Boom Boom Brannigan passes on

[Doug Drown]

That Drum real estate ad was really clever.  Little WSNY positioned 
itself as a worthy local competitor to WGY.  Though in the '60s and 
'70s when visiting in Schenectady I was fixated on WPTR and WTRY, I did 
listen to WSNY occasionally and found that it was a well-run station.   
There were many such stations in middle-market cities, little bantams 
that held up well to the big guys.  I think of WNEB in Worcester from 
my adolescence --- 1230 kHz, 1 kw daytime, 250 at night, a CBS 
affiliate with a format geared toward middle- to older-aged adults.  It 
had good DJs, good local news and sports coverage, all in all doing a 
fine job competing against full-service NBC powerhouse WTAG and the two 
hotly competitive Top 40 stations, WAAB and WORC.   -Doug

Quoting "Dan.Strassberg" <dan.strassberg@att.net>:
> I remember Edwardson and Putney from WGY in my college days (early to
> mid '50s). In those days, though, Steve Fitz was on little WSNY, a
> 250W Class IV on 1240. WSNY sounded amazingly professional for such a
> small station--its signal reached the entire Capital District by day
> but was competitive only in Schenectady and adjoining communities,
> such as Rotterdam. Weak signal or not, WSNY appeared to have sold out
> its entire schedule month after month, year after year. Always ~17
> minutes of commercials per hour from sign-on to sign-off. Most of the
> commercials were locally produced. Many used jingle packages that were
> designed for specific types of businesses (furniture stores, variety
> stores etc) and could be tailored to specific businesses simply by
> inserting the advertiser's name, address, and phone number. Some ads
> used proprietary jingles, however. The one that I guess I will never
> forget was for W Baldwin Drum Real Estate: "Drum's along the
> Mowhawk/with his eye on pro-per-teee." Ended with the beat of a
> tom-tom over which was whispered W Baldwin Drum...W Baldwin Drum... W
> Baldwin Drum... Very memorable. Probably moved a lot of houses and
> farms. 
>
> -----
> Dan Strassberg (dan.strassberg@att.net)
> eFax 1-707-215-6367
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Dave Doherty" <dave@skywaves.net>
> To: "D. A." <donald_astelle@yahoo.com>;
> <boston-radio-interest@bostonradio.org>; "Doug Drown"
> <revdoug1@myfairpoint.net>
> Cc: <JPolsinelle@firstcardinal.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, October 26, 2010 10:17 PM
> Subject: Re: Boom Boom Brannigan passes on
>
>
> >I met Boom-Boom in 1968 or maybe 1969 at the WPTR studios. Another
> >WPTR DJ, Roy Urbinas, who eventually wound up in Plattsburgh and may
> >have originally hailed from there, cut a couple of voicers for me,
> >and Roy introduced us. Boom Boom was an interesting character, very
> >pleasant, and the first "Boss Jock" I ever met. 
> >
> > Not long after, I worked summers as a tech at WGY, pushing buttons
> > and whatnot for Bill Edwardson, Jack Shannon, Harry Downey, Earl
> > Pudney, and Steve Fitz. 
> >
> > -Dave Doherty
> >
>