Here’s another example of how fast time flies: I realized last night that July 11th is my 35th anniversary working at this company. This day in 1983 was the first day of the Saskatoon Ex and I was advised to wear jeans to work as we were going to spend the afternoon at the Exhibition Grounds, what is now called Prairieland Park. I thought, wow, this is pretty cool. We didn’t wear jeans at the radio station I had been working at in Calgary. We had just one station in 1983, CJWW. The corporate name was Western World Communications. That’s where the two W’s come from in CJWW. The AM frequency that the station occupied was 1370 which didn’t go very far. Driving south I don’t think it lasted much beyond Dundurn. The biggest station at the time was CFQC at 600 on the dial, the frequency CJWW has occupied for the past 20 years. Saskatoon had two other stations in 1983 when the city’s population was about 165,000, CKOM 1250 AM and CFMC, 103.1 FM. There are now seven private commercial stations in Saskatoon along with a community station and the CBC while the city has grown by more than 100,000. The technology in our business had sure evolved in the past 35 years. In 1983 we were still spinning vinyl records on turntables. Not long after we switched to CD players and now everything is in a computer; you won’t find CD or record players anywhere. However, what comes out the other end on the radio in your car, at home, the workplace or wherever still sounds the same. Except some of us are a little older.
That’s Coffeetalk. I’m Vic Dubois.