Chris Noel 1970

 

Chris Noel brought home to a lot of soldiers.  Her Date With Chris shows were worldwide hits and she toured and toured with several stops in Vietnam.  Thanks Chris!

Chris still keeps the faith with her veterans shelter click here.  See what you can do to help out...

Date With Chris - 1970

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Joe Ferguson 1983

 

Joe Ferguson from Portland OR KUPL radio was part of the 1983 experiment when AFRTS had jocks from around the country record shows.  Bob Moke and Danny Kramer from Salt Lake City were some of the others.  The deal was supposed to be 13 weeks.  Whoever was after Joe turned out to not be available and Joe got another 13 weeks.

A couple of years ago he asked me if I'd be interested in all of the shows on transcription disks.  He wanted the opportunity for us to hear them again.  I'm very thankful.

Joe Ferguson - 1983

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Pete Smith 1983

   

Pete Smith was part of the EZ listening tradition at AFRTS.  He followed John Doremus, who followed Jim Ameche.  He had quite a career in Los Angeles radio KNX; KDAY, 1956-58; KRKD, 1958-61; KNOB; KPOL; KMPC, 1961-88; KJQI/KOJY, 1993-95; KGIL, 1998. Pete was part of "Music of Your Life."

Roger Carroll was telling me that Pete was fulltime swing at KMPC.  What a gig.

Pete Smith 1983

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Gene Price 1973

 

Gene had been doing the show for about a year, starting a quarter century of making friends around the world.

Gene Price - 1973

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Mary Helen Barro 1983

 

The Latina voice of home... Mary Helen Barro.

Mary Helen Barro - 1983

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Charlie Tuna 1973

 

Time for another of our 1973 visits with Charlie Tuna.  What do you think?

Charlie Tuna 1973

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Joe Allison 1969

 

Capitol recording artist Joe Allison has another hour of your country favorites

Country Corner 1969

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Face The Nation 1967

 

In 1967, much of the longform news programming came on transcription disk.

On todays "Face the Nation" Senator William Fulbright updates us on Vietnam

Face The Nation 1967

Wolfman Jack 1980

 

He sure had the magic.  Only one we'd get complaints about.  Wolfman could connect to the troops in the field.  Complaints would come from Colonels, compliments would come from Corporals.  We got him a better time slot.

Wolfman Jack

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Roger Carroll 1972

 

Been almost 5 years since we lost RC.I'll always value the time I helped him with his online station.

He sent us all of the shows that he saved.  Here's another.

Roger Carroll - 1972

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Gary Owens 1969

   

This is a much better transfer of something that was presented a while back.  I was sent a bunch of disks that weren't stored in sleeves and were in pretty rough shape. 

Gary Owens - 1969

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Tom Campbell 1975

   

Here's some 1975 goodness from Tom Campbell.

Tom Campbell - 1975

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Roland Bynum 1981

 

Roland Bynum has touched a lot of people.  A teacher, a broadcaster and a great person.  

Roland Bynum - 1981

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BIll Stewart 1970

 

Bill Stewart was another of the KMPC talent that had the AFRTS gig, He was the Bill of the KMPC jingle..."Ira, Johnny, Bill and Dick!" Bill graced LA playing his mixture of Swing, jazz and MOR at several great stations.

KMPC, 1951-59; KGIL, 1965-66; KRHM, 1966 and 1969; KGIL, 1973-75. For Armed Forces Radio he hosted "A Quarter Century of Swing." In 1969, the 30-year veteran was honored with a concert at the Palladium. For 20 years he did in-flight airline music programming. Bill died in 1993 of congestive heart failure.

Bill Stewart - 1970 More Bill Stewart

Jim Pewter and Laurie Allen -Valentines 1993

  

Jim and Laurie on tour

In 1993 Jim and Laurie Allen did a Valentine Day special "Hooked on a Feeling".  Jim says him and Laurie did about five of these specials.  They started working on them after they returned from Europe in 1992.  The music was their choice and the they had a great time producing, writing and recording the shows.  Here's Part one:

Jim Pewter and Laurie Allen - Valentines Special hour one

Jim Pewter - 1993 Valentines special part 2

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Don Tracy 1983

 

East coast Don Tracy, way back when...

Let's get the party started with some Don Tracy fun!

Don Tracy - 1983

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Chris Noel 1970

 

Chris Noel... still making memories.  She's still giving her all with her veterans shelter.  You should help out Click here

Date With Chris - 1970

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Joe Ferguson 1968

 

In 1983 AFRTS tried an experiment with local jocks from all over the country doing shows.  Joe Ferguson was doing great things in Portland OR and gave it a go...  Joe shared these shows with us.  Thank you my friend.

Joe Ferguson 1983

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John Doremus 1968

 

Amazing set of pipes and smooth.  John Doremus had evening music for many years.  Similar to what Jim Ameche did earlier and what Pete Smith did later but smoother and bigger.  He had recorded Music Through the Night shows sponsored by the airlines that ran on the biggest AM clear channel stations in the country.  He also was the one that started syndicating in flight music.

John Doremus 1968

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AFKN Clem Shamus "Ballad of the Plain Steel Pot" 1967

Clem Shamus from the 1966 AFKN yearbook

 When I was at AFKN in the 2d Division in 1977, someone came up with a 45rpm copy of Ballad of the Plain Steel Pot by Clem Shamus. It was popular I was curious and Clem is fan of the blog, I asked him about it:

Hi Thom, I wrote Ballad of the Plain Steel Pot while at AFKN in 1966. I took a leave and flew to San Antonio, TX to record it for Brazos Records. "Green Beret" was hot (became #1 for the year), but Brazos got tied up with Xmas music for kids and didn't get it out until the spring of 67. I was of course back in Korea (NCOIC of radio in Seoul) and had no control of any kind so I don't know what, if any promotion, distribution or anything about it. They sent me 500 copies and they were sold and the money donated to an orphanage. It was impossible to get around to promote it over there and I of course was busy with the day job.

Clem Shamus "Ballad of the Plain Steel Pot"

Update: Clem's wife shared the following with the AFVN group:

"Clem passed away yesterday 5/27/12. He was totally at peace with the very difficult decision he made. It was peaceful and surrounded by the ones that loved him most. Myself, 3 of 5 children and his brother

and sister-in-law."

Gene Price 1973

 

Willard is back, with your favorite silliness. Gene Price Country World is nice way to start the back to work crunch.

Gene Price - 1973

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AFVN Det 5, Hue overrub 2/2/68

 

 From Robert Moorecook

Today is the anniversary of Det 5 Hue was overrun.
I encourage you to take a moment to remember this brave men who served there.

American Forces Vietnam Network - AFVN
Prisoners of War
Six men assigned to AFVN were taken prisoner during the Vietnam war, five spending about five years in captivity before being released. The sixth, Steven Stroub, was executed shortly after capture. The AFVN'ers were captured when the detachment at Hue was overrun -- following a fierce fire fight during the Tet holiday -- on Feb 5, 1968.

Two other men also died that day at AFVN. SGT Thomas Franklin Young, USMC was Killed in Action in that fight. Also killed that day was Courtney Niles, a civilian with NBC International, who died defending the station. One AFVN'er escaped.

Details follow --

John Thomas Anderson - POW

John Bagwell - Escaped

James V. Di Bernardo - POW

John A. Deering - POW

Harry Lawrence Ettmueller - POW

Donat J. Gouin - POW

Courtney Niles, Civilian Contractor - Killed in Action

Steven J. Stroub - Captured and Executed

Thomas Franklin Young - Killed in Action

More information at Robert's website

Mary Helen Barro 1983

 

Mary Helen Barro kept the Latino beat alive.  She started with the network in the late 70s and was there a long time.  Bailar!

Mary Helen Barro 1983

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Charlie Tuna 1991

 

Charlie Tuna - 1992

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