WFAN ("the FAN", the NYMets radio station)

[George Thompson]

My previous adventure into Mets Land was in early July, when I caught the broadcasters passing the time during a rain delay.  It was about the time of the 25th (?) anniversary of the conversion of an earlier station with different call letters and a different format to WFAN, a 24 hour sports talk station.  One of the broadcasters had in fact been with the earlier station, recalling having participated in the mournful get-together of the broadcasters laid off from the old station, then walking down the hall to join the celebration of the broadcasters hired by "the FAN".

His recollections of the earliest months of the FAN was that it achieved direction and acceptance among NYC listeners when it made it a policy that all its on-air moderators should be from NYC.  (Presumably this involved firing some of the celebrants of a few months before.)  The new policy was based on the thought that when NYC sports fans heard NYC accents they would accept that this moderator understood their fanaticism for their local teams.

Those of you who come unglued when you hear an interesting regional accent ought to check it out.  I suppose that the broadcasts, except for the game broadcasts, are to be heard through the web.

GAT

George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African
Theatre", Northwestern Univ. Pr., 1998.

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