The Harvesters WSAZ channel 5

[philo]

Here is a pic I ran across in my parents picture files. It says 1951 on back

[Dave Allen]

Nunley, Dave, Campbell and Genlock?

[genlock]

The Genlock family did not get TV until 1952.
In Lundale, WV, that's up Buffalo Creek.
Amherst Coal #1 mine, soon to be worked out.
What were the Harvesters names?

[genlock]

Steel guitar guy is an ax murderer, I think.
Guy on the bottom middle steals cars.
I can tell.

[oldtvman2]

went on google and found a book "Mountaineer Jamboree: Country Music in West Virginia by Ivan M. Tribe and found a lot about Richard Cox and the Harvesters. Some of the original members were Riley Pucker, Burt Layne then there was Charlie " Big Foot Keaton, Junior Ruggles, Curley Wellman and later Ray Daniels and Jerry Gildea. i believe that Curley Wellman and Big Foot Keaton are two in the picture. reading about all this brought back a lot of memories. a lot of great country musicians came from the WV area.

[philo]

I believe that Charlie Big Foot Keaton was working for Sonny Sprigs the beer distributor in Ironont in the 70's. I remember him as a giant over 6'6" 300 lbs moving cases Strohs like they were boxs of chips. He was a friend of the family, prehaps thats how we got the pic.

[CoolBreeze]

[genlock]

I don't remember the harvesters but I do remember Bigfoot Keaton from the Saturday Night Jamboree.
Very successful local production, Dean Sturm was the host. At that time most TV stations had
a show something like this. A local talent signature show that could be very appealing
to clients who wanted something more than spots in the 6 o'Clock news. WSAZ would do shows
of a non-televised verity to keep everyone employed and to keep the sponsor happy.
Other stations would have shows of a different type. A station in Duluth had a Polish music
show called Chimelewski Fun-time and syndicated it throughout the upper mid-west.
Lots of accordions (and harmonicas, I think). Country music but a different country.

[lastone]

When WSAZ went to channel 3 at full power was when they were being watched in CUBA, was it not? Follwed by a forced power reduction!

[genlock]

WSAZ went to channel 3 after they moved from the 8th st hill xmtr site to barker ridge with the tall tower.
I think they were on high power for some time before the reduction.
Viewing of WSAZ in Cuba and Australia was made possible by the state of the sunspot cycle much
more than the 100,000 watts of video power. This was the legendary cycle peaking in 1957
that had a maximum usable frequency of 60 MHZ and a lot of stations were propagating worldwide.
WSAZ was one of the stations to see advantage in a powerful signal and used that to set the
size of the market (DMA). It was very expensive to generate that much RF power and the equipment
was finicky and difficult to maintain. WCHS had similar amplifiers for their high-band channel 8
but it was much easier to keep running properly. During times of sporadic e propagation,
I have watched a station in Cuba and looked out the window and could see WSAZ tower.
The propagation made the Cuban station so powerful, that it over-rode a very nearby WSAZ.
We have not had a sunspot cycle as powerful as that one since.