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Tag Archives: KTBI
PRESS STRIKE Sees Tacoma Radio Boom
2011/05/10 – 3:39 pm
PRESSMEN’S strike which stopped publication April 12 of the Tacoma News Tribune, the city’s only daily, has expanded news and feature coverage on Tacoma’s radio stations and made business “awfully good,” according to station executives. A week after the strike hit Tacoma’s afternoon and Sunday publication, all local stations reported success in (1) meeting the community’s need for news, and (2) serving advertising requirements of local business. To its normal 12 daily newscasts, KMO Tacoma swiftly added special commentary programs, two extra news shows Saturday and Sunday, and an extra sportcast daily, Jerry Geehan., general manager, reported. Notices of club meetings, Philharmonic concerts and other public events, and a quarter-hour of funeral and obituary notices, were being aired as a public service. Mr. Geehan said advertisers who heretofore have used radio consistently found business up to standard, although department stores and others who threw in a quick spot schedule to substitute for their normal newspaper ads were not having equal success. KTNT (FM), the transit-radio station owned by the News Tribune, took over the AP bureau for Pierce County (Tacoma) and -added two persons to its news staff. Burke Ormsby, KTNT director of news and special events, reported the station also launched a Sunday program with eight actors dramatizing the weekly comics. Over-all spot business at KTNT doubled after the strike began, he said. KTAC (formerly KTBI) Tacoma, which began a concentrated news coverage when it went fulltime February 11, augmented its news schedule tremendously, according to H. J. Quilliam, president. Business at the station boomed after the strike began, he said. [1952--Broadcasting Magazine]
The voices of Tacoma baseball
2011/04/12 – 5:34 pm
Jerry Geehan [photo courtesy of the Tacoma Public Library archive] began his broadcasting career at KVI Radio in 1932. In 1937, he became the first broadcaster for the Tacoma Tigers of the Western International League. In 1938, he joined KMO Radio as Tacoma’s first play-by-play broadcaster handling WIL baseball and PLC and CPS games. He also had a daily sportscast.
Geehan became KMO’s sales manager in 1943, and two years later moved up to the station’s general manager post. In 1952 he served as general manager of Channel 13 TV. He was owner and general manager of KTAC Radio from 1952-69 and was Chairman of the Board of the Washington State Association of Broadcasters.
Many of Tacoma’s great sportscasters got their start under Geehan, including Clay Huntington, Rod Belcher, Doug McArthur, Bob Robertson, Don Hill, Art Popham and Bill O’Mara.
Clay Huntington, voice of Tacoma Tigers baseball 1946-1951;] Huntington’s early sports broadcast career includes stints at KTBI, KTNT and KMO radio stations and both KTVW and KTNT television. All of this, as well as sports broadcasts on a 14-station network that covered Washington, Oregon, and Alaska. His vast record of community involvement includes helping to fund the construction of Cheney Stadium in 1960 and bring Triple A baseball back to Tacoma.
Don Hill [pictured at the KTAC microphone] was for many years Tacoma’s voice of baseball. He was the regular announcer of the Tacoma Giants and Cubs games from 1960-1971. Don Hill had a record broadcasting career that spanned 50 years. “How About that Giants Fans” -Tacoma News Tribune; 1984
Bob Robertson – From 1958-68 he was the TV voice for the Seattle Rainiers and for 11 seasons he did Tacoma Giants, and Tacoma Cubs television play-by-play. Bob served 16 years as the radio voice for the Tacoma Tigers and Rainiers from 1982-1998 and was the last announcer to recreate a baseball road game from the home radio studios. – oldtimerbaseball.com
Art Popham – While serving as batboy for the Kansas City Athletics, Art earned the 1968 “Hustle Award” for always performing his duties at high speed and with gusto. He became the team’s public relations director at age 20 and, when Athletics owner Charles O. Finley moved the team to Oakland, Art followed the team to the Bay Area. He proudly wore the Athletics’ 1972 World Series championship ring. In 1976, Art left the Athletics to become the voice of the Pacific Coast League’s Tacoma Twins on KMO Radio, serving in that position from 1976-84. During that time, he broadcast games for the Twins, Yankees, Tugs and Tigers. In addition to calling PCL games, Art also worked University of Puget Sound and high school games. He and Doug McArthur also created the “Live from the Leaf” sports program, which aired from the Cloverleaf Tavern every Friday night from 1977-81. – oldtimerbaseball.com
Jerry Howarth-Tacoma Twins baseball broadcaster from 1973-75. Jerry is the only broadcaster from Tacoma to make it to the major leagues as he is currently the voice of the Toronto Blue Jays. – tacomasportsmuseum.com
Tacoma radio station ready to open
2011/03/08 – 6:15 pm
FIRST of the two new broadcast stations authorized for construction in Tacoma, last May- KTBI, licensed to Tacoma Broadcasters Inc.—will go on the air the week of Aug. 24, according to Edward J. Jensen, manager, who was onetime manager of KVI, Tacoma, and who later went with KGU, Honolulu, and KOL, Seattle. Mr. Jensen during the last year has been on the sales staff of KSFO, San Francisco. The new station will operate with 250 watts on 1490 kc., and is
Western Electric equipped throughout with a 154-foot Blaw-Knox tower. The other Tacoma station (KTRN), authorized the same day and granted either 500 or 1,000 watts on 1430 kc., will be operated by Michael J. Mingo, former newspaper editor, but is not yet ready to go on the air. Mr. Jensen reports the following staff selections: E. S. Robinson, from KVI, commercial manager; Fred Pelger, from KBKR, Baker, Ore., program director; Kenneth Grinde, from KXRO, Aberdeen, Wash., chief engineer; Tom Morris, from KOMO-KJR, Seattle, announcer-engineer; Leonard Duba, from KXRO, announcer-engineer; John Porter, announcer-engineer; Paul Terry, formerly with South California Orange Growers Assn., special events and continuity; George Johnson, musical director; Ruth Reisner, continuity and women’s editor; Mrs. Stewart Clarke, garden and home expert; Esther Fox, office manager. The station is owned by a group of local businessmen, headed by G. C. Cavanaugh, Tacoma and Bremerton lumberman, as president and controlling stockholder.
[Broadcasting Magazine, August 1941]
Tacoma radio men proudly serve in war time
2011/02/21 – 10:02 am
April 1945-CLAY HUNTINGTON has returned to the sports and special events staff of KTBI Tacoma, after three years with the Navy.
September 1945-DICK ROSS, recently released from the AAF, has been named production manager for Associated Broadcasting Co. on the West Coast. Ross was shot down over Germany and held prisoner of war for nine months. Before entering service he was program director for KMO Tacoma and night supervisor for Don Lee Broadcasting System headquarters.
Tacoma TV station applications
2011/02/19 – 5:53 pm
1949
Bing Crosby, Carl Haymond, channel 13, Dash Point, KMO TV, KTBI, Scripps Newspapers, Television Tacoma