Local News
Popular area DJ Chuck Black dies at 56 By TIM PRESTON 06/04/2013 6:50 PM
Veteran radio broadcaster Chuck Black died Tuesday while golfing with his brother.
Black, 56, was a 1975 graduate of Fairland High School in Ohio and Marshall University where he also played baseball before an injury sidelined his athletic career.
In addition to a long career which included stints at several stations in the region, Black was most recently co-host of the morning show on 93.7 “The Dawg” along with Julie Reeves, and also worked in sales for the station’s parent company, Kindred Communications.
Mike Kirtner, president of Kindred Communications, said Black was with the company for a decade and had been working the morning shift with Reeves for only a couple of months at the time of his death. During his career, Black had the honor of retaining the highest morning show ratings in the history of Tri-State radio, according to a statement released by the staff at The Dawg.
“He was really what radio was all about,” Kirtner said, noting Black’s greatest asset was likely the number of people he knew, and an abundance of self-confidence. Kirtner said Black was “very much a family guy,” who was helping raise a grandchild. He also cited Black’s years of involvement with Marshall University, and his time as a baseball player for the school. Kirtner said he was uncertain about the circumstances of Black’s death, but reported he had been golfing with his brother at Sugarwood in Lavalette before saying he felt light-headed and went to their cart to take a telephone call but did not return.
Julie Reeves, who was Black’s morning show co-host on 93.7 The Dawg, said the show will go on today from 6 to 9 a.m., with programming dedicated to his memory. Kindred said the station will also honor Black throughout the day by playing the song “Go Rest High Upon that Mountain,” once each hour. Reeves said she has known Black since she was 15 and singing in the band Kentucky Blue, and recalled he was always supportive of her career.
“He was such a good person. I loved him so much,” Reeves said, noting she was recently stranded on the side of a local highway and Black came to where her car had stalled and waited with her until he knew she was safe. Reeves noted Black had been feeling poorly in recent weeks, but made a point of not complaining and always made it to work, joking he had to be there to show her what to do.
J.B. Miller of Big Buck FM 101.5, who was Black’s competitor for the local morning audience, said it was actually Black who convinced him to get back into broadcasting after a year away from the industry.
“He said, ‘We’ll compete and have fun and make fun of each other,’” Miller recalled. “It was like his pet project to get me back into radio.”
Miller said he cherishes his last hours together with Black at this year’s Appalachian Uprising, where they spent four hours together under a tent “telling old radio stories,” about the quirky personalities they had encountered in their mutual years on the air.
Judy Eaton, who was Black’s former morning show co-host at WTCR for a decade, said his on-air style and off-air personality “were one and the same.”
“He was one of the best friends I ever had,” she said, remembering their mornings together at the former studios “up on the hill in Catlettsburg” which included two pregnancies. Despite the emotion of the news, Eaton also recalled a time when Black played a prank on her during her first days in radio, explaining they were riding together in a parade through downtown Milton. Black asked her to get something from the back of the vehicle, she said, and flipped up the back of her skirt “so there I was mooning downtown Milton,” she said with a chuckle, before adding Black “would do anything” to help people, “whether he knew you or barely knew you.”
Former broadcaster Eddie Riffe said Black was responsible for getting himself and many others on-air work at WTCR, with many awards and professional accolades to his credit.
“I remember when he broke the news of Keith Whitley’s death,” he said, explaining Black and Whitley were close personal friends. “He had that big voice, but it wasn’t big that day.”
In an interview with reporter Carrie Stambaugh, Black said his most memorable moment in radio came when a powerful earthquake in Japan created a tsunami that swept across the Pacific Ocean.
“We had a listener call, who was listening on the internet and called to tell us the tsunami warning had been issued and she was evacuating,” said Black, explaining the caller was on a military base in Hawaii and had family in Wayne County. As she spoke, Black said, he could hear sirens in the background as well as military police on loudspeakers ordering an evacuation.
“It was just one of those moments you realize how small a world we are. It’s one of those moments you think, ‘Wow! You are really doing something good.’ Keeping people informed. That’s probably one of the neatest moments I’ve ever had,” he said. The woman called back several days later to update listeners about the situation, he said. “That was neat, that someone that far away would think enough of their family to call and say, ‘Here I am. I’m OK.’”
Black also said he cherished meeting people who listened to him.
“Getting to listen to the people who listen to you on a daily basis — that is a very high honor and I will always respect that. The most important thing I like about my job is meeting people and I hope I can do it until I quit, or retire, or I’m too old to do it.”
TIM PRESTON can be reached at
tpreston@dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2651.
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