CLARION, Pa. (EYT) — With the sale of Clarion radio stations C-93, WWCH AM, and GOAT FM 94.1 to Seven Mountains Media under review by the Federal Communications Commission, owner Bill Hearst offered some background on the decision to sell and on the history of the stations.
(Pictured above: owner Bill Hearst (seated) with employees DJ Jesse Ferris, Business Manager Maleigha Wright, and Haven LeFay. Not pictured are DJ Espo Wilcox, Wayne Brosius, and part-time announcer Sierra Brown.)
“The new owners met with the employees last week and announced they are planning to hire the current employees,” Hearst said. “The deal I made with Seven Mountains appealed to me because they want to keep the station local, they wanted to hire my employees, and they wanted to buy the building. I wanted to get rid of everything, sell everything, and retire.
“They want to maintain the local identity at the station. That’s why they want to keep the employees and keep the building. They just want to make sure that people realize that the station’s still part of Clarion, a local station.”
“I’m not sure what changes they’re going to make. I have no idea.”
The sale terms were missing from the Federal Communications Commission FCC filing, but the Clarion stations will join Seven Mountains’ 101.3 WKFT Strattanville in serving the Clarion area. WKFT simulcasts “Bigfoot Country” 102.1 WIFT DuBois.
Seven Mountains Media has a variety of stations and formats in State College, Lewistown, Wellsboro, DuBois, Selinsgrove, Olean NY, Elmira NY, York, Stroudsburg, and Wilkes-Barre. Seven Mountains Media is also in the process of acquiring 34 radio stations from Forever Media, including stations in Johnstown, Altoona, and State College.
C-93 FM has a hot adult contemporary format and WWCH offers classic country.
“WWCH 1300 and the GOAT 94.1 are the same thing,” Hearst explained.
Local perspective
A local perspective was always part of the Clarion Broadcasting approach, starting with Bill’s father, William Curtis Hearst, who had extensive experience with newspapers as an owner.
In 1941, W.C. Hearst became publisher of the Clarion Republican, and in 1948, he became publisher of the Clarion Democrat.
In 1965, the Clarion Republican and the Clarion Democrat were purchased from W.C. Hearst by Western Pennsylvania Newspaper Company (The Derrick) and Homer L. Watson was named publisher. The papers were combined and renamed the Clarion News.
Nevertheless, W.C. Hearst decided to venture into radio on June 12, 1960, when he and his wife Harriet and partners Bill Sheridan and Henry Troese purchased and launched WWCH, the first AM radio station in Clarion County.
The call letters WWCH included the initials of Hearst. The station was located above the former Garby Movie theater on Main Street in Clarion.
It was still there when their son Bill Hearst started working with his dad in 1978 after he graduated from Mansfield State College.
High points
“A couple of high points I had in my career were working with my dad when I was just out of school,” Hearst continued. “Another high point came four years ago when my daughter Kristan Hearst came back from Colorado with fiancé, Espo Wilcox, to help at the station. I thank both of them, and we had a lot of fun working together. They decided they weren’t interested in continuing family ownership at the station and formed the PA Mushroom Company.
“I also thank my wife Chris for putting up all the years and all the late nights, live broadcasts, and going to the transmitter at midnight to try to fix it. There was a lot of constant stuff that you have to do and things breaking and needed to be fixed.”
The station next moved from the Garby to a house on Wood Street where Bill also had an apartment above a garage at the rear of the lot. WWCH was joined by an FM sister station, WRRC (C-93) in 1985.
The stations moved to their current location in Clarion Township in 1994.
“We have a lot more room for satellite dishes and antenna out back. Over the years, we’ve made improvements in the building and continually upgraded equipment, but I think we have also expanded community involvement through the station’s broadcasts.”
Other improvements included sports coverage over the years.
“We broadcasted high school sports and still do high school sports. We followed a lot of teams all the way to Hershey Park for the championship games. I think I trained a lot of sports people over the years, too. Some of them are still doing sports in the area, but they worked here first.”
“We have had some long-term shows like Trading Post, the I.C. Mass at 8:30, and the Protestant services at 11 a.m. So, that’s something we do in the community.”
Bill explained that the station has broadcasted at the Clarion County Fair and helped different community groups through their remote broadcasts.
“Over the years, I’ve trained a lot of my employees through the internship program with Clarion University. Some of those employees went on to some big broadcasting jobs: Larry Richert at KDKA and Tim DeBacco from East Brady who was the Pittsburgh Pirate PA announcer.
“I had some other people that went on to work with ad agencies and major radio stations.”
Internships and training programs are still part of the station, including Haven LeFay participating in the Career Links career youth training program.
What are you going to miss the most?
“I think I’m going to miss most is coming here and being busy all day long and going home at night and thinking about stuff I have to do. I may miss the business of all the things we do here like news stories, commercials, and on-air promotions.
“I did a lot of community service and public service announcements and liked helping at community events. But, here in Clarion, you can volunteer for all kinds of things.”
Like other small businesses, Hearst admits that it’s harder to find people who really want to work following the pandemic.
“I don’t know why (people) don’t want to come out here and work with me. It’s super fun; why wouldn’t they want to come out and work at a radio station?! But, it’s been hard to find people that want work.
“During the pandemic, when I came to work every day, I had a great pandemic. I was working every day. It was super busy. I would drive to work, and I was the only car on the road there for a while. I kind of enjoyed the pandemic, actually.
“I didn’t have very much money, but I still enjoyed the pandemic. I felt we did a lot for the community during the pandemic. Advertising decreased a little; but, it’s back up now.”
For those entering the broadcasting business, Hearst has some advice.
“I think you just have to work hard at it and kind of live (it) and breathe it. You have to work 60 hours a week and enjoy it. You also have to save as much as you can.”
