Commercials, we'll be right back after this word from our sponsor

Commercials, now I am sure you are wondering why I added this to my look at the early days of WMPT and Williamsport Radio. Before WMPT radio commercials were pretty bland, what is called institutional advertising. Not too long after the Neat and Nifty Fourteen Fifty came into being, a company came to town wanting to sell local advertisers singing jingles, just like the big national advertisers, but written especially for the local people. What a great foot in the door for a station that, even though it had a large listening audience, was still thought of by the local businesses at “the Kids Station.”
The advertiser needed to commit to a long term contract, I believe it was a year and they got the jingle for either a very reasonable price, or in some cases free.
I wish I would have been working at the station in those days, I can just see all of them sitting around trying to come up with clever slogans to be sung. Here are some of my favorites:
“Mr. Sleep, Mr. Sleep it’s like sleeping on a private cloud of your own a custom built Lycoming Mattress, Just whistle for Rissell TV the house that service built, you’re aware at Carroll House they care, Phone 323-9488 for George H Ocker, and who can forget the most challenging one of all, for fresh floral fashion it’s Paul F. Glunk, think Glunk.” As I am writing this those tunes still run through my head, as many of those singing jingles survived well after my arrival in 1966 and many stayed in use till the Agnes flood of 1972 destroyed the master tapes.
Other notable early advertisers on WMPT included the movie theatres, Capitol, Rialto, Keystone (later known as the State), Central Music, we used to drive Francis Carducci crazy, J. P and M Sullivan, Lane’s Rexall Pharmacy, D.J. Vannucci Pharmacy, Montour Auto, Elery Nau Hardware, First National Banks of Montoursville, and South Williamport, Nippon Panel, Browns Pharmacy, Wallace and Perris Pharmacy, The Knit Nook, Hi-way Pizza (later known as Mr. Pizza) and of course Coca Cola. At times creating a commercial can be a real challenge, Steve George reminded me of a commercial (two voice) we did for Lisowski's Lawn Mowers in Montoursville. All the commercials for Snapper Lawn Mowers were written at the company headquarters in Georgia. One of the great features of the Snapper Hi-Vac was that is had a bag. The commercial copy read, "the Snapper Hi-Vac, it sucks the grass clippings up and blows them into the bag." Steve and I took over two hours to record that spot, and it ran for about 2 weeks. In later years I had the Lisowski account and got to know Walt Lisowski quite well, even later I met his sister and found out that Jim Tokarz from my high school class was his grandson.
It is amazing how many of those businesses, including WMPT are no longer around. Over the years I had the pleasure of writing a few unforgettable campaigns, including Smith Printing, and a great set of commercial for the Balls Mills Naval Academy, for the Sheraton Inn located on Montgomery Pike, that actually had a Sun-Gazette reporter driving around and around in Balls Mills looking for construction.
One of the classics I used for years in any talk I gave on radio advertising was for Holcomb’s Donuts that involved a couple of guys watching a drive in movie. One has a loud bag of snacks the other is chewing on a “quiet Holcombe’s Donut.” Dick Crownover and Mike Sullivan voice it and did a great job with the commercial. After it started airing Holcombe’s sold out of donuts in about 2 hours.
WMPT was always known for clever commercials and that in one way or another made it a successful station and created many business success stories.