LATEST NEWS... NOV 29, 2018 - Some unfortunate family happenings has again pushed me back on some pursuits and now with the holidays I suspect I may not have a lot of new material/interviews to post for a few weeks, but just did add chats from two announcers from the 1950s: MIKE HANNA and BOB GREEN... Mike worked at WSAY when the studios were situated in the Powers Building in downtown Rochester. Mike sent me a photo of him in the studio doing some paperwork HERE! (enlarged for effect and detail). He's hoping to send me another photo from those facilities, perhaps situated on the second or third floor at the time... Bob Green was an announcer in late 1958 when the studios had moved to French Road. I'm still trying to identify when exactly broadcasting began at French Road- that would seem to be 1957 or around then... We do know when the transmitter went into service out at French Road, as I found a full page advertisement in the Democrat and Chronicle from May 16, 1945 HERE!... Green also posted an amusing recounting of a fire out at French Road on Youtube HERE!. Where folks went on to after WSAY is proving very interesting. Mike ended up as a commercial pilot, flying for American Airlines for 30+ years-- while Bob went on to servicing advertising agencies with BOB GREEN PRODUCTIONS and radio spots for decades as well, based in Houston... Just followed up with JIM KELLY tonight who was an announcer in the early 1970s before doing more radio- and sports for WOKR (Channel 13) in Rochester. Luckilly, while I was working at SAY in the late 1970s, I rescued a ton of radio spots left behind by the jocks and saved a few from Jim and HERE's ONE!- a commercial for the legendary bar ELIOT's NEST, I believe located technically in West Henrietta, NY off of Scottsville Road along the Genesee River, now McGinny's. You can check out everything I found on the floor out at French Road via the WSAY website I maintain HERE!. Hopefully, I'll hook up with Jim soon for a visit. Jim also pointed me to one of the Jerry Jacks from the early 1970s, RICK WETZEL. Here's a switch: soon after Rick left WSAY he moved into 40 years in the world of finance and became the CEO of Focus First Federal Credit Union in Rochester- just spoke to him today- where he is retiring from at the end of the month. He's anxious to talk about his stay pushing those 5,000 powerful watts... Received my copy of NO STOPPIN' THIS BOPPIN - LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL by Bob and Terri Skurzewski. It reviews Buffalo, NY radio from 1950 thru 1964. You can purchase your copy THRU AMAZON HERE!. It includes a bunch on WSAY Studio Engineer (1958-60) ROD GOODSPEED, already interviewed for the WSAY STORY PROJECT, and about WNIA- WSAY's sister station, also owned by Gordon Brown... Visited JOHN SEBASTE for a fourth time for more about his tenure, around 40 years from 1963 through the early 80s at SAY. Always enjoyable to visit John and his two dogs, Nina and Monty. Continuous interesting ancedotes from John, whom so many have lauded for their start in media, as John hired so many of the Jerry Jacks and Tommy Thomases, etc... MARK GIARDINA, long-time Rochester-area newsman- whom I worked alongside for years at WXXI- is enjoying retirement. Mark was among those who made the jump from WHAM to form the NEW WSAY in the early 1980s. If I can get him off the couch long enough, I plan to interview him shortly for what should be a very interesting recounting of the "mutiny" which.. ultimately.. did not end well. -BILL FLYNN

LATEST NEWS... OCT 7, 2018 - Needed to divert for a few weeks in September for some personal reasons, but back at it again... found a transcription service, called voicebase HERE! that is virtually free and a big timesaver! With a clear recording, the only thing to do is add punctuation and some proper names of people, places etc. It is amazing how accurate it is and has brought me a boost as far as my outlook on attacking this project. Completed now is 19 interviews and will soon add excerpts from the last two (DAVE ALHART and ROD GOODSPEED) to the main page here... DAVE ALHART [1956-61 at WSAY] was the first MIKE MELODY at WSAY. (the brother of Channel 13's DON ALHART). Dave claims also to be the first to secure a commercial account, Canada Dry, as in the soft drink. Among his many stories: while reading the news in the famous "kitchen" studio, hearing a noise behind him and seeing someone (I have a possible culprit to confirm) urinating in the sink (attempt to get the announcer to laugh on the air)... one of Dave's engineers ROD GOODSPEED [can't fake a name like that!] (the engineer, the person who operated the controls at the main board) was interviewed last week. He worked at SAY in the late 1950s-early 60s and has saved a bunch of stingers, brief promos, quick id's, etc. from that period. Although sound won't be featured in this project, I hope to post those clips on my other WSAY page -- the one that now has promos, commercials, ID's, etc from the 1970s HERE! soon... Rod operated his own TV repair shop in Rochester for a time and also was renowned in the Buffalo area for radio work... Rod told me that the radio museum in Bloomfield, NY HERE! includes an exhibit on Gordon Brown. I'm following up that lead now. BTW, that museum is a fascinating place to check out- I did a few radio pieces on the place years ago... For that matter, St.John Fisher College has an area set aside honoring and documenting local radio history that I need to visit. Among the photos is one with Gordon and MORT NUSBAUM soon after WSAY began in 1936 or '37! SJFC also has amassed a huge load of radio sound from Rochester radio stations, that is not available on-line yet but will be. I see MORT NUSBAUM is interviewed many times, and with his passing years ago, will hopefully mean we can piece some of the earliest WSAY times together. Personally, SJFC has secured grants to have over 300 of my WXXI and WHAM radio features added to the mix- a huge relief- as I had saved all of my stuff on big reels over the years but would never have the patience (or expertise) to clean up the, yech! mold and whatever from the things being stored incorrectly... As the fall and winter sets in- and the hibernation period- I hope to plod away consistently in contacting folks for interviews. The list of WSAY employees keeps growing but no one is being refused so I would appreciate folks checking out the lists here for steers... Did you ever wonder if anybody ever grabbed the WSAY call letters after the Rochester demise? When searching the internet, nothing comes up HERE! . Not so long ago I saw that a high school station was boasting about using WSAY but it seemed that was an in-house thing and not on-the-air. But I'll check... Ran into a radio story in a Rochester newspaper that claims the reason for the WSAY call letters comes from a promotional slogan: Wha say? (What do you say?) Say SAY... I will be archiving these LATEST NEWS updates, you can click on the PAST POSTS button above to access that stuff. -BILL FLYNN

LATEST NEWS... AUG 27, 2018 - ... Messaging currently with 60s announcer LEE DEFENDORF, interview soon. He was Lee O'Day at WHFM as I recall also. His brother RAY, also an announcer at WSAY, interview pending, apparently had Gordon on the air, live during the so-called race riots in Rochester during the 60s- and that Gordon drove through one of the turbulent areas and had protestors jumping on his car!... Just interviewed SAMME PALERMO, who contributed funny bits for the KEVIN DeHOND and TOMMY NAST. Here's one HERE!... We're up to 15 different interviews of folks so far, Samme's to be transcribed still. I hate to add it up but there's got to be at least 100 potential folks to include in this thing, and I wish for long health to see this to fruition... DAVE ALHART, the brother of TV 13's Don Alhart apparently was THE first Mike Melody, Don tells me on Facebook. Dave has replied and can't wait to hear about it... GARY SMITH's brother TODD SMITH also should be soon for an interview. He was the engineer for disc jockeys in the 1950s on WSAY. And when I say engineer I mean the guy who adjusted volumes, fired the records from the main control room while the announcer announced form the kitchen studio across the way through the glass. It was TODD and JACK PALVINO who decided to play hooky from their on-air shift to watch the late 1950s World Series game at a Pittsford bar. So they pre-recorded their show ahead of time (a big no-no!) and had the tape rolling while they were at the bar. Problem was, the damn tape broke and Gordon was waiting for them at the station when they got back. Jack says he didn't last much longer after that incident. (By the way, Jack has another book out before the end of the year so look for it! I found his first book HERE!...Will find out if that led to TODD's departure anytime soon after. Completely admirable I say! Just bad luck with the tape. I'm wondering if they had the yellow grease pencils then with that blue splicing tape and somebody was a little loose on an edit and that's how the tape broke. Also I forgot to ask Jack whose idea it was- for the attempt. We'll find out from Todd... So many people who I have contacted about a pending interview- without exact confirmation of exactly when, so hang in there, please. Of course, contact me at berflynn@yahoo.com if you want to schedule... I've done three long interviews with JOHN SEBASTE and there's more to come. John started at WSAY on the day Kennedy was shot, November 22, 1963 and lasted into the early 80s after the Dickey takeover and was an announcer and went into management. He trained many of the announcers in that span (although Ferdinand Jay trained Sebaste I've learned!) and many have credited John with the chance to get into the business at all. Most had NO radio experience, John says of his hires for announcers... I'm having trouble finding a good audio-to-text program that doesn't cost much or is free for this project. Transcribing takes awhile you can imagine for the usual 45 minute interview. I'm wondering if a reliable one is even out there. Do you get a return of one long drawn out sentence? Even that might be worth it, to go back and edit it up...want to thank local long-timer on Rochester airwaves BOB SCOTT who turned me on to TOM BADGER's (Sales Manager for the new WSAY in the early 80s) number- who then got me in touch with BOB LUTHER (GM of the New WSAY) who is crucial to tell the story of the New WSAY. What happened was several WHAM radio folk, including the legendary morning men Jack & George- bolted WHAM to go over to WSAY which was being purchased by LEW DICKEY. It didn't work out but a tremendous try I say. You just don't hear of that stuff nowadays. But, don't have to tell people who "know".. radio is no where what it used to be, as far as on-air personalities... sad to report that 1970s announcer CRAIG WALKER apparently passed a few years ago. A picture was found attached to an obit, the age is right, and hope I am wrong. On the lookout for 1970s announcer GREG TRUELSON. Found him on Linkedin, called the place in Pennsylvania where he had worked, but he left there a little while ago and I can't find him more later... happy to report that GARY HEMDAL, MARY DRISCOLL and TONY SCARDILLO, thre of the Country jocks that took over immediately after the removal of the rock n'roll format in 1979 have been contacted and all are willing to participate. PAUL CASSELLA, another of the Country announcers then, is on Facebook and I'm hoping he will want to join in... - BILL FLYNN