On the road, Canton Here We Come!

Sometime in 1976 it became clear to Dave that operating more than one station had certain advantages, shared staff, equipment, selling, and buying power. Several afternoons were spent talking about potential locations for a new radio station, with the decision being reached the the new station should be located in a town that didn't have primary radio service. After more discussion we decided to do a market potential study on Canton and Troy, Pa. I was born in Canton, Pa and spent many summers of my youth there at my grandparents. Of the two communities Canton was the largest by about 400 people and seemed to afford the best facilities for the station and tower. My parents who had recently retired owned a mountain top location, perfect, so we thought, for the tower, and there seemed to be a wide variety of buildings available for studios.

I was dispatched to spend a few days in Canton to do some investigation, very quietly, so we could make a decision about our next move. I could not even tell my parents of our plans, since at that time there was no frequency assigned to Canton or Troy and we would need to apply to the F.C.C. to amend the table of assignments to add an FM frequency to either community. The only person in Canton who knew anything about our plans was Paul Burr the Canton Borough Manager. He proved to be a valuable source of information about the commercial and statistical base of Canton. With this information in hand Dave and I sat down and took a hard look at the potential cost of building this station. After determining that it was financially feasible, finding a potential frequency, 100.1 MHz we forged ahead with the paperwork to have that frequency assigned to Canton. It took about three months for the F.C.C. to act, and even then there was no guarantees that Dave and I would be successful in securing a license, as the frequency allocation was open for anyone who wanted to apply for it.

The process of completing the application meant spending a lot of time in Canton, and the surrounding area meeting with "community leaders", an FCC term, and doing a programming needs assessment. Once that was completed the over 1 pound application was filed with the FCC and it was set back and wait for the cut off date to see IF anyone else would file. After what seemed to be an eternity, the FCC finally granted a Construction Permit in the late fall of 1977, too late of course for us to do anymore than get the tower site cleared and obtain a studio site. By this time I had met a fellow named Dave Seagren. Dave S. was President of The Canton Business Association and Manager of Beacon Consumer Discount Company's office in Canton. Dave had come from California where he had been a C.H.I.P.S. officer. He had recently purchased a house up on Center Street hill and was in the process of converting the bottom floor to his home and and office for a collection business he ran. Dave S. offered us the second floor for $50.00 per month, we jumped at the chance. In retrospect, we should have gone elsewhere because we got what we paid for! Anyway, weekends during the fall ,winter of 1977-and the spring of 1978 were spent putting together studios What a job!! The house was well over 100 years old, had been through a fire and years of neglect as an apartment house. To add to the fun, nothing was square or level, we wound up building new walls and floors throughout.

During that time we were on the lookout for a used tower, finally locating a former AM tower in Orange, Va. So one day Dave C. and I along with one other person climbed into a U Haul truck and made the round trip to get the tower, all 180' of it. We had to sandblast and paint the tower in WMPT's parking lot and truck it, yet again, to the mountain top where it was assembled on the ground.

I must admit that Dave C. allowed me a bit of freedom in choosing equipment for the station. I ordered the studio equipment and he took care of the transmitter and antenna. For you technical junkies here is the list. Transmitter: a C.C.A. 500 watt FM Transmitter, a Orban stereo generator and processor, Belar Frequency and Modulation monitors, and a Celwave 4 bay antenna. Studio Equipment: (NEW) Ramko DC-8MS stereo audio console, (NEW) 2 CCA 12" turntables, (NEW) Revox reel to reel, (NEW) Shure RE-10 Mics, (USED) 2 B.E. cart machines, (USED) 1 Stereo cart Machine. The transmitter controller was designed and built by Alan Preuss who had once been the Chief Engineer of WMPT as was working in aviation electronics for Bendix in Florida. Also the way we also obtained a used and abused, Gatesway mono console for the production studio. Equipment wise we were pretty good, staff wise, well that needed to come together. (to be continued)