W*O*L*D

Harry Chapin's "W*O*L*D" tells the rather depressing story of a middle-aged radio disc-jockey who drifts from job to job only to discover that his life, looks and voice have passed him by. The song was inspired by Jim Connors, a DJ at WMEX in Boston who is credited with discovering the singer and helping his earlier song "Taxi" become a hit. When performing live, Chapin often changed the call letters in the lyrics near the end of the song to fit a local station. The version below was recorded in Los Angeles where he changed it to "KHJ". In the last performance before his death in July, 1981 he changed it to "WKRP" (even though the concert was in Canada.) "W*O*L*D was a major inspiration for Hugh Wilson when creating the hit television series "WKRP in Cincinnati."



Twelve years before Chapin's "W*O*L*D" became a hit in 1974, an actual station from Marion, Virginia with the WOLD call letters signed on the air. It's unclear what year this sticker is from; a randomly chosen Broadcast Yearbook (1980) lists the AM as being Modern Country and the FM as Adult Contemporary. The pots of gold suggest they might have been a (Golden) Oldies station at one time or maybe it's a play on the call letters. 1330 AM is currently WITM and carries a Religious format while 102.5 FM is a Classic Rock station known as "The Renegade."