last link on the left

They say a wound gets worse when treated with neglect. The same might have been said of Corus Entertainment station CHQT - Cool 880.

But since late summer of 2007 some creative changes have been prescribed for the ratings-challenged frequency. A new contest launched early in December was another sign Corus has not given up all hope for a station that has a near-heritage legacy.

First, a little history ...

CHQT signed on with a "Strictly On The QT" ad campaign on August 19th, 1965 under the ownership of Lewis R. Roskin (Uncle Lew as he was called by staff exclusive of his presence) and business and radio man Murray D. (Curly) Dyck. Shadow financing was provided by Dr. Charles A. Allard and Zane Feldman.

Allard and Feldman were also the original owners of the World Hockey Association's Alberta Oilers, later the NHL's Edmonton Oilers. The pair eventually sold the team to Nelson Skalbania, who in turn lost the team (and Wayne Gretzky's contract) to Peter Pocklington during a card game. In 1974 Allard launched CITV, now Global Edmonton. Feldman presided over the construction of Northlands Coliseum, since renamed Skyreach Centre and Rexall Place. He also operated the city's long-gone Beachcomber restaurant for many years.

The CRTC granted QT their licence with expectation that it delivered news in depth with good quality music and limited commercial interruption.

QT initally operated at 1110 kHz with a power of 10,000 watts day and night (directional at night). The frequency was plagued with transmission problems: poor ground conductivity at the tower site, and the station's night pattern (to protect KFAB in Omaha, Nebraska) meant listeners south of Edmonton lost access to the station's easy listening fare during evening hours.

Playing "Beautiful Music" – with a paused syllable emphasis on "Beaut" – the station was known for playing high-class elevator Muzak. The sales department sold the station's well-heeled demographic as "The Market That Matters." The station later introduced a "Sounds Familiar" format – also known as "Your favourite songs performed by people you've never heard of."

Personalities on the station during its glory days included such morning men as Stu Melby, Irv Shore, Bob Bradburn, as well as such other on-air personalities as George Gillespie (always popular with the ladies), Bob Hill, Garry Gaudet, Don Andrews, Lorne King, Larry Ross, Bobby Ng and Glen Corness. Corness, later calling himself Robert, was television station CITV's bumper and image voice during the 1980s (and the voice that introduced episodes of SCTV – "Don't touch that dial ...").

Program director during the early days was Roger Charest, who later co-founded the OK Radio Group (CJOK-AM Fort McMurray, CIOK-AM St. Paul and CFOK-AM) with Stu Morton. Charest eventually moved on to head CKER and CHDI The Bounce.

In the newsroom were Hugh Tadman (later a school trustee and an assistant deputy minister with Alberta Community Development) along with brothers Peter (later an author and Alberta Solicitor General spokesman) and Stephen, Len Grant, Johnny Bohonos (also known sometimes as John B. Kennedy), Murray Blakely, Ron Dyck, Bryan Hall, Gordon "Extreme Combover" Ross, Jerry Peters, Dwight Ford, David Hankinson, David Hankinson, Matt Hawkins and new-guy Ed Mason.

On the sales side, clients would remember Doug Shillington and Gerry Gerling, while the technical end of the station was capably looked after by engineer Frank Makepeace.

For most of its easy-listening heyday, the station operated from the second floor at 10154 103 Street – a former pool hall whose history could be smelled oozing out of its walls on hot summer days. The station later moved to the twenty-second floor of the many-named building at the southwest corner of 103rd Street and Jasper Avenue.

In 1985 CHQT got approval to slide down the dial to 880 khz. Additional interference from newly-minted St. Albert outlet CKST 1070 finally warranted the move. CKST later morphed into CHMG 1200, and through several ownership changes became CFMG FM operating at 104.9 mhz. Recently operated as a Standard Broadcasting outlet, EZ Rock 104.9 fell under the Astral Media umbrella in 2007.

CHQT itself underwent numerous ownership changes, having been sold to Monarch Broadcasting Ltd. in 1990, and later to Shaw Radio Ltd. in 1993. QT then moved into a former warehouse on 102nd Street north of 105th Avenue with its new sister station CISN-FM, the station former CHED Good Guy Bob McCord founded.

In 1999 Shaw Communications spun off its radio division to a new entity called Corus Radio Company. It was then that fellow Corus station CHED inherited CHQT's long-established newsroom (QT billed itself as "Alberta's Major News Station"), watched over by the now veteran Ed Mason. It's been said that Daryl Hooke, then CHED's prgram director, loved the merger so they could kill QT news and have it all to themselves.

Under Corus, the CHQT property suffered a series of format changes, flipping in 2001 from Familiar Favourites "AM-880-CHQT" to Cool-880 "Good Times and Great Oldies." In late October 2003, CHQT Cool 880 became JOE AM, playing a variety of music from the 80s 70s and 60s. In early 2004 CHQT returned to Oldies Cool 880 and the JOE format was moved to sister station CKNG-FM. It has long been thought the short-lived JOE imprint on CHQT was to prevent the moniker from being adopted by rival-to-Corus stations.

CHQT never recovered from the changes. Boasting a solid 7.3 ratings share as recently as Fall 2001, it fell to a station-low of 2.1 in the Early Summer 2007 book.

In September 2007 CHQT started fashioning itself into "Boss Radio," a format popular in the sixties when Top 40 was king of the airwaves (for more about the style visit the Wikipedia entries for Boss Radio and Bill Drake, the format's creator).

With CHED evening talk show host Lesley Primeau now installed as QT's music director (she was heard all over the Corus building shouting "Anybody got some old CDs?"), one of the Boss Radio elements the station tried to replicate was "20/20 News" (twenty minutes before and after the hour) which allows Bob Layton and Ed Mason to shoehorn newscasts inbetween their duties down the hall at CHED.

However, Bob and Ed's attempt at capturing the 20/20 News sound (listen here – courtesy of RadioWest.ca) pales to what the guys at CKLW did to news in the late sixties/early seventies (listen here – courtesy of Rock Radio Scrapbook). For more about the legend of The Big 8 - CKLW, visit this Wikipedia entry or view an excerpt of the DVD "CKLW - Radio Revolution" at Youtube.

It has been heard that Primeau is trying to lure some high calibre talent, in the form of Jungle Jay Hamilton and Ryan Watters, back to Edmonton's airwaves.

Hamilton recently filled in for Chuck Chandler when the former-disco king was off for knee surgery. He previously worked at CHED and CKNG - Power 92 back in the nineties. Possibly joining him is current Corus salesman Watters who held down stints at JOE FM, and at various permutations of 96X and Mix 96.

CHQT also re-jigged its entire schedule and remained one of the last AM stations in Edmonton to broadcast in stereo (something cable FM fans at 93.5 mHz have appreciated for years). Also added was a "Hear the album cuts" tagline with the station now playing non-singles.

With nearly zero promotion dollars in the Corus budget, the little station that once was launched a contest in December 2007 inviting radio wannabes to host their own hour-long show (albeit buried in the ratings cume nadir of Sundays between 8 and 9 pm).

Titled So You Want To Be A BOSS jock? , opportunity was extended to closet legends in their own living rooms and High Fidelity types to have a say in the music CHQT plays.

Time will tell who signs up. But in a era when radio is crying out for personality, the CHQT cattle call might provide the perfect stepping stone to fame for the next best-looking guy or gal you'll ever hear, hosts with the most pumping out pounds of sound with their stacks of wax while delighting listeners with their platter chatter.

But in the bigger corporate picture, it might all be for nought should Corus sniff competition on the news horizon. A late fall 2007 CRTC call for applications might bring an all-news station rival to fellow Corus station 630 CHED.

CHED station manager and Corus VP Doug Rutherford has gone on record telling his troops the broadcaster would "defend their turf" and turn Cool 880 into a news operation.

For fans of BOSS radio as it once was, it is hoped the grassroots interest the "So You Want To Be A BOSS jock" contest might generate will be enough to reward the station with better ratings numbers – and a better chance of survival in the heated Edmonton radio market.

Update: On March 14th, 2008 Corus announced that Cool 880 would flip to all news in May 2008.

Update: On March 21st, 2008 Gord Robson was found dead at the age of 56. His body was discovered in his apartment by members of the Edmonton Police Service – see Gord Robson (1951 - 2008).

radio - edmonton radio news 2007 - so you want to be a BOSS radio station?