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10 Questions with ... Duke Hamilton
March 31, 2019
Have an opinion? Add your comment below. It's been a while since I've been in commercial radio, but one thing I've brought with me from my KROQ and TV days -- that isn't so obvious where public radio is concerned -- is that sense of fun I've always had with the music and listeners. I am filled with stories and goofiness that I can't help but share, but it's always, always, always secondary to the music
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BRIEF CAREER SYNOPSIS:
Hubbard's Country WUBE (B105.1)/Cincinnati kicks off its 50th anniversary celebration this month, and no discussion of the station's history could be complete without a conversation with Duke Hamilton, who has been on the air there for an astonishing 41 of those 50 years. In his time with the station, Hamilton has had stints as its PD, its MD, and hosted nearly every daypart, including mornings, middays and afternoons.
Before joining WUBE on December 5th, 1977, Hamilton had previous radio jobs at KPCR/Bowling Green, KY; KKSS/St. Louis; and KXLR/Little Rock, AR; as well as four years doing what he calls a "command performance for Uncle Sam" in the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service in the Panama Canal zone. Hamilton was inducted into the Country Radio Broadcasters' Hall of Fame in 2003. In 2020, he will celebrate his own 50th anniversary in radio.
1. What factors do you think have contributed to WUBE's longevity in the Country format?
Not only have we been in the same format for 50 years, but the call letters have never changed in that amount of time either, which is kind of interesting. But I think it's been the companies that have owned us, and the people that have worked here, and the people in hiring positions -- General Managers, Program Directors -- who have always recognized good talent, and the talent has always been a primary focus of the station.
A lot of times you'll get new GMs or new PDs, when they come in one of the first things they do is just clean house. I can't ever remember that ever happening here to that degree. There may have been one or two people that got switched around or let go, but never has there been a mass firing or cleaning house at any time in the years that I've been here.
Secondly, I think this station has always had that local connection, even before the days when you had to be more local because of the internet and cell phones, streaming and satellite radio. We've always [been] driven to serve the community, be very visible in the community, and the people on the air have always been true personalities and have always maintained that local connection. Anything local that was going on, we've always been a part of it. So I think that that has contributed the most to the longevity of this station.
2. What makes WUBE so special, in your view?
The people that we have on the air are all very relatable. I think our listeners feel like they are part of our family and we are part of theirs. When we're out at concerts or remotes, it's like, "Hey, haven't seen you in such a long time," and "I heard you the other day saying this." It's just that interaction with people, and that local feel, and family feel, that has made it special over the years.
3. What are the things you hear the most when you go out and interact with listeners and they find out who you are and where you work?
Just due to my longevity, one of the first things is I'll have maybe a young mother with her children in tow come up to me and say, "I remember you being on the radio when I was the age of my kids here," or "I was 7 or 8 years old and my mom and dad used to listen to you on the radio when I was riding in the back seat." It's [about] being here that amount of time and people actually being raised on you throughout the years, from a young child all the way up to the time they had their own kids and they're still listening. That's kind of a neat deal.
About the station itself, [I hear,] "We listen to you guys all the time," and "That's the first thing I turn on the morning," or "It's on whenever I get in the car," or "You guys do a great job." Or they'll tell us about something they heard a jock say on the air. You can tell that they're really into the station and that it's part of their life.
4. What was one of your favorite station events during your years there?
We've done some great promotions over the years. One of the biggest things I recall we did for a number of years was a thing called "Free Day in the Country," where we would book several acts, and it was a listener appreciation-type day. It started early in the morning at one of the riverside parks here in Cincinnati, Coney Island. It was down on the banks of the Ohio River, where Riverbend is these days. We booked some national talent as well as local talent, and it went on all day long into the evening hours. We had some very big national talent over the years on that show, artists like the Bellamy Brothers, Reba McEntire, Janie Fricke, Vince Gill, Restless Heart and Eddie Rabbitt. We tied in sponsors, but it was still a free event. The first one was in September of '77, and it ran up all the way through the late '80s. That was our way of kind of giving back every year to the listeners.
5. What were some of the times when you felt like the station was just really there for the community?
Probably one of the biggest times was in 1997 when we had a very severe flood that not only impacted Cincinnati, but a lot of the smaller towns along the Ohio River. We were doing a lot of outreach as far as getting into these communities, and raising money, and taking supplies and trying to just be on the air with information about where people could go for fresh water and where they could go for supplies.
And then going through some of the times that were really hard times to be on the air, like 9/11 and the space shuttle Challenger disaster, those kinds of times when we really pretty much did away with music on the air and just gave people information.
6. On a funnier note, what are some of the craziest or most memorable things that have ever happened to you on the air?
I remember when I was program director and David Allan Coe was kind of making a comeback. The Columbia rep brought him by the station for an interview with my midday guy, Roy Wakely, and [the rep] says to me, "Just make sure your guy on the air doesn't get into any of the prison talk." Roy introduces him and says, "It's great to have you back here in Cincinnati," and the first thing out of Coe's mouth is, "I like Ohio. I spent a lot of time in prison with people from Ohio." And it just went downhill from there.
7. How about off the air?
For April Fools' Day one year, one of the funniest things I can recall that we did was we promoted the fact that in honor of our anniversary, we were going to have Kenny Rogers on Fountain Square in downtown Cincinnati, and people could come out and have their picture taken with him. Of course, it turned out to be a nasty day. It was windy, and cold, and kind of spitting rain and snow, and this was an outdoor event. Sure enough, a lot of people came and stood out in that kind of weather, and when the time came, the black limo drove around the square a couple of times and everybody's so excited. It pulls up to the square and our morning guy gets out with a cardboard standup of Kenny Rogers.
We stood him up there and people held him because he would have blown away otherwise. There were a few that were honked off about it, but by and large people got that it was an April Fools' joke and still managed to come over and get their picture taken with Kenny Rogers in a cardboard standup.
8. Any memorable on-air interviews that you conducted yourself?
I had one of the very first interviews with Taylor Swift when she came through. That was kind of a big thing. Her mother was with her at the time. This was obviously before she got huge, and we talked and she sat in with me a whole afternoon on the air. I doubt she would do that now.
9. How many physical buildings, owners, GMs and PDs have you had in your 41 years there?
I think the one we are in now is only the third building that I've been in. And not that many GMs and PDs. There were probably seven PD and probably only about five GMs. Owner-wise, oh gosh, that's a tough one. I would say somewhere in the neighborhood of seven or eight owners.
When I came the station was owned by a company called Kaye-Smith, which was Danny Kaye, the actor, and Lester Smith. They sold to a company called American Media. Then we were owned by a company called DKM. I think they were out of Dallas. We were owned by Schering-Plough when Plough Broadcasting had all their stations back in the late '70s/early '80s. Chancellor Broadcasting has owned us, a company called AMFM, which was an offshoot of Chancellor. Then we were owned by Entercom for maybe three months and then we went to CBS for a short time, and then went to Bonneville, which sold us to Hubbard.
The owners always seemed to realize the heritage we had and realized that the reason for that was the people that were on the air. [So] they weren't afraid to put the dollars into talent, and promotion, and contests to keep us where we were ... I've had good people to work for, and people that have always appreciated what I did do and let me do it, so I don't have any of those horror stories where you take a job one day and start looking again the next.
10. Any last thoughts about the station's anniversary, and your own future there?
It's hard to believe that it's been 50 years. There was a lot of great talent that went through, and a lot of them have gone on now or have passed away. But we've kind of just been quietly going about the business of trying to be the best we can be for that amount of time.
For me, as the old timer here now, it's nice to see some of the fresh faces that we've got here and the young talent that are coming up. It's good to see that there are young people that still share that ideal of doing great radio, and wanting to be on the radio and provide that service to the listeners.
In this day and age, with the business being what it is and [radio having] a much smaller piece of the pie than we used to have years ago, there are not as many people that maybe want to get into this business any more because you can't start out making the kind of money that you think you should be making, and it is such a specialized job that you have to take your lumps and work your way up to get your career going and make some decent money. But there still are a lot of young people that want to be on the radio, so that's heartening in the face of the competition that we have now.
I kind of wonder about radio's future. I'm kind of at the end of this thing here compared to some of these younger folks, but I have concerns about where the business is going and how it will be delivered in the future. But [for me,] it's just always been magic. We try play a little theatre of the mind and still do some things on the air that keep our listeners attentive.
People ask if I'm going to retire, but as long as I can drive myself here and talk I might as well keep doing this as long as I can keep bringing something to the table. If I get to a point where I feel like I'm just getting on the air and going through the motions and being more or less of a cue card reader, then I don't want to do this anymore. But if I can get on the air and still relate to the younger audience that we have, still bring to the table some good ideas and some good radio, then yeah, I'll keep doing it.
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