When China blows up every American satellite in space, my trusty AM transistor radio will keep receiving signals.
Most folks under forty years of age have never laid eyes on a transistor radio. My parents bought me a Wilco transistor as a child, and I carried that machine everywhere, like Linus with his blue security blanket. The rotating dial stayed fixed on WHNY 1250, McComb’s premier station for news, sports, and commentary. Sundays offered a dream AM lineup. In 1972, before Sunday breakfast, the sun rose to Paul Harvey, a national broadcaster who shared current news and told oddball stories with surprise endings. He would conclude each unexpected finish to a tale with his famous line, “And now you know the rest of the story.” His deep baritone closed each broadcast with a silent pause followed by the same catch phrase, “Good Day!” I mimicked his voice and developed a passion for public speaking after hearing Harvey spin yarns of mystery, suspense, and American heroes. His radio program warmed up the listeners to local Southern Baptist services where preachers delivered sermons on fire and brimstone which made me tremble with fear. The truth is that those preachers played a significant role in keeping me mostly on the straight and narrow. On Sundays at noon in the fall, I would rush home from church. New Orleans Saints games blared from my tiny speaker and on every key play, static from our kitchen microwave interfered with the audio. The antennae extended about two feet, but I often had to lay sideways on the floor for adequate reception. Numerous times, Archie Manning threw or ran for a touchdown, and I celebrated by performing a wild private dance in my den with the transistor radio in hand.
After the Saints lost each Sunday, and they seemingly lost every single game, WHNY played the current pop hits with Casey Kasem, the famous disc jockey who hosted a Top 40 program. Kasem also provided the Saturday morning animation cartoon voice for Shaggy, my favorite Scooby-Doo character. I fell in puppy love with Olivia Newton-John when she crooned the hit “Please Mr. Please,” begging a cowboy not to play a special love song. My love of music, outside church hymns, began with listening to those songs on my AM radio. On some Sundays, I concluded my evening with a St. Louis Cardinals baseball game and Hall of Fame announcer Jack Buck. Baseball is by far my favorite sport, traced directly to AM radio stations and the colorful play-by-play from talented broadcasters. Mom and Dad caught me more than once standing in front of a mirror with a pretend microphone, imitating a radio voice, a skill that allowed me many opportunities later in life, including courtroom advocacy before juries.
That little electronic box of magic caused occasional mild controversy. My parents complained that the maximum volume fuzz from the radio produced ringing in their ears. They fussed that the radio broadcasts echoed through the house and interfered with their spousal conversations. Simultaneous sounds from my radio and their television often clashed. I have no doubt Mom and Dad second-guessed their decision to give that machine to me. I did not care. I treasured my transistor radio.
WHNY is gone, their license canceled, and the building destroyed. AM radio listeners around the country today are in steep decline. Many new cars do not offer AM radio. Good luck finding a transistor radio in a store. But, one day, some Russian hacker will freeze all radio signals except amplitude modulation (AM), leaving my tiny transistor radio as the last defense and lone beacon of hope for long distance communication. When that happens, I will hug my transistor tight and sing the words of Bruce Springsteen in his hit, “Radio Nowhere.” “This is radio nowhere. Is there anybody alive out there?”
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Clark Hicks is a lawyer who lives in Hattiesburg. His email is clark@hicksattorneys.com.
