios" (that didn't need batteries) to receive
> its big signal by clipping onto metal classroom desks.  That was bad
> enough for the teachers then.  Today we have iPods and smartphones -
> no wonder teachers get frustrated!

I remember having one of those.  It was actually a modern-day crystal
set.

> WMEX and WBZ were of course also well-known then (ca. 1961) but WCOP
> ruled the after-school hours with the Ed Mitchell show.  He'd
> progressively slow down and "kill" songs he didn't like such as the
> weepy tragedy hit "Jimmy Love" by Cathy Carroll, where the teen girl's
> boyfriend gets zapped by lightning right before they were going to get
> married.  Mitchell inserted comedic Stan Freberg and Spike Jones audio
> clips liberally in his shows, along with sound effects - dogs,
> gunshots, trains, wolf-whistles, bedspring noises and so on - that
> seemed the same as those on a Radio Shack sound effects / stereo demo
> record I had.  How he pulled off all this sound-bite tomfoolery before
> computers and MP3 files I'll never know.  I wish I had some airchecks
> of his shows.  Ginsburg gets all the acknowledgements - and he is
> certainly due them - but few seem to remember Ed Mitchell of that same
> era.  Most likely this is because WCOP "went square" (as kids said)
> sometime in '62 or early '63

I remember "Eddie, Eddie, Eddie MITCHELL" on WCOP.  When WCOP "went
square" (it was in the summer of 1962), that was when I first started
listening to WMEX.  The signal was good in Bedford in the daytime,
but problematical at night.  And what did I hear?  The same guy who
was Ed Mitchell on WCOP turned up as Fenway on WMEX, doing the same
shtick!

--
A. Joseph Ross, J.D.                           617.367.0468
 92 State Street, Suite 700                   Fax 617.507.7856
Boston, MA 02109-2004                        http://www.attorneyross.com
>>


-----Original Message-----
From: A. Joseph Ross <joe@attorneyross.com>
To: markwa1ion@aol.com
Cc: boston Radio Group <boston-radio-interest@lists.BostonRadio.org>
Sent: Thu, Jun 3, 2010 12:47 am
Subject: Re: WCOP (was: Boston Radio Studios)


On 2 Jun 2010 at 12:04, markwa1ion@aol.com wrote:

> WCOP was very popular at the Brackett Elementary School where some
> kids would use "rocket radios" (that didn't need batteries) to receive
> its big signal by clipping onto metal classroom desks.  That was bad
> enough for the teachers then.  Today we have iPods and smartphones -
> no wonder teachers get frustrated!

I remember having one of those.  It was actually a modern-day crystal
set.

> WMEX and WBZ were of course also well-known then (ca. 1961) but WCOP
> ruled the after-school hours with the Ed Mitchell show.  He'd
> progressively slow down and "kill" songs he didn't like such as the
> weepy tragedy hit "Jimmy Love" by Cathy Carroll, where the teen girl's
> boyfriend gets zapped by lightning right before they were going to get
> married.  Mitchell inserted comedic Stan Freberg and Spike Jones audio
> clips liberally in his shows, along with sound effects - dogs,
> gunshots, trains, wolf-whistles, bedspring noises and so on - that
> seemed the same as those on a Radio Shack sound effects / stereo demo
> record I had.  How he pulled off all this sound-bite tomfoolery before
> computers and MP3 files I'll never know.  I wish I had some airchecks
> of his shows.  Ginsburg gets all the acknowledgements - and he is
> certainly due them - but few seem to remember Ed Mitchell of that same
> era.  Most likely this is because WCOP "went square" (as kids said)
> sometime in '62 or early '63

I remember "Eddie, Eddie, Eddie MITCHELL" on WCOP.  When WCOP "went
square" (it was in the summer of 1962), that was when I first started
listening to WMEX.  The signal was good in Bedford in the daytime,
but problematical at night.  And what did I hear?  The same guy who
was Ed Mitchell on WCOP turned up as Fenway on WMEX, doing the same
shtick!

--
A. Joseph Ross, J.D.                           617.367.0468
 92 State Street, Suite 700                   Fax 617.507.7856
Boston, MA 02109-2004                        http://www.attorneyross.com