Top 40 Geek World has been abuzz for a week or two with the news that WLS in Chicago will celebrate Memorial Day by bringing back some of its best-known jocks and newscasters for an all-day “rewind” special. (The complete lineup is posted here.) I’m going to be on the air myself on Memorial Day, but I’ll be taking some time to listen to the WLS reunion too, because I wouldn’t be on the air at all if it weren’t for that station and some of those people.
Larry Lujack, who will be reunited with Tommy Edwards on the morning show Monday, was my biggest inspiration. Lujack and Edwards are best known for “Animal Stories,” which became so popular in the late 70s and early 80s that the WLS station van was christened the Animal Stories Mobile Unit. Fred Winston, who will hold down 9 to noon, might be the funniest guy I ever heard on the radio, combining a surreal wit with unbelievable pipes—indeed, some of the crazy things he said were even funnier because of that voice. Jeff Davis, who’s best known today as a voiceover artist (if you go into your local Blockbuster Video, you’ll hear him), will do 3-to-6. He was at WLS from the late 70s to the mid 80s, doing late nights. John Landecker returns for the evening shift. He was probably the quintessential night guy for the Top 40 era, with plenty of rock and roll energy and an ability to work the phones like no one else. (Stand by for another Boogie Check.) Edwards and Landecker are regulars on other stations in Chicago today, but it’s a testimonial to the mythic power of WLS in the 70s that they’re being permitted to return.
So there will be lots of star power on the Big 89 Monday, but it’ll be no more star-packed than the day-to-day batting order at the station back in the day. In 1978, for example, Lujack, Edwards, Landecker, and Davis held down 16 1/2 hours of the broadcast day. To get the full effect of the reunion, you should probably hear it out of the air on a transistor radio, but you can also listen live at the WLS website.
There are five volumes of Animal Stories available on CD. This fairly representative bit is from Volume II.
“Story 17 (The Rhinoceros)”/Uncle Lar and Lil’ Tommy (buy it here)
Filed under: Radio Tales
I know I’ll be listening. As late as 1983, WLS was still going strong as an AM Top 40 station. Their line-up that year of Larry Lujck (6-10am), Fred Winston (10-2:30), Tommy Edwards (2:30-7), Brant Miller (7-11pm), and Jeff Davis (11-2am) was one of my all time favorites. WLS also held a 25 year reunion weeekend in 1985. (It was a 25 year reunion to celebrate 25 years as a Top station…WLS went to a Top music format in 1960). During the reunion weekend, while Bob Sirott was a guest, Larry Lujack came into the studio and began a rather testy exchange with Sirott. Fred Winston played it back on his show the following Monday, and I was ready with the record button on my boom box. I still have it today on tape. It’s hilarious. Uncle Lar and Young Bob still haven’t made nice.
[...] Record Charts, Tracks — jb @ 7:00 am With Chicago radio legends set to reconvene at WLS on Monday, it’s a happy accident that this survey is the newest acquisition at ARSA this week—the [...]
Nice to know the origins of your oft-used pen name, Winston Lujack.
[...] I spent several hours listening to the Big 89 Rewind on WLS, which brought back several personalities from the 70s and 80s for the day. Larry Lujack was [...]
Being a 42 year vet of Broadcasting, I of course was up at 5am and tuned em out to go to bed about 8PM.
It was GREAT…..
Where did FM ever think they could be a rock and roll station?
R&R just sounds better on AM !
A couple years ago, Bob Sirott, then host of a TV program on WTTW in Chicago, interviewed Larry Lujack. One of the most insightful interviews I have seen. Of course, Lujack is a very private person and seemed uncomfortable with answering some of Sirott’s questions.
WLS, The Big 89, Rocks.
A friend of mine emailed me about the Big 89 Rewind, and I had to listen via the internet throughout my house in Georgia.
Listening to WLS from late in the afternoon in the winter with Bob Sirott, and then Landecker, Steve King, and Yvonne Daniels in my room in Omaha Nebraska where it boomed in at night was THE reason I got into radio! It was a thrill to hear the jingles, the jocks and the Big 89 sound again.
It was a thrill to work in radio in Chicago in the 80’s for WLS’s competition at B96, and WFYR, but it was always my dream to crack the Mic on the Big 89 WLS. There will never be another big personality TOP 40 station like it!