PHOTO INDEX: WARM'S TOMMY WOODS, GEORGE GILBERT AND THE LATE JOHN F. KENNEDY.
WARM AND NOV. 22nd
45 years ago today, President John F. Kennedy was killed in Dallas, Texas. As the dominant radio station in this market, WARM was the radio clearinghouse for news until TV took over the coverage. George Gilbert was on the air doing his program and Terry McNulty, then the News Director came into the WARM studios and became the first radio voice in the area to announce the death of the President. Gilbert recounted in the WVIA TV documentary “WARMland Remembered”, that up until that time WARM news was exclusively local. But that changed on the 22nd. In the same program Tommy Woods recounts how the radio staff was stunned at the news. “We were an upbeat station, but on that day the music went away and we started pulling music out of our library that hadn’t been heard in years,” recounted Woods. Woods recalled walking around Scranton with Ron Allen in disbelief. “But at some point” Woods recalled, “we had to get back. We had to entertain and we did so with a big smile and excitement in our presentation because that’s what the people needed”.
WARM played solemn music and ran news reports until after the funeral. ON Nov. 26th, WARM Radio as its listeners knew it was back. The station played the best of top 40, the News team still followed the Kennedy saga and those great contests went on and on. But WARM and its listeners had changed, just like America did that day. Here’s one of the top songs WARM played in its rotation right after that tragic weekend.
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