Category: Buffalo Radio & TV

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

Irv. Danny. Van. Carol. The men and women who’ve watched and listened to have become family enough that we only need their first names. Buffalo has a deep and rich broadcasting history. Here are some of the names, faces, sounds and stories which have been filling Buffalo’s airwaves since 1922.

Scroll to read more about Buffalo’s Radio & TV History from one of WNY’s most counted upon broadcasting historians or search for a specific person or station…



John Otto: Hold the Phone!

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

 This page first appeared on staffannouncer.com in 2004, and was last updated May 21, 2014.

Weekly vintage John Otto airchecks from buffalostories.com
Weekly vintage John Otto airchecks from buffalostories.com

In celebration of John Otto’s 85th birthday, and mindful that it was 15 years ago this year that your congenial co-communicator signed off, we introduce several hours of John Otto recordings unheard since the day they were first broadcast in 1998.

It’s truly one of Buffalo’s greatest broadcasters at his finest: John Otto, broadcasting live from the Tralfamadore Cafe on the night he was inducted into the Buffalo Broadcasting Hall of Fame.

John talks with and interviews dozens of our city’s finest broadcasters, and they pay tribute to him– on the radio, on the telephone, at long last.

And the more to come sign is up– As we draw nearer the 15th anniversary of our-operator-on’s last show, we will present dozens more recordings from the 1950s through 1999 in this space. We’ll get to that in as soon as it takes to tell it– in the meantime, enjoy that Hall of Fame day broadcast below, and hold the phone.

John Otto played many of his own sound effects on the show… You could often hear him fumbling for the right cart as someone asked to guess the voice, or Joann the Just would call– of course, the trumpet was necessary to announce her presence. Here are a few of the sound effects “Your operator on” would play– taken directly from the broadcast carts which he himself used on the show.

otto-cart-label

John spent most of five decades on Buffalo radio, and his show was introduced by various jingles and production elements through the years. Several of these were given to me by the late Ben Bass, who aside from sending 30 years as a disc jockey himself, was also an engineer on the Otto show in the 1970’s.

Finally, here are some clips of the man himself– These were saved at the radio station by many of John’s producers through the years, including Mike Maniscalco, Brad Riter, Greg Bauch, Ben Bass, and others. They are mostly short, entertaining John Otto clips on pop culture and bad callers– others are just a taste of how John sounded on the air. The last clip is 46 minutes worth of a show– enjoy!

Reformatted & Updated pages from staffannouncer.com finding a new home at buffalostories.com
Reformatted & Updated pages from staffannouncer.com finding a new home at buffalostories.com

New: The Weekly Otto & Ben Bass Jingle of the Week

By Steve Cichon | steve@buffalostories.com | @stevebuffalo

The holidays are bringing the first installment of several new features on Buffalo Stories.com. Over the coming weeks and months, we’ll regularly be sharing from several categories in our expansive audio archive.

Weekly vintage John Otto airchecks from buffalostories.com
Weekly vintage John Otto airchecks from buffalostories.com

The first is “The Weekly Otto.”  With at least 48 hours worth of John Otto shows on tape, plus many more interesting audio clips from his own personal audio collection, there should be plenty of material to keep us going for quite a while providing regular audio looks back at one of Buffalo’s all-time favorite intelligent men of the people and most missed voices in the night, on the radio, on the telephone (at long last, don’t you know.)

Another soon-to-be regular feature is The Ben Bass Memorial Jingle of the Week.

Jingles from the collection of the late Ben Bass on buffalostories.com
Jingles from the collection of the late Ben Bass on buffalostories.com

Buffalo Radio good guy Ben Bass passed away unexpectedly in 2014. Ben was often irascible and difficult to deal with– but he had a heart of gold, and was always doing what he could for others. Aside from 40 years as a broadcast engineer, radio disc jockey, and ham operator, Ben was also a great collector of commercial and radio station jingles.

Upon his death, a handful of Ben’s friends got together to buy up as much of his jingle collection as possible– it’s a veritable history of Buffalo radio. This archive includes jingles, production pieces, and station IDs from the 1950’s through the 2000s from dozens of Western New York– many of which it’s almost certain that Ben had the only remaining copy. Stations big and small… Jingles good and bad… We’ll be offering regular segments from more than ten hours worth of jingles from Ben’s collection.

Reformatted & Updated pages from staffannouncer.com finding a new home at buffalostories.com
Reformatted & Updated pages from staffannouncer.com finding a new home at buffalostories.com

We’ll also be repackaging classic Staffannouncer.com pages here on Buffalo Stories.com. I started working on Staffannouncer.com in 2003, at a time when many of Buffalo’s pop culture treasures weren’t even mentioned on the Internet.

It’s hard to imagine typing “Irv Weinstein” or “AM&A’s” into Google and getting no results, but that’s the way it was.  Staffannouncer.com was my way to fix that.

I built a great 2004 website from code, by myself. A dozen years later, the look and some of the information needs some updating. I’ll be taking care of both of those things as I migrate all of the still-relevant pages and information from Staffannouncer.com here to Buffalo Stories.com.

Buffalo’s Christmases Past: Channel 4’s Santa Show

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

From 1948 to 1973, the children of Buffalo knew who the one, true Santa was — and it was the guy who read their letters on Channel 4.

During most of the 25 years the show aired, Hengerer’s sponsored the show to run from Thanksgiving to Christmas Eve for 15 minutes on weekdays, a little longer on Saturdays. In 1956, the show that delivered approximately 50,000 letters to Santa through its run became Buffalo’s first locally-produced show regularly presented in color.

Two men played Santa on Channel 4. Announcer Ed Dinsmore was the first St. Nick from the show’s inception until his death in 1954. Station program director Bill Peters — who was also known on the Van Miller Show as Norman Oklahoma — played Santa from 1954 until the end of the show’s run 19 years later.

Santa, however, was barely the star of the show. Forgetful the Elf, played memorably by WBEN copy writer John Eisenberger, was there for the entire run of the show from 1948 to ’73. Not only was the elf he played forgetful, but he was silly. Most shows revolved around Forgetful trying to paint Santa’s sleigh with polka dots, or trying to convince Santa to get rid of his “old fashioned” red suit for something as bit more modern. Hundreds of times through the show’s quarter century, Forgetful was seen greasing up the reindeer’s antlers, with the hopes of making them go faster.

This clip is the only known remaining video from the long run of the Santa show. It’s not from the broadcast of the show– but from 8mm home movies shot by a Channel 4 crew member.  This brief video shows Peters as Santa, Eisenberger as Forgetful, and Brook as Grumbles.

The soundtrack for the film is Leroy Anderson’s “Sleigh Ride,” which was used as the show’s theme song. It was also frequently used during the Christmas season by WBEN’s legendary morning man Clint Buehlman.

No full episodes or even short clips of this show — which ran for 25 years — are known to exist. The show was usually presented live, and recording was a more costly and difficult endeavor than it is today.

Santa and Forgetful had plenty of helpers through the years, all of whom — just like Peters and Eisenberger — had other jobs around the station. Grumbles the Elf was played by executive director Gene Brook and then floor manager Bud Hagman. Another director, Warren Jacober, played Freezy the Polar Bear. There were countless other puppets and guest stars, but none rising even close to the popularity of Eisneberger’s Forgetful.

The show ended along with Bill Peters’ death in 1973. Eisenberger died in 1984 at the age of 72.

Eisenberger as Forgetful and Peters as Santa. (Buffalo Stories archives/Steve Cichon collection)

 

Buffalo in the ’70s: Irv and other TV news favorites on the stage

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

Irv Weinstein is remembered as one of — if not the — greatest personalities in the history of Buffalo television. But even as he sat on the set of Eyewitness News reading Buffalo the news for 34 years, his greater love may have been acting. Many times through the years, Irv took the time between the 6 and 11 to take to the stage.

Buffalo News archives

In this photo, Irv, along with Channel 2 weatherman and news director Stewart Dan and Channel 4 weather reporter Suzi Makai, prepare to open “Fiorello” at the Jewish Center on Delaware Avenue.

Dan played the lead role in the play; Makai was the director.

Buffalo in the ’60s: Clint Buehlman’s Thanksgiving

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

Clint Buehlman spent 46 years on Buffalo radio. From 1931 until 1977, “Yours Truly” Buehly’s voice came across Western New York’s airwaves daily, checking Arthur Mometer for the temperature, helping commuters through traffic, and letting kids know when school was cancelled.

Buffalo News archives

Nearly 40 years after Buehlman’s retirement, the day he’s remembered and talked about most by his generations of audiences is Thanksgiving Day.

In 1987, when “Your AM-MC, CB” came back to WBEN after a decade of forced retirement for an interview with then-WBEN (now WHTT) morning man Bill Lacy, Lacy said Thanksgiving time was, by far, the time of year when the phones rang with thoughts of Buehlman the most — and they were mostly thoughts about Fred Waring and the Pennsylvanians.

Buehly made it a Western New York tradition to play Waring’s version of “Grandma’s Thanksgiving” every year, and it remains a song takes many Buffalonians back to the old kitchen radio and a much simpler time.

In 1977, upon reaching the age of 65, Buehlman was forced to retire from the early morning seat he had occupied on WBEN since 1943. Here’s a look back at his career at the time of his retirement.

Buffalo in the ’60s: Irv Weinstein and Gov. Nelson Rockefeller

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

During a mid-’60s visit to Buffalo, Gov. Nelson Rockefeller stopped by the Main Street studios of WKBW-TV for an interview with now-legendary Channel 7 newsman Irv Weinstein.

Buffalo News archives

At the time, however, Channel 7 was, as pejoratively described by Irv himself, “the fourth station in a three-station market.”

Channel 7 signed on in 1958, 10 years after Channel 4, and four years after Channel 2. The offerings of the ABC network didn’t help endear WKBW-TV to Buffalo viewers: Weinstein likes to remind people of quality network programming such as “My Mother the Car.”

When Weinstein left WKBW Radio to join Channel 7 alongside Rick Azar in 1964, the evening newscast went on the air at 7:20 p.m. to avoid competition from the other stations’ 6 p.m. newscasts.

irv720pm

Buffalo Stories archives

A few years later, Tom Jolls joined the crew, and the Irv, Rick and Tom team that dominated Buffalo TV news in the ’70s and ’80s was complete.

The three men, plus addition of more local newsfilm, better tight writing and a display of personality and human interaction unseen before on local TV made Channel 7 — and Irv Weinstein — No. 1 in the market, virtually uninterrupted, from the late 1960s through Irv’s retirement in 1998.

Nelson Rockefeller was governor of New York from 1958 to 1973 and was appointed vice president by Gerald Ford. He served from 1974 to 1977 and died in 1979.

—–

GALLERY: Remembering Irv, Rick and Tom

Buffalo in the ’70s: Barry Lillis said it would be like this!

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

With a smile and personality more reminiscent of a Vaudeville comedian than a meteorologist, Barry Lillis’ ceaseless efforts to make Buffalo smile while offering the forecast through the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s have made him one of Western New York’s most loved all-time television personalities.

Buffalo News archives

Born and raised in Niagara Falls, Lillis grabbed his first broadcasting gig at WGGO Radio in Salamanca in 1963. After spending a decade all around the TV dial and all around the country as a weather anchor and children’s show host, he came back to Buffalo and WGR-TV in 1976 as the weather anchor alongside newsman Rich Kellman and Ed Kilgore on sports.

Barry left Channel 2 in 1981 for Pittsburgh, but two years later, he was back and hosting the cult classic all-night movie show “Barry’s Cat’s Pajamas.”

Had he just spent parts of three decades as Buffalo’s favorite weather goofball, it likely would have been enough. But what really endeared us was his heart—tearfully on display in the raw, as he became synonymous with Channel 2’s Muscular Dystrophy and Kids Escaping Drugs telethons.

Buffalo News archives

Since leaving Channel 2 in 1996, Barry has run for Pomfret town justice, was ordained as an Orthodox Catholic priest, and has opened a wedding chapel helping hundreds through their wedding vows.

He’s also helped hundreds through addiction. Lillis marked Dec. 21, 1984, as the day he began his own recovery from alcoholism.

In 2014, Barry moved Western New York’s hearts again as he made public his battle with late-stage cancer.

From the BuffaloStories.com archives, this is a 1976 Barry Lillis weather forecast, taking you around foggy downtown Buffalo and out to the airport, offering up a healthy serving of Barry’s standard zaniness as well.  Rich Kellman is at the Channel 2 newsdesk.

What Labor Day means for me and my family

Both of my grandpas typify what Labor Day is about.

monic steve grandparents
With my grandpas Jim Coyle (left) and Eddie Cichon (right), and Grandma Coyle and my beautiful bride on our wedding day in 2001. The more weddings I attend, the more grateful I am that I had three grandparents there on my wedding day.

Grandpa Coyle was poor, and I think it’s fair to say didn’t have many prospects, until his boss at the Boys Club helped get him an apprenticeship with the Glaziers Union. After years as a glass worker, he ran Local 660 for decades.

gramps and glaziers
That’s Grandpa Coyle, in the center, next to the sailor, with the checked jacket and the rip in the photo. He was a glazier– a glassworker– and eventually spent a couple decades as the funds administrator for the Glaziers Local 660. This is from c.1953.

Grandpa Cichon started as a laborer at National Aniline, but learned a trade to become a tinsmith. He put in 40 years there.

gramps racing
Grandpa Cichon usually had no fewer than 3 or 4 jobs at a time, including regular work through the ticket takers and bet takers union at Memorial Auditorium, War Memorial Stadium/Rich Stadium, and Buffalo Raceway.

Both men’s willingness to work hard for better lives for themselves and their children is now also being enjoyed by their grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
Sure, organized labor is about 40 hour, 5 day work weeks… But to me, it’s about building American families for generations.
Labor Day also makes me think of my time as a union member, when the company that owns Channel 4 locked out half of our NABET-25 bargaining unit.
Technicians (studio crew, engineers, master control operators) weren’t allowed to work through contract negotiations, while newsroom staff (producers, photographers, editors) were forced to work with (incompetent) replacement workers.

steve locked out
As someone who has only ever wanted to show up and do my job, it was a time I’ll never forget– when the owners of Channel 4 wouldn’t let some of its hardest working, longest tenured employees come to work to provide for their families.
I don’t always agree with every union stance, but whenever I hear someone say unions are past their usefulness, I pray that they never learn first hand how useful a union can be.

Buffalo in the 60s: Van Miller calls first sports contest at ‘War Memorial’

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

The Bills’ first and second home games were played in the same stadium — the Rockpile — but that stadium changed names in between.

It was 55 years ago tonight– Aug. 24, 1960– as the brand-new Buffalo Bills played in their second-ever preseason game, that the athletic field known by most as “The Rockpile” was rededicated in “tribute to living veterans and the dead of all U.S. wars” as War Memorial Stadium. Previously, the Rockpile had officially been known as Civic Stadium.

A Congressional Medal of Honor winner from World War I was on hand to speak on behalf of all veterans.

Van Miller was behind the mic as the Bills and Oakland Raiders became the first team to play on the newly christened field. Both teams were only a few preseason contests into existence in the new American Football League.

As appeared in the Buffalo Evening News, Elbert Dubenion, Rob Barrett, Richie Lucas, and Tommy O’Connell standing on the Bulls sideline at the newly named War Memorial Stadium– forever known as The Rock Pile. (Buffalo Stories archives)

As seen in this photo, the Bills’ uniforms during the team’s first two seasons are nothing like future Bills uniforms. Among the Bills’ early equipment were cast aways from the Detroit Lions– blue and silver with jersey numbers– but no Buffalo insignia– on the helmets.

Van Miller died July 17, 2015, at age 87.

Buffalo in the 70s: Turned back at the Peace Bridge from “Canada’s Woodstock”

By Steve Cichon
steve@buffalostories.com
@stevebuffalo

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation called The Strawberry Fields Festival outside Toronto “Canada’s Woodstock.”

Anywhere from 75,000 to 100,000 people, mostly teens and college students from the northeastern U.S., showed up for the festival at Mosport Raceway in Bowmansville, Ont. Days before the event, local officials tried to shut it down – saying the permits were gained until false pretenses (and by all accounts they were).

With the province worried about the number of young people streaming in – only a year removed from Woodstock – Canadian border police started turning away massive numbers of young people at the Peace Bridge and other border crossings.

WKBW’s Stan Roberts talked with some of those who were turned away, including WKBW Newsman Brad Casey. Channel 4’s Chuck Healy sent film to New York that was used on a national CBS broadcast.