Sunday, January 29, 2012

Radio Board Game - WBT

I first read about this radio-themed board game dating from the 1920s over at Jose Fritz's excellent Arcane Radio Trivia blog. Two to four players each start at a different "Tune In" station in the northern part of their time zone and try to be the first to get to the "Sign Off" station which is WFAA in Dallas, Texas...although it appears way south of Dallas on the map. Click it to enlarge. The blue routes are shorter but filled with danger (Static! Antenna Down! Poor Reception!) and the red routes are longer but easier going.
Of the 40 stations shown on the board, 12 still exist on the AM dial with the same call letters. (Two others--KFJM-Grand Forks, North Dakota and KFKX-Hastings, Nebraska are now on FM instead of AM. KOB in Albuquerque, New Mexico is still around too although their calls are now KKOB.) I have stickers from 10 of the 12:

KLZ - Denver, Colorado
WOI - Ames, Iowa
WKY - Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
WWJ - Detroit, Michigan
WTAM - Cleveland, Ohio
WHAS - Louisville, Kentucky
KDKA - Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
WBZ - Boston, Massachusetts
WDAE - Tampa, Florida
and
WBT - Charlotte, North Carolina

1110 AM WBT is a 50,000-watt, clear-channel News/Talk station that went on the air in 1922. The call letters were assigned by the Department of Commerce but unofficially stood for Watch Buicks Travel after the original owners sold it to a local Buick dealer. Much of their programming is locally produced including Keith Larson's show on weekdays from 9am to noon.

LAMA! is a greeting of sorts or verbal "high five" between Larson and his "self-selecting" club of listeners. When asked what it means he apparently dodges the question but the audio drop he uses is taken from Bill Murray's character in Caddyshack. (At the :55 second mark.)

No comments:

Post a Comment