The LuLac Edition #4, 982, July 5th, 2023

 

WRITE ON WEDNESDAY 

Our "Write On Wednesday" logo 

This wee we look at Eddie Ackerman Optimist column from Pittston Progress regarding WARM Radio. Given the slogan during this heat wave, "It's only WARM for me" holds up as an answer.

 

 

IT’S ONLY WARM FOR ME

 

“Is it hot enough for ya?”

 

“It’s only WARM for me.”

If that little exchange rings a bell then:

One, you are definitely of my generation.

And two, you must get to the Sidney and Pauline Friedman Jewish Community Center in Kingston on the evening of July 13.

That’s when the film “WARMland Remembered,” an original documentary produced by WVIA, will be shown followed by a round table discussion about the radio station that defined the lives of many of us during our youth. It’s all to commemorate the 65th anniversary of the launching of “The Mighty 590,” the only station played, it seemed, in the 1960s in homes and automobiles throughout Wyoming Valley and on little transistor radios propped next to blankets on Sandy Beach at Harveys Lake.

It was a “Top 40” world then, and WARM owned the format around here.

But it was more than that. It was the personalities, the deejays who became part of our lives, guys we considered friends even if we’d never met them in person. The term “deejay,” short for disc jockey and coined by gossip columnist Walter Winchell in 1935 for guys who spun records on the radio, has a different connotation today. Today’s “DJs” are electronic recording artists with names like “Marshmello,” “Shaggy,” “Jam Master Jay,” and “DJ Kaled” (yep, DJ is actually part of his name).

But in our day, deejays were radio personalities. Wolfman Jack was probably the most famous across the country, but around here it was a group known as the “Sensational Seven.”

I would have guessed the original Sensational Seven included guys like Joey Shaver, “King Arthur” Knight (you don’t forget a name like “King Arthur” Knight), Tommy Woods, George Gilbert, Harry West and “The Big Fella” Terry McNulty, but save for George Gilbert, I would have been woefully wrong. According to David Yonki’s blog “590 Forever Warm Radio,” the original seven were, in addition to Gilbert, Harry Newman, Bart Maldon, Don Stevens, Jack Murphy, Vince Kierney and Jackson Gower.

But it’s the others I mentioned that were part of my life. I got ready for school in the ’60s and work in the ’70s with Harry West in the background.

One morning, he said, “You can’t do anything about the past, but you can sure ruin the present by worrying about the future.” That was more than 50 years ago and I still think about it, and try to apply it.

It’s hard to say what we loved more about WARM, the music or the deejays and their antics. These guys were fun, often in an off-beat manner. Remember Terry McNulty’s “Pineapple Feature?” He’d list a group of people joining him in the studio that day — full disclosure: I believed they actually were there until the day when I was one of the group, even though I was standing in the newsroom of the Sunday Dispatch at the time — and “open a can of pineapple” and pass it around. I must admit, when I heard, “Ed Ackerman is taking a ring of pineapple out of the can right now,” I burst with pride.

David’s blog is packed with information, and that means packed with memories. I am particularly fond of lists of top 40 songs. I learned, with a fair amount of surprise, that on Sept. 3, 1967, as I began my first year of college, the number one song on WARM was “Ode to Billy Joe” by Bobbie Gentry. “All You Need is Love,” by the Beatles was third. I can still hear Eddie Arnone singing that to himself in an art class at Wilkes.

It pains me a little to read Dave’s accounts of WARM Day because my parents wouldn’t let me go. (God, did I lead a sheltered life.) WARM Day was a full day of music at Rocky Glen Park featuring the top artists of the time.

David calls WARM Day 1965 “the greatest one ever.” He doesn’t mention if he was there and I really don’t want to know because David is a lot younger than I. Headlining that show were Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons (who interestingly will be at the Kirby Center in Wilkes-Barre this October), the Beau Brummels (whose hit “Laugh, Laugh” is still one of my favorite songs), Cannibal and the Headhunters (whose song “Land of 1000 Dances,” better known as “Naa, Na, Na, Na, Naa” often breaks out at football games), and locals Eddie Rambeau, Mel Wynn and The Rhythm Aces, and Joe Nardone and the All Stars.

One of the coolest things about WARM Day is that it was free.

And guess what? So is the show on Thursday, July 13, in Kingston. It is sponsored by WVIA. Seating is limited, and registration is required. Go to wvia.org/events.

Ed Ackerman writes The Optimist every week. Look for his blogs online during the week at pittstonprogress.com.