Former KXOK PD Transitions Here As New WCZY Mid-Afternoon Personality, Music Director
DETROIT — “There wasn’t a whole lot of decision making to be done,” admits KXOK St. Louis PD Gary King about the announcement of his move to Gannett’s WCZY here, where he’ll do mid-days and serve as the AC station’s music director. “It was an opportunity to work with Lee (Douglas, station manager of WCZY and former KXOK GM) again and the most exciting company in broadcasting today.”
King, who sees his future in the eventual ownership of a chain of properties, started out at Louisville’s WAKY and then moved to Baton Rouge’s WJBO /WFMF, where he was operations director prior to his move to St. Louis a year ago. Coming on board as acting PD and afternoon drive talent at KXOK, his title was not made official until this August. At that time, the Storz station had already transitioned primarily to talk, and King was doing mornings.
That shift will now be held by former midday man Charlie Brown, who, without the title, will be handling King’s PD chores. Afternoons, which were vacated last month by Pat Riley (Billboard, Oct. 1), are now being done by longtime KXOK per- sonality Johnny Rabbit, using his own name, Ron Elz, as the station continues to move in an all-talk direction with 20-year veteran Nick Charles handling mid-days.
With the addition of King in mid-days at WCZY, the Detroit lineup now features Dick Purtan in mornings and former WCAO Baltimore personality Lou Roberts in afternoons. Former WCZY afternoon talent Marc Avery now does that shift on CKLW here, while Dave Prince moves into the ‘CZY evening shift. END
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Information credit and news source: Billboard; October 8, 1983
