This year commemorates the 70th anniversary of when Beaver County’s first radio station, WBVP, was heard over the airwaves for the the first time on May 25, 1948.  To mark the historical event, each week, another “70th Anniversary Moment” will be showcased on the airwaves and published on the station’s online feeds.

If you do any research at the McCartney Library at Geneva College, and happen to ask archival Librarian, Kae Kirkwood, to help find information about the topic of Geneva College students participating in radio broadcasts, you will discover that there is a long history of hands on learning in the radio business.  According to records kept in the beautiful campus library in Beaver Falls, radio broadcasts produced by Geneva College began to air twice week in 1938 on New Castle Radio Station, WKST, which had just been granted a license and started broadcasting earlier that year.  In the 1950’s, WBVP alumni and Geneva College students at the time, Don Kennedy and Owen Simon helped organize a radio broadcasting club where students would tour other radio stations and learn about the industry.  According to Kirkwood, Kennedy even helped build a radio studio for the students to use on campus where weekly programs were produced and later on aired on WBVP.

In 1965, with radio broadcasting becoming more and more popular, Geneva College applied for, and was granted a license for an educational radio station, WGEV.  Initially the college station could be heard on 88.3 F.M. and 550 A.M.  Later on the station would only use the F.M. signal.  One of the earlier faculty directors at Geneva College for WGEV was arguably the most famous broadcaster to have started their career in Beaver County, Dr. Mike Emrick.  Emrick worked At Geneva College from 1969-1971.  Emrick loved hockey, and began to cover Pittsburgh Penguins games for The Beaver County Times while teaching at Geneva College. Later on, he got into broadcasting N.H.L. games with the Phildelphia Flyers and New Jersey Devils radio networks. Today, “Doc” Emrick’s voice is heard around the world and is one of the most familiar in hockey as a television analyst on several television networks for N.H.L. Stanley Cup Playoffs and Olympic hockey games.

As the years went by, the relationship between the Geneva College radio station, WGEV, and WBVP flourished and was  very beneficial to both parties.  Geneva students often started their careers at WBVP after graduating.  The college station had a very well developed curriculum and practical training that produced a constant pipeline of good talent for the “big radio station downtown”.  In return, there were many occasions when the resources from WBVP were used to help improve the sound of WGEV . Old equipment was often donated to the college station.  WBVP staffers even helped out and taught classes on occasion.  Former WBVP and WWKS General Manager and Sports Anchor, Chris Shovlin, taught a few broadcasting classes for a couple years in early 1980’s.  Sam Siple was one of those Geneva College broadcasters who later on became the morning news anchor and Program Director at WBVP.  Siple recalled the system that WBVP helped set up for WGEV, so that the collegiate station could carry ABC network news. In the recently published book , Behind The Microphone, The History Of Radio In Beaver County, PA.  Siple reported that the owners of WBVP at the time, Hall Communications, through a contract with ABC that they had for WBVP, included the college station, WGEV, as a “Spoke Station” in the agreement, which allowed WGEV to air certain feeds from ABC that were sent from the “hub” station.  Engineers and technical support staff at WBVP/WWKS installed a phone line coupler in the Beaver Falls studio to send ABC network material to a similar piece of equipment installed at WGEV.  Also attending classes at Geneva College and participating in college radio station activities at the time with Sam Siple, were Current WBVP and WMBA talk show fill in host, Tom Stein, Former newscaster and Program Director, Randy Buckwalter, Show host from the  1980’s, Ken Mueller, and current station owner, Mark Peterson, among others.  Dozens of Geneva College graduates, who started their careers behind the microphone at WGEV up on college hill, wound up working afterwards at WBVP.  It was a perfect feeder program for the Beaver Falls radio station.

In 2002, WGEV left the traditional F.M. airwaves, but continued broadcasting through an internet on line stream, and thus, continued to give students the opportunity to learn the broadcasting business.  Many of those students continue to darken the doorway of WBVP in search of internships or permanent employment. The current host of “A.M. Beaver County”, Matt Drzik, is one of the more more recent talented broadcasters who came through the pipeline from Geneva College to WBVP.

“70th Anniversary Moments” is presented by  Abbey Carpet and Floor,  Albert’s Heating, Cooling and Plumbing,  Aliquippa Giant Eagle, The Beaver Falls Municipal Authority, Beaver Valley Auto Mall, Beaver Valley Sheet Metal, Castlebrook Development, The Community College Of Beaver County,  Farmers Building and Savings Bank, Freedom United Federal Credit Union, Hank’s Frozen Custard and Mexican food, The Health Huts, Kitchen City, Laughlin Insurance Agency,  Rochester Manor and Villa and Young’s Jewelry and Coins

 

This year commemorates the 70th anniversary of when Beaver County’s first radio station, WBVP, was heard over the airwaves for the the first time on May 25, 1948.  To mark the historical event, each week, another “70th Anniversary Moment” will be showcased on the airwaves and published on the station’s online feeds.

One of the great benefits of being from an area dominated by big manufacturing industries in the early twentieth century was the people that ended up coming to Beaver County in search of work.  Business was booming for local steel mills and just like the hungry blast furnaces needed to be fed with more and more fuel and raw material to keep up with skyrocketing demand for the product, The factories themselves were starving for and needed more workers.  Anybody who could do anything, regardless of training or background was needed and thus word spread throughout the world about the labor opportunities available in Western Pennsylvania.  This led to an influx of immigrants of many different varieties settling in Beaver County. It was a perfect match.  The immigrants found good work, and they brought their rich and diverse cultures with them for the benefit of the whole community.  Soon churches, social clubs and even radio shows revolving around the language, culture and ethnicity of the various homelands far away sprang up in Beaver County.  These outlets helped the local ethnic enclaves preserve and promote their history, tradition and significance, as well as expose their ideas and way of life to others.  The result was a community in Beaver County that even today is very rich in cultural diversity.  The following is an excerpt about the ethnic radio shows that aired in Beaver County is taken from from in the recently published book,  Behind The Microphone, The History Of Radio In Beaver County, PA:

“One of the ways these various cultures were reinforced and celebrated was with weekly radio shows that aired on WBVP and WMBA and even on Kiss 106.7 F.M.  All the way up through the 1990’s, one could tune in on the weekends for a heavy dose of Polkas, Italian, Greek, Croatian and Serbian music hours. In addition to the music shows, Orthodox Christmas Midnight mass from St. Elijah Serbian Orthodox Church in Aliquippa was broadcast live on the air for many years. A Christmas day broadcast on WMBA of Divine Liturgy from Holy Ghost Russian Orthodox church in Ambridge was a highly anticipated event.  Even to this day, the weekly Sunday 9 A.M. mass from St. Monica Parish in Chippewa Township is broadcast live on WBVP and WMBA, a tradition that goes back to the very early days of WBVP, when the church was known as St. Mary’s and located in downtown Beaver Falls. Beaver County’s radio stations played a part in promoting and preserving the cultures and traditions that came to the area from parts elsewhere.

The Sunday Morning lineup on WMBA around 1990 was indeed a reflection not only what nationality groups were prominent in Beaver County, but also a testament to the passion and interest these immigrants had in maintaining, celebrating and promoting their heritage  This was demonstrated by putting the effort in to in provide the content, funding and producing the weekly shows. Every week, the programs were recorded ahead of time at WMBA and played back on Sundays. This required a significant time commitment from everyone involved.  At 8:00 A.M., WMBA aired The Italian Hour hosted by Aspinwall resident, Sal Patitucci. Patitucci would record the show on reel to reel tapes  at WKPA in New Kennington and then send the weekly installments of his program out to various radio stations in the Pittsburgh area.  At the time, his show also aired on WEDO in Mckeesport and WHJB in Greensburg. The Croatian hour Aired at 10 A.M. hosted by John Plesh. The Serbian Hour, hosted by George Bowes, would air at 11 A.M. and the finally, The Greek Hour would start at Noon. The Greek Hour was hosted by Presbyteria Note Taetras, wife of the pastor from the local Ambridge based Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church.  Current State Representative Rob Matzie, was then  the Sunday morning producer at WMBA and  reported that he would do the commercials in English and Presbyteria Note Taetras would announce the commercials in the Greek language during that segment.  Matzie anchored the weekly Sunday morning cavalcade of ethnic diversity and aired a local news report between the programs in the WMBA Studio during his career at the station, from 1987 though 1994. On Saturday afternoons during this period of time, WMBA aired a polka music show from 2 until 4 P.M. hosted by Bob Frynkewicz called “The Polka Revue”.

George Bowes, or, Bozic, as would appear on his birth certificate,  was known for a successful career at WWSW in Pittsburgh, as well as outlying radio stations including WEDO in McKeesport and WLOA in Farrell. Later on, Bowes worked in politics, but to Beaver County people, he was known as the host of the Serbian Hour on WMBA.

WBVP and WWKS were no stranger to ethnic radio programming either.  One of the mainstays of the line up was “The Croatian Hour”, which aired on WWKS, Kiss 106.7 F.M. The program was  hosted by Eddie Sabolic and it aired from 10 A.M. to Noon from the late 1960’s up through the mid 1980’s. For a brief period of time in the eighties WBVP aired Sal Patitucci’s  Italian Hour broadcast as well. In more recent days, on Sunday mornings, WBVP aired a popular Italian music program hosted by New Castle native Angie Augustine and polka shows that were produced at first by Harry Golmont and later on after the WBVP and WMBA merger, in 2000, by Bob Frynkewicz.”

“70th Anniversary Moments” is presented by  Abbey Carpet and Floor,  Albert’s Heating, Cooling and Plumbing,  Aliquippa Giant Eagle, The Beaver Falls Municipal Authority, Beaver Valley Auto Mall, Beaver Valley Sheet Metal, Castlebrook Development, The Community College Of Beaver County,  Farmers Building and Savings Bank, Freedom United Federal Credit Union, Hank’s Frozen Custard and Mexican food, The Health Huts, Kitchen City, Laughlin Insurance Agency,  Rochester Manor and Villa and Young’s Jewelry and Coins