Part Three - On The Move
In 1955, through some convoluted maneuvering NBC had forced Westinghouse to
trade its Philadelphia stations for NBC’s stations in Cleveland. In 1965, the
FCC ruled that this trade was improper and the swap was ordered reversed. KYW
and Bob were going to Philadelphia.
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Bob Hagen at the relocated KYW,
the nation's second successful
all-news radio station.
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Westinghouse had recently embarked on a
risky radio experiment—an all-news format at 1010 WINS in New York,
something critics said would never work. But it seemed to be working and
they wanted to see if the experiment could be successfully repeated at KYW.
Bob was put in charge of implementing the non-stop news wheel in Philly.
He pulled it off. KYW became the nation’s second successful all-news
operation, with Bob Hagen as editor in chief. |
Philadelphia was big. Chicago was bigger.
In 1967 Bob got a call to join the news
department at WCFL, a Top 40 operation, owned by the Chicago Federation of
Labor, of all things. This was an age when even rock and roll stations did news.
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WCFL's large news department was considered
one of the best in the Windy City.
One of Bob's first
assignments for WCFL took him to Detroit - it was the summer of 1967 and the
motor city was burning.
Bob was appointed news director of WCFL and
led the station to a sweep of the Associated Press awards in 1970.
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Bob Hagen on the air at WCFL in 1967 |
Chicago was big. New York was bigger.
Chapter 4 - New York |
