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DAYTON AREA BROADCASTER’S HALL OF FAME

Pictures, Audio & Media Archives

WING AM

You rarely see this type of co-operation in radio these days. Here (in three parts) is a broadcast of the late Jack Wymer's famed "Man On The Street" show aired on WING-AM around February, 1965. The broadcast saluted the 30th anniversary of competitor, WHIO Radio. On it, you'll hear the voices of Wymer, the late news anchor, Don Wayne, late morning show host Lou Emm, and other station notables. (Courtesy: Cox Radio/Dayton)

PART ONE - PART TWO - PART THREE

The "Official" WING History

Located in a box of photo albums and newspaper clippings in the station storeroom at 717 East David Road, here is the verbatim history of WING radio... which came from a press release celebrating the station's 65th anniversary.

"High Flying 1410 WING"

From sometime in the late 1950's until the early 1990's, WING Radio was the station for an entire generation of Dayton radio listeners. With DJ's like Gene "By Golly" Barry, Steve Kirk, Bob Holliday, Lou Swanson, Jerry Kaye, Richie Allen ("The Duke Of Dayton"), Kim Faris, John King, Terry Dorsey and many others, WING ruled Dayton's airwaves for decades. Our thanks to Gary Pfeifer of Scottsdale, Arizona who contributed these clips of WING Radio. Gary is an air check collector. Please visit his site at www.geocities.com/garypf_2000

(Note: Some of these files may take a bit of time to load. Please be patient. The wait is worth it.)

The date was April 20, 1964. The U.S. (and the Miami Valley) was now in the grip of Beatle mania. Here, we join afternoon drive DJ Bob Holliday as he counted down the daily WING survey. (We have intentionally left some of the commercials and imaging "as is" or with just small edits, to help give you the feel of what WING was like then. You'll also hear another feature of WING in those days, "The Singing Clock". )

But, WING was not only about the top hits of the day. For many years, WING boasted an award-winning news department. That same afternoon Bob Holliday was counting down the hits:

Roy Dittman and Sid Hayman kept Dayton up-to-date with the news of the day.

Some Fun "WING Things"

Complements of WING Radio (and many thanks to "Engineer Dave"), here are some photos from the WING archives!

Pictured here is longtime WING Air Personality and Program Director Jerry Kaye on the air from the famous "showcase" studio at 128 West First Street in Dayton.

This photo will forever answer the question, "Was Steve Kirk's hair ever a color other than white?" Yes! It's a young "Kirkie" in the WING "Showcase" studio in the old Talbott Tower downtown. (Non-radio folks may note: the cartridge tape machines mounted into the cabinet to Steve's immediate right...they played the jingles and commercials. The dark colored "knob" to the left of Steve's left hand is the speed control for one of the turntables. Any youngsters looking at this please note: Turntables were used to play vinyl 45 rpm "records", which predated i-Pod's, MP3's, CD's, even your parents' 8-track tapes!)

Was there life at WING B.K. (before Kirkie)? Yes. Lou Swanson did wake up duties in the early 60's, Jerry Kaye did, too. Way back when, an aspiring comedian named Jonathan Winters also graced the WING morning airwaves. Then, around 1965 or so, you woke up with the gentleman pictured at the left: Michael O'Farrell.

WING appropriately lived it's "legend" status into the early 1990's. During the 80's, the station was famed for it's WING Sock Hops which benefited local charitable concerns. Here, we see Steve Kirk hosting one such event. Were you there?
The people at WING have been gracious enough to allow The Dayton Broadcasters Hall Of Fame access to the dozens of boxes of photo albums and station memorabilia they still have in their possession. We thank Mainline Broadcasting (the current station owners) and "Engineer Dave"...rest assured, more photos and artifacts will be forthcoming here!

Makin' the scene with his record machine...The late Gene "By Golly" Barry on duty in the WING "Showcase" studios at 128 West First Street, downtown Dayton...in a photo taken in 1974.

"I gotta go now...got to see a man about a record..."

From his days with "Swing With WING" to his final stint in Dayton radio back at WING broadcasting live from the Radisson Hotel in the late 80's/early 90's, an entire generation of Daytonians considered Gene "By Golly" Barry, their "old platter pal".

Simply put...what Alan Freed was to the kids of Cleveland and New York, what Jerry Blavat and Jocko Henderson were to Philly, what Herb Kent was to Chicago, Gene was to the kids of the late 50's and 60's in Dayton. The nighttime DJ who would pull a 40, 50 or 60 share of the radio market at night.

Gene had many stints in Dayton radio. He left WING and would later surface at both WDAO-FM and WAVI-AM. He'd go into business for himself by opening "Gene By Golly Barry's Record Shop". And...why not? Whether he had a radio gig or not, Gene's fans could always go to see him at the record store. And he would talk the day's hits to you anytime with the knowledge and passion of an old pro. And yet, he always seemed to find his way back home to WING.

Sadly, very few tapes of Gene (despite our best efforts to find them), are apparently in existence. And your webmaster here kicks himself every day... because we never taped Gene's last run on WING. We could have run a few tapes for posterity sake...it just didn't occur to us to do it. Speaking for myself, I will always regret that.

Gene was never a guy to hog the spotlight. I remember those broadcasts in the 80's at the Radisson. I'd stop out there every few Saturday nights to make sure everything was going OK. The minute Gene saw me in the crowd, he would get on the mike on the air and call me up to the DJ stand. He made it a point to allow me a few moments to stand in "his" spotlight. Not that I really think I deserved it, but it was certainly appreciated.

Not too long ago, there was, in Dayton, a reunion of the former WING staffers. It's too bad it didn't get more coverage than it did, because a lot of names and voices you would remember were there. For the reunion, Dayton Broadcast Hall Of Famer Bill Nance put together from some of his tapes, a "sampler" CD that remembered the days when WING ruled Dayton radio. An edit of the final cut on that CD is here.  It's Gene's legendary "sign off" complete with the theme music he used each night to close his radio show.

It's OK if you get a little teary-eyed listening to this. I sure did.

The late Gene "By Golly" Barry in a photo taken for the WING survey in 1974.

Gene "By Golly" Fans Take Note:

We are very happy to announce that Gene "By Golly" Barry will be among those broadcasters inducted into the Dayton Broadcasters Hall Of Fame on September 12, 2009.

We have been "on the hunt" for recordings of Gene for quite some time, and quite often, to no avail. However, we want to thank sincerely, former WING staffer Randy Scott, who worked with Gene at the station back in the early 1960's for the following air check.

I've said here that those of us who worked with Gene during his final stint at WING have regretted than we never "ran tape" on his show. Fortunately for us, Randy's brother did...when Randy was in town for his 30th high school class reunion.

So, here you go...with our additional thanks to former WING Production Director Joe Demma for Gene's famous opening theme, and his program close courtesy of former WING news guy Bill Nance, let's take one more ride on the "Barry Go Round".

(Be patient, please - this air check is about 15 minutes in length and may take time to load.)

Dayton Broadcasting Media Page

It was one of the coolest spots in downtown Dayton, if you were a teenager around 1960...

Here you see the WING “Showcase” studio at 128 West First Street. (It’s now a medical office of some sort.)

On the air, is late night DJ Randy Scott, who supplied this photo to us, and below, gives you his memories of working in this studio:

“My showcase studio memories are a little fuzzy after 50 years but in ’60 when the picture was taken I definitely recall the turntables were to our left (window side), the three cart machines were on our right (triggered from a panel mounted to the right of the Gates board), and the 45’s were in wooden bins mounted next to and at the same level as the turntables.

Of course they were in those heavy green cardboard sleeves, and the bins were separated into four categories, something like # 1 through # 10 in the first bin, #11 through #20 in the second bin,  #21 through #40 in the third bin, and the hit-bounds in a fourth bin.  To ensure rotation, the plan was to play the one from the front of the bin, then place it at the back of that bin.  

The format, as I recall, called for a Top 10 to come out of “news live at :55,”. The news guy (Bob Barron in my case) would read in the main studio from a small table with a mike which was behind the Profile Bread sign on the left.  I believe later they read the news from the tiny newsroom which was further down the hall. I think you had to go through the newsroom to enter the record library.”

In addition to the photo, Randy also enclosed an acetate
disc which had been recorded at the WING studios. This disc contained send-ups recorded by Gene “By Golly” Barry and some of the other WING jocks of the time, including morning host Hap Hopkins, Joe Bauer and others.  

Click to hear Randy’s promos from this disc.

(Be patient...there’s a lot of audio on this file, including plenty of “record noise”...but, hey!  What would you expect from an acetate  disc which dates back 50 some years?)