Mark White -AFN Berlin 1980

 

The late Mark White had his claim to King of Jazz.  He brought some wonderful music to Berlin for well over three decades.  Chris Muermann was a big fan at the time and recorded several of his broadcasts.  Garry made them available.  Today it's a tribute to Ella Fitzgerald, coming to Berlin for a concert.  Mark, keep swinging...

 

AFN - Mark White 1980

 

 

Chris Noel 1970

I'm still reading Chris's book "Vietnam and Me".  It's highly recommended.

Get it from Amazon

But right now, it's 1970 and time for a Date With Chris

Date With Chris - 1970

RIP Mark White

One of the great voices of radio history has been silenced. After spending a wonderful Christmas day with his family, Mark White went to bed and passed away in his sleep 12/29/2013. He would have been 89 on the 2nd of January. Mark was the manager of AFN Berlin from the 1950s until 1988. He left behind a great legacy and many friends. (David Glen Andersen facebook feed)

Mark White airchecks

News Censorship at AFVN during the Vietnam War

Roland Bynum 1983

Roland always gets the party started. 

 

Roland's recruiting show

 

It's late summer 1983, let's check in on the Creators Workshop...

 

Roland Bynum - 1983

 

Melody Roundup 1944

Melody Roundup brought top Western talent.  This time with Bob Nolan and the Sons of the Pioneers.

 

Hard to tell what the source material was 78s, radio transcriptions, movie soundtracks. 

 

Melody Roundup - Sons of the Pioneers 1944

 

 

GI Jive - 1946

Martha Wilkinson was one of the first big stars of AFRS.  During WWII there was a show called "GI Jive", one of the DJ shows.  Pretty non-descript until Martha became GI Jill and the voice of home.

GI Jive 1946

Roger Carroll - 1981

Young Roger at WMFD

There's always time for a Happy Hour.  When I was working civilian, one time I had a PD wondering how I could do so many "universals".  To him that meant being able to do a break without necessarily doing a station promo or talking about the record.  I learned it from the Roger and the AFRTS-LA talent.  Many thanks.

Roger Carroll - 1981

Gary Owens

Thanks Jerry for sharing these, they were airchecked off of the Thailand network.  I finally heard from Gary, letting us know it's okay to share these.  When I was a boy DJ, I kept the postman busy with incoming KMPC airchecks.  Amazing.

Gary Owens - 1969

Gary's on facebook, be sure to say hi!

Merry Christmas 2013

Merry Christmas and thank you for visiting.   It's been a nice year with family, my day job and people in general.  More and more people are stopping by every month so I guess it serves a purpose.

If you haven't checked in yet, you can email  afrts@live.com or facebook Thom Whetston or the afrtsarchive.blogspot.com page (click "Like" on that one).

Approximately every week I send out an email about what's new, sometimes asking questions, sometimes looking for people.  Just let me know if you'd like to be on the mailing list.

If you saved any recordings or memorabilia about the network, please let me know.  There are a lot of people that'd like to remember it.

AFRTS Christmas shows

Chris Noel

Music Censorship at AFVN and AFKN

Enchanted Keyboard - 1951

By the early 1950s radio had changed.  Prior to that the networks were doing great comedy, mystery variety shows and AFRTS could clip the commercials and send them out.  But now they were tasked with creating a lot of programs.  Many information and education programs were produced along with entertainment offerings.

"Enchanted Keyboard" was typical.  Classical piano with Don Thompson announcing.  Some wonderful talent was available to come in and play the piano.

On this broadcast, Edward Rebner

Enchanted Keyboard - 1951

Charlie Tuna - 1983

"Boss Angeles" Charlie was one of the guys that made KHJ happen.  The things Bill Drake did with that station had a lot to do with every top 40 station in the United States.  Charlie started there in the mid-60s and went with us in 1971.  Thanks for the memories.  Stay Tuna'd!

Charlie Tuna - 1983

Redd Harper - 1948

Redd was a part of a concert band that became more and more successful until they were invited to join an Oklahoma City radio station in 1924. From there, his career took off and his music was in greater demand. In 1931 he joined a larger radio station in Des Moines, found more success, and then decided to head to Hollywood, California. However, he arrived at the end of the Western Jazz era and the beginning of the Great Depression, thus finding it hard to find work and was not as successful as he had been. He struggled to find work in the city. When World War II started, he joined the Coast Guard for three years.  After the war, Redd was doing shows for AFRS.

After the war he found success again in Hollywood as he began working with other big name artists of the time from both radio and movies. During this time he also found success in the movie industry and starred in several films, including The Strawberry Roan.

Redd Harper Hollywood Roundup 1948

Ronnie Landry - 1959

Ron Landry, later of Hudson and Landry was drafted into the Army in 1958.  By 1959 he was doing a show on the network from AFRTS New York.

Ronnie Landry - 1959

 

I was usually assigned with the infantry, this was a classic:

 

 

Jim Ameche - 1965

"The Most Beautiful Sounds Around"  Orchestral music just isn't heard anymore.  Jim Ameche brought it to AFRTS.

Jim was a huge star during the "Golden Days of Radio" and managed to stay very successful as a DJ.

Jim Ameche - 1965

Chris Noel - Christmas 1969

December 1966, Chris in Vietnam

Chris Noel - 12/25/69

AFN - Bob Debasia - 1984

Bob Debasia has your 1984 wakeup call

AFN - Bob Debasia 1984

Connectivity

We're back on the air.  About a week ago Comcast pushed out an update that killed my Motorola SGB6580.  I managed to get it back to defaults and running again.  I own my modem, rather than paying the 7 bucks every month.

Yesterday it was the same thing and I couldn't get it back online.

I spent four years working for Comcast, getting modems activated and online.  I do know this stuff.

Just wanted to let you know that Comcast and Motorola have a long history of not playing well on certain Motorola models.

At least I'm not alone...

On with the show...

Roger Carroll - 1981

I'm grateful that Roger made so many great shows and made them available to us. 

 

Today it's memories of 1981.  If you have any of Roger's Christmas shows please contact me!

 

Roger Carroll - 1981

Gary Owens - 1969

A little bit more from the G.O. show.  

A very mod Gary, from "Laugh In"

 

Gary Owens - 1969

AFVN The Early Years - Adrian Cronauer

Adrian Cronauer explains the early years of AFVN and block programming.

Chris Noel Christmas 1969

Because of the way the transcription disks were sent out, there was no way to tell when they were actually broadcast... Except for Christmas week.  That week we would get disks with actual airdates.  They'd send them almost a month early to make that happen.

This was aired worldwide December 19, 1969

Chris Noel - Date With Chris - Christmas week 1969

Good Morning Vietnam - the real story

Paul Bottoms  let me know about this:

"Adrian Cronauer, Tony Booth who was at AFKN in Korea and I gave a presentation in February 2011 for two days at the Virginia War Memorial in Richmond."

Here's the first part:

Charlie Tuna - 1982

If you see the film "Rollercoaster", there's a DJ MC...

Charlie's back with another sixty minutes in the radio.  I hope that you've visited his website charlietuna.com He really has taken the show... trivia, humor and great stories and made the transition to the internet.

Charlie Tuna - 1982

FEN - 1964 the start of the Vietnam War

Here's live coverage from FEN August 5th and 6th 1964 of the Gulf of Tonkin, pretty much the beginning of the Vietnam War.

 

 

FEN News on Tonkin 1964

Chris Noel - Christmas 1966

 

Chris had just started doing "Date With Chris" and it was the holiday season

 

Chris Noel - Christmas 1966

Chris Noel - 1971

We're up to 1971 and it's time for your Date With Chris.

Chris Noel - 1971

Mosquito Network - The Ulithi Encyclopedia

During WWII we had a base in the Western Carolines and a LT (jg) John Vollbrecht  found the local Ulithi population interesting.  He studied them and presented talks on AFRS WVTY.  There was enough interest where the station published a book about the culture.

Johnny Bond - 1961

To the strains of Les Paul's "Cimarron" and a bushel basket full of gramophone records.  It's old school country from 1961.

Happy listening!

Johnny Bond - 1961

Bob Hope - Christmas 1968 Long Binh

We've made it to December.  Christmas is coming. This is Bob Hope's 1968 Christmas show from Long Binh, Vietnam.  Whet was it like to be at one of these shows?

Bob Hope - Christmas 1968 - Long Binh

More Christmas Memories