Sam Delaney had been a radio man his whole life. Station manager, on-air talent, janitor when needed—he had done it all. Now, in his seventies, he sat in the empty control room of what was once a bustling AM station. The place smelled of dust and warm circuitry. The walls hummed with silence.
Sam still knew every button by heart. Especially the one marked EBS—Emergency Broadcast System. Back in the day, the FCC’s rules were clear: tones were sacred. The piercing signal wasn’t just a sound; it was a promise. Tornado warnings. Flood alerts. The nation’s line of defense against panic. There had been rules—Title 47 of the CFR, etched into his memory like scripture.
But things had changed. With each new administration, the guardrails loosened. The equal-time law that once kept political chatter balanced had vanished decades ago. A president erased it. He feared his old Hollywood reels would force TV stations to give airtime to his critics. One law changed, and suddenly the airwaves were open territory—bluster, bias, and one-sided noise pumping into homes unchallenged.
Now Sam watched as networks ran those same tones he once revered, but not for weather or disaster. They tested loyalty. They triggered crowds into a frenzy. They commanded obedience in ways he never imagined. Once, tones meant safety. Now, they meant control.
He rubbed the crease in his neck where headphones had rested for thirty years. Outside, the town he had called home was no longer united. Neighbors didn’t trust neighbors. Families split along the fault lines of which voice on the radio they listened to.
Sam leaned into the old microphone. The ON AIR light flickered.
“What if I told you,”
He began. His voice was gravel but steady.
“The lie isn’t in what you’re hearing. It’s in what you stopped questioning.”
He paused, finger hovering over the tone button.
For the first time in his career, he considered sending out a tone. This was not to warn people of a storm but to warn them of themselves.
I came across this news report and was genuinely impressed by its craftsmanship. The reporter doesn’t just tell the story. They show it. They use actuality reporting and a wraparound technique that gives the piece depth and authenticity. It’s the type of journalism that doesn’t just inform—it immerses you. This level of storytelling should be seen and appreciated by more people.
Happy Thanksgiving, And Wishes For Bright Holidays, Wherever You May Be!
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Joseph Noyes “J.J.” Jeffrey, a renowned DJ who became a respected station owner, passed away at the age of 84 following a brief battle with cancer. A native of Portland, ME, Jeffrey began his broadcasting career in his home state in the 1950s. His early career included stints at various local stations, where he honed his signature high-energy style and developed a deep passion for Top 40 radio.
Jeffrey’s career took off when he became the afternoon host at WRKO Boston, one of the nation’s premier Top 40 stations. His success in Boston led to similar roles at two of the biggest Top 40 powerhouses of the time: WFIL in Philadelphia and WLS in Chicago. Known for his vibrant personality and memorable catchphrases, Jeffrey quickly became a household name in each of these markets.
In 1975, Jeffrey transitioned from behind the mic to station ownership, partnering with Bob Fuller to launch Fuller-Jeffrey Broadcasting. Their first acquisition was 102.9 WBLM in Lewiston/Portland, ME. Over the next two decades, the company expanded its reach, owning clusters of stations across the country, including in Modesto, Sacramento, Santa Cruz, Santa Rosa, CA, and Des Moines, IA. Fuller-Jeffrey Broadcasting’s portfolio was sold to Citadel in 1999, forming what is now largely Townsquare Media’s clusters in Portland and Portsmouth, NH.
Not one to rest, Jeffrey and Fuller immediately launched Atlantic Coast Radio, building another prominent radio group in Portland, ME. Their stations included the Sports format “WEEI” on 95.5 WPPI Topsham and 95.9 WPEI Saco, “The Big Jab” 96.3 WJJB-FM Gray, and Conservative Talk 1310 WLOB.
J.J. Jeffrey will be remembered for his contributions to the radio industry, both as a beloved on-air talent and as a visionary station owner. He leaves behind a legacy of passion, innovation, and an enduring impact on the world of broadcasting.
The sky was cloudy to the southwest, and humidity had been building since the morning. Many had yet to pay attention to weather patterns forming in the Oklahoma and Texas Panhandles, particularly dew points that were above average. Everything was out of balance. No one was paying attention except for one News Director at a small community radio station in the Oklahoma Panhandle community of Guymon. That news director was me, Benjamin Groff II (JR), and our role in providing live coverage of severe weather events was crucial.
It had been a busy day for the news department at KKBS 92.7FM. The Oklahoma Secretary of State had been in town attending Civic functions, plus a rape trial at the Texas County Court House was underway, and the suspect had been a topic that brought turmoil in the community for his alleged sexual abuse of a child. There was also an ax murder victim discovered in a dirt cellar in Steven’s County, Kansas, and the Hugoton Court House was buzzing with activity as the sheriff there had a suspect in custody.
The KKBS broadcast signal reached a five-state region, covering the Oklahoma Panhandle, the Northern Texas Panhandle, Southwest Kansas, Southeast counties of Colorado, and Northeast New Mexico. An anomaly in broadcasting also allowed the station’s signal to get received on radios and listened to by residents of Vernal, Utah. Listeners from the area would call the station often with their weather conditions and share local news to be part of the radio station’s mix. Our commitment to serving the community was unwavering, and we valued every listener’s contribution.
In Perryton, Texas, to the southeast of Guymon, a city of less than 7500 souls, the area mainly consisted of farmers and ranchers. KKBS radio station also reached Spearman, Gruver, Stratford, and Dalhart, Texas. In each community, the station, under my direction, established contacts and points of communication to use during news events. The same situation existed in southwest Kansas from Elkhart, Dalhart, Liberal, Hugoton, Johnson City, and Ulysses.
The radio station studio on the north side of Guymon is a one-story building set behind a hill on one side. The broadcast tower is near the city center. It was on the same tower as most emergency services and, thus, on an emergency roster for being tended to promptly during power outages. Our studios were placed on priority through a demand I had made to the power company after I explained that we broadcast to every community in five states and were rebroadcast through each cable carrier of every community. We need to get back on the air to broadcast emergency notices to the people as soon as possible. I did not realize I made such an impact that the power company initiated a person to guarantee our station downtime was as minimal as sixty seconds or less. It was good that it happened.
As the day continued, I stepped outside and felt the air. I had felt the conditions before. It had been in my hometown 12 years earlier when a storm ripped through the area and tore the hell out of the county, killing a lifetime resident of the town and his wife as they were hunkered down in their cellar. Being a retired police officer, I had a sixth sense, which led me to believe we were in store for something more. I felt it. There were times I sit in the newsroom on an afternoon on a slow day and think out loud, saying this feels like a plane crash day, and low and behold, we would be breaking a plane crash somewhere in the valley later. It was the same way this day, and I began planning for it.
I asked our sales team to be on call and ready to return to the station within ten minutes of getting my call, not to ask questions, get in their car, and come. They would answer calls and send me information about storm coverage. They should send their families to storm cellars, and they would be OK with us; the hill protects the station. I asked our evening staff to get ready to rock and roll so that it would be different from business as usual. I was going to be interrupting their shows, and we would be going live with actual news actualities from the field, raw broadcast, and they needed to get prepared for raw emotions to get heard. When it happened, they were not. But maybe they were more than they would have been.
Shortly before 4 PM, I noticed on an antiquated system that there was a massive hail storm in north Texas Panhandle County near Gruver, Texas; I called the Gruver Texas City Manager from the newsroom. I always contacted people in a way that allowed me to quickly air with them regardless of what was happening; in this case, it was gold. I asked him if he was getting hail. He said he was and was trying to drive west out of town; I buzzed the main studio to get ready to go live at any moment with breaking news, and suddenly AJ, the city manager, said
OH MY GOD, BEN, THERE IS A TORNADO ON THE GROUND WEST OF GRUVER, TEXAS, AND IT IS MOVING NORTH…
I flashed the hand signal and said go live; use the weather signal…
Stacy was on the board and broke into music with a particular news weather bulletin where I came on and issued a “KKBS TORNADO WARNING” and had the city manager describe what he was seeing. After the conversation, I returned and said that the National Weather Service has yet to issue a Tornado Warning, and we are in contact with them trying to get them to notice the storm.
A small radio station in the Oklahoma Panhandle doesn’t carry much weight with the National Weather Service, and they should have paid more attention to what we were trying to explain to them or the fact that we had an actual sighting by a city manager. We contacted the Channel4 Meteorologist who used to offer services to our station and explained to him what we were seeing, and he said he would turn his radar toward us and take a look; as he did, he said,
Map-Radar Image is for reference purpose only not actual radar screen used.
Holy Moly! That looks like a hook echo! Has the National Weather Service put out anything on this yet?
I explained to him our frustration with the weather people, and he said look, I am going live and putting my warning out, I told him we had already put ours out. He said
Thank GOD. I hope people are listening!
The Local Civil Defense and the owner of the other radio station in Guymon were listening, and they were severely upset that we were putting out a weather warning without their authorization. They even entered their radio station (one I once worked at KGYN) and denied on air there was any chance of severe weather today, saying the other stations were nuts. The Civil Defense Director went as far as to call our station owner and threaten her with an FCC violation complaint. She called me and asked what type of warning I issued. I explained that I issued a KKBS weather warning and a KKBS tornado warning, confirmed by a city manager talking to us live on the air from Gruver, Texas. She smiled and said issue some more.
I continued broadcasting the weather warnings and hear the disgusting remarks on the police radio frequencies from the civil defense director and his people over our decision to warn people about the threat of undesirable weather moving into the region. What is more, the storm producing the tornado was now moving into an area referred to as Hitchland, an agriculture-based community and ranching area. As we were broadcasting, our friend from the television station called and told me he had confirmation that a tornado was on the ground. We then broke into our programming and broadcast that a tornado had hit the area, and there were casualties. As we did, we began to get phone calls about fatalities in the area. As we tracked this storm, we warned the Beaver County, Oklahoma communities that they would be in the track of the storm-producing tornados.
The dry line producing these storms was like a whiplash effect; it produced storms in front and behind its path. Another line of storms formed twenty miles west of Guymon, stretching from Guymon to Elkhart to Johnson City, Kansas. It was a night of stress and high excitement for those who enjoy broadcasting under pressure.
During one segment of events, the bank that the radio station shared the building with was hosting Claudette Henry, the Oklahoma Secretary of State, at a reception that evening; while I was broadcasting live during one of the live storm updates, I saw Ms. Henry walk past the newsroom. I quickly wrapped up, stretched my headphones cord to the door, and shouted.
“Is that Claudette?”
She responded
“It Sure Is”
In my best Oklahoma demeanor
“I get you to do a live interview with me quickly?”
Claudette said,
“Let’s go for it!”
The interview consisted of talking about how she can’t fly out of Guymon until our radio station gives the all-clear and mentioning how everyone in five states is listening to you guys. She said she was impressed with the quality of coverage we provided; she didn’t expect to see it in Guymon.
My station’s owner was sitting in the basement at her beauty shop, listening to the radio and receiving phone calls on her cell phone. She was one of the few people in town at the time who had a cell phone, and everyone called her on it. On this night, it was to thank her for providing a station with such a spectacular news team.
It have been better news for everyone. The operations manager had called the station manager a bitch during a sporting broadcast, and then failing to join in the weather broadcast appeared to have ended their relationship. The next day, she dismissed him from his duties and placed them upon me and his salary. A few years later, she added the sales manager responsibilities to my duties. A few years later, I accepted a position in Cheyenne, Wyoming.
It was the 1990s and anything goes was a leftover motto from the 80s!
For all anyone knew, it was just another day. The sun was rising and appeared to be sunny, with average temperatures warming to 75 degrees by midafternoon, with a light wind from the south. That was the weather forecast everyone heard to start the day, as it echoed from speakers in the downtown square broadcasting from the local radio station KBAD. Topping the news from KBAD included a report concerning a house fire, two auto accidents, and a lost dog report. The station did not broadcast national news because the management felt it included more divisive material for the community and the station’s audience. KBAD’s motto promoted the station and its fans as * Kindhearted * Brilliant * Ambitious and * Devoted! It had a unique frequency on the AM Dial at 1000.0khz AM and 100.0mhz FM. The frequency identifier permitted those who wish to find it an easy way to remember its location on the radio dial. Operating by remote control authorization from the Federal Communications Commission, KBAD’s radio tower stood in two separate locations. The FM Broadcast Transmitter and Antenna broadcast on the same tower as many of the local television stations’ antenna services towers near the edge of town. The AM Broadcast Transmitter was with three directional towers west of the city on a hill that permitted the station to fluctuate power between sunrise – sunset – sunrise hours. The AM station reduced power during the daytime, and the signal with increased power would reach a different area than at night. The night signal could reach several states.
The day was unfolding as usual, with one of our regular radio programs in full swing. Suddenly, in the midst of a phone-in segment, a caller made a startling revelation –––
“Do you people know that there is a guy hanging from your radio tower west of town? He is just dangling there.”
The Host was surprised by the caller comment and replied
Sir, this is a live show. Please, this is not a time for pranks.
The caller shot back. – The caller’s voice was urgent, his words cutting through the airwaves.
‘This is not a joke,’ he insisted. ‘There’s a man, about three-fourths of the way up your middle tower, hanging upside down. You need to get him help.’
The Host, with urgency in his voice, told listeners
We take this seriously; our station manager and engineer are coming to the tower, and emergency responders are responding.
The Host then suggested that the caller should have notified 911 before calling the radio station first.
The man hanging upside down had been hired as a contractor to change the red blinking lights once a year to make sure that it met FCC requirements. On his way up, he experienced a fatal heart attack. He was tied off and had his safety gear on, which prevented him from falling when he could not continue climbing or descent. Due to how high he was, a specialized team of climbers had to be dispatched from over three hundred miles away to go to the scene and create a plan to lower him. It took over 24 hours to get the man to the ground safely.
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