93 KHJ: THE BOSS IS BOSS
By Dave Andrews and Jim Hilliker
Additional source material: Bobby Ocean, Don Barrett, Richard Wagoner. YouTube video uploaded by thebig93
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Some Top-40 stations come and go. Others, like KIIS FM, come and stay.
Then there are those who become the stuff of legend. One such station was
KHJ, a top-40 outlet at 930 on the AM dial. From a year after the birth
of Beatlemania to a month before the death of John Lennon, KHJ
brought Southern California the latest and greatest hit tunes.
KHJ was one of the oldest stations in the Los Angeles market, having made its first test broadcast April 11, 1922. The station was dedicated two days later. In 1922, all stations in the new 'broadcasting' service shared the same frequency/wavelength, 833 kilocycles or 360 meters. (Imagine, being told you can
only be on the air for half an hour or an hour, since the next station has to get its turn on the air!) About 15-25 stations in L.A. all took turns going on and off the air on 360 meters.
In November of that year, KHJ became a "Class B" station, increasing power from 50 watts to 500 watts and moving to the prestigious Class B frequency of 400 meters, or 750 kilocycles. (KFI would do the same in January of 1923.)
During 1923 and 1924, the AM broadcast band finally expanded from 833 and 750 kc, and stretched from 550-1350 and later to 1500 kilocycles.
KHJ was shifted around a lot by the Dept. of Commerce, and (after 1927) by the new Federal Radio Commission:
Purchased by Cadillac dealer Don Lee in 1926, the station was moved up to its present 930 frequency in March 1941, when the AM band expanded from 1500-1600 kc.
An FM outlet, K45LA, was also launched that year.
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During its top-40 days KHJ was owned by RKO General, which also owned KHJ-TV channel 9 in Los Angeles.
93 KHJ "Boss Radio" became a hit music station in May 1965. For about three years its competition was its neighbor on the dial, long-time hit station KFWB "channel 98". In March 1968, KFWB threw in the towel and switched to an all-news format. Boss Radio was king. The station's DJ roster read almost like an all-star list, with the likes of such talent as Charlie Tuna, Johnny Williams, Machine Gun Kelly, Billy Pearl, Bobby Tripp, Mark Elliott, Bill Wade, Robert W. Morgan, Bobby Ocean, Humble Harve, Jerry Butler and Sam Riddle. (In the sixties, Riddle also hosted a TV show called Groovy Game on Channel 9.) The Real Don Steele, already experienced on several stations around the country, became a legend on KHJ, and his fast-paced, quick-witted style was the inspiration for jocks of many years to come. |
Check out some KHJ Top 30 surveys here
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Perennial morning man Charlie Van Dyke cut his own 45-rpm record that actually made it to the station's top 30 list in the summer of 1976: The Flag, a spoken word piece backed by patriotic music, which celebrated our nation's symbol. In the mid seventies KHJ hired its first female DJ, a lady who went by the single name of Shana. A second female DJ, Sally Adams, came aboard in 1977.
Once in a while they'd poke fun at other rock stations. One day, as the
song Fame was ending, the DJ came on and did an uncanny impression
of a KLOS jock saying "Alright, a little David Bowie there...." then, switching
back to his regular voice asked, "What's the matter with these FM DJs? They
think they're gonna wake somebody up?" They'd also occasionally poke fun at
their own personalities. A DJ once said that KHJ was the place where "when
Charlie Van Dyke cuts himself shaving in the morning, he bleeds coffee."
KHJ once had a contest where if you counted the number
of times Ringo Starr's hits were played one weekend and were the first one
to the station with the correct answer, you won dinner for two with Ringo.
Another time, a message by Elton John was scrambled and the first person to
correctly decode it won something really big.
During the mid-seventies, Los Angeles had the good fortune of being graced
with the KHJ Coca-Cola Concert Caravan, a series of summer concerts at
random shopping mall parking lots around the southland. Spanky & Our Gang played
Del Amo Fashion Square. Laurel Plaza hosted The Hudson Brothers. Early '70s
stars Rare Earth and King Harvest jammed at a mall in Montebello. Novelty act
Larry Groce (Junk Food Junkie) co-starred with Pratt & McClain
(Happy Days theme) at Northridge Fashion Square. The Ramones were scheduled
to play a parking lot in 1977, but got pulled at the last minute and replaced
by Stephen Bishop. And a shopping mall in Costa Mesa greeted big time act
England Dan & John Ford Coley. All these concerts were free, along with
all the Coca-Cola you could drink.
With the rise of FM top-40 initiated by KIQQ in 1973 (and continued by other
stations as time went on), KHJ's ratings began a slow downturn. Serious AM competition came around Christmas 1976 when KTNQ signed on
just up the dial with its "anything goes" top-40 format. This proved to be
a wake-up call for KHJ. They expanded their music selection
slightly, but except for Black Betty by Ram Jam, their wider playlist
went in a different direction than Ten-Q. Aiming to attract older listeners,
they added a few album cuts like Bob Seger's Main Street and The
Eagles' Life In The Fast Lane, and even played some tunes more suited
for FM AOR, like Led Zeppelin's Kashmir (uncut!) and Emerson, Lake &
Palmer's From The Beginning.
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In May 1977 their top-40 charts became eight-page foldouts featuring song
lyrics on one page, concert and giveaway information on a couple of others,
and in-depth information on any given artist. These deluxe foldouts were
too expensive to produce for very long, and in 1978 they went back to their
single-sheet top 30 charts. Later, they created "KHJ Sun Stickers" for your bumper or windshield.|
Signs that the station was in trouble became noticeable in the summer of 1980 when the two biggest songs of the
year failed to make the KHJ playlist: Queen's Another One Bites The Dust
and Devo's Whip It. A number three song, Together (by the group
Tierra) also got snubbed, as did Bette Midler's ballad The Rose.
At 9 PM on November 7, 1980, KHJ switched over to a country music format.
Competing with the likes of upstart KZLA and top-rated KLAC, it lasted barely
two and a half years.
In April 1983 they switched back to a top-40 style format, declaring on
the air that "The Boss Is BACK", and even invited listeners to tune in KFI
or KRLA and decide for themselves. At first they
seldom played anything that came out after 1980, and added older songs
they'd previously passed over like Bruce Springsteen's Born To Run,
Meat Loaf's Two Out Of Three Ain't Bad, and Ambrosia's Holding On
To Yesterday.
Newer songs crept in as time passed. In 1984 the station
advertised itself as Car Radio 93 KHJ, with traffic reports every ten minutes
in addition to their music mix. (Its sister station in San Francisco, 610
KFRC, promoted "Car Tunes" at about the same time.)
On January 31, 1986, KHJ abandoned its classic call letters and adopted those
of its FM outlet KRTH. They began playing "Smokin' Oldies -- from the first
ten years of rock 'n' roll" and the air was filled with the likes of
Elvis Presley and Bobby Darin. This format lasted until the late 1980s,
when they became a simulcast of KRTH-FM. Ironically, they had been sold and
the format dropped just before receiving news of their best ratings book ever.
In the early '90s they went Spanish, changing their call sign to KKHJ. The
station was "Radio Noticias" with an all-Spanish news format, and then "La Ranchera".
In one of the best legal moves in recent history, the argument was made (successfully) that the calls "KKHJ" could not be said in Spanish over the air as the "KK" pronunciation would amount to an obscenity. (The calls had been broadcast in English.) This led to the return, on March 15, 2000, of the wonderful heritage calls we all know and love -- and were again said in English at the top of every hour -- KHJ!
In 2014, KHJ was sold to Immaculate Heart Radio and is once again in English with Catholic programming.
WHERE ARE THEY NOW?:
After KHJ went country, PD Chuck Martin went over to KWST. When he took off for sick leave, they replaced him with John Sebastian, who thought the K-WEST calls meant nothing. So he dropped them and launched magic 106. Most of the KHJ staff from 1980 went to K-WEST in 1981. In 1982, Martin began a six-year teaching stint at Chapman University. He now owns an ad agency and a production/recording studio in Orange County.
Sadly, The Real Don Steele
passed away August 7, 1997 at age 61. There are numerous tributes dedicated
to him on the web. Bill Drake, 71, succumbed to lung cancer on November 30, 2008 (info found at radioinsight.com).
THE LEGACY CONTINUES?: A talk station in the high desert, 1380 KHJJ, promotes
itself as "KHJ". There is an FM station in Canada with the call letters CKHJ,
at 93.1.
KHJ #1 Songs 1965-80 (partial listing)
On December 31, 1976 at 5 PM, KHJ began their countdown of the year's top 93 songs.
The countdown was repeated at midnight. Preserved here in Real Audio is the ending of the
#1 song of the year, followed immediately by the KHJ legal ID and the introduction to
"Countdown '76", with a wonderful recap of the year's highlights as only KHJ could tell
it!
KHJ Lineups (Rock Radio Scrapbook)
The Real Don Steele Remembered
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