Written by M.D. Smith, III, Kirby Jones Smith, and M.D. Smith, IV
1925-1928
M.D. Smith, Jr. bought WBRC Radio (Bell Radio Corporation = WBRC) in Birmingham, from J.C. Bell in 1928 for $2,000.00. The station operated four hours a day on (eventually on a frequency of 960 kc) with a power of 50 watts. The transmitter and studios were in the home of Bell, which was located in Fountain Heights.
(Mr. Bell's wife, Mary Emma Clayton Bell, did announcing (1925-1928) as was told in her death announcement of April 1, 2008. Yes, the date is correct, she was 105 years old, and was said to be one of the first "women disk jockeys." She lived in Vestavia.)
[Note, for a complete history of Channel 6, WBRC that includes history after the station was sold to Storer, click FOX6 here. ] http://www.myfoxal.com/story/10551172/fox-6-wbrc-station-history (link subject to change)
M.D. Jr. father, M.D. Smith, Sr. was originally a Minister born in 1853. He had to make his own tent for a revival, made it better than any of that age, and eventually made some others and sold them. It was profitable, and he ended up going into that business full time as "Smith Mfg. Co." M.D. Sr. had two sons, M.D. Jr. (born 1890) and H.L. Smith came into the business Smith Manufacturing Company around 1908 in Dalton, GA. They made large and small tents. With his 2 sons M.D. Jr. and H.L., they started Awning and Tent companies in Birmingham, Atlanta and Chattanooga from their Dalton, GA home. Around 1910, M.D. Smith, Jr. came to Birmingham (probably with his father's guidance) and started Birmingham Awning and Tent Company, a branch of the Dalton Family business. M.D. Jr. Married Eloise Hanye in Feb. of 1912.
M.D. Jr. and H.L. had a disagreement and split the businesses in 1919, with M.D. Jr. taking Birmingham and Atlanta (later sold). There were plants then in Birmingham, Chattanooga and Dalton. MDS Jr.(born in 1890 and died in June 1937 from a nail wound in his arm from blood poisoning in days before Penicillin) ended up owning and running the Birmingham plant. H.L. took over Chattanooga and Dalton. By then, M.D. Sr. had died or retired. (Atlanta sold or closed down)
Here is another photo of M.D. Smith, Jr. with his son, M.D. III (born 1917) as a small boy.
1928-1929
The studio was moved to the Old Athletic Club. Broadcast hours were extended to 12 hours a day when power was increased on April 30, 1929 to 1,000 watts daytime and 500 watts night.
1931
The station was incorporated, and J.C. Bell bought 25 percent of the stock, Glenn Marshal bought 25 percent, and M.D. Smith, Jr. and wife Eloise had 50 percent.
1932
1935
1937
1938
(Of interest, the layout of this building with offices to the left, entrance hall & live studio in center, and on the right the announcer/control room and rear of that was the transmitter room. MDS, III built that exact same layout in 1955 when he built WBYE-AM in Calera, Alabama as the first radio station he would build and own himself after Eloise sold WBRC-AM-FM & TV in 1953. The WBYE building was still the original in 2017 when I visited)
1939
In 1940, Eloise married Dr. Hanna and changed her legal name to Eloise H. Hanna.
1940
1941-1945
During the war years, there was much talk about FM radio. It was believed that after the war, all AM stations would convert to FM.
M.D. Smith, III was in business as Birmingham Awning & Tent Co. After Pearl Harbor (December 7, 1941) , the Quartermaster came to see us about war work, since we made tents, awnings, and taupolines at Birmingham Awning and Tent, and practically said we had to go in war work. We made everything from parachutes to underware, as well as tents, during the war.
We then formed Marson and Company--a 50-50 partnership, M.D. Smith III and Kirby J. Smith--we were known as in the needle trade. They loaned us $50,000 and furnished all material. We paid back the $50,000 after the first item. We started making bandoleers (shell clips) at our location at 213 South 21st Street, Birmingham, Alabama. We bought 40 sewing machines, a cutting table, and turned out 5 million bandoleers.
During that time, the Quartermaster seemed pleased and came to us and asked us to make parachutes. They were all white and all shroud lines too. We had a time as they were all cut on bias to center top ring. There was always a government inspection in the three plants, to even count the stitches as per specs. After the first 425 came off and were inspected, we finally had one accepted. I'll never forget MD III held it up and said we had conquered the order to parachutes. We went on and made and shipped a total of 75,000 parachutes. At a price we received $50.00 a parachute, we made a ton from them (MD IV was 1 year and 3 months old in March of 1942. I'll never forget MD III said to MD IV, we are on our way!)
We were also awarded contracts for 100,000 barrack bags, men's shirts, general issue, and jungle hammocks, as the war was invading through the jungle, through the Philippines. They were very complicated, made to hang between two trees, and had hammock canvas bed with sides of netting, a zipper on all sides, and a waterproof top. We made 25,000 jungle hammocks and were paid late, as not many plants in the United States would undertake them. We had then bought two other buildings, each two floors, to make these items. We worked three shifts at all plants with 800 people (seamstresses) and long cutting tables in each plant. They gave us the patterns of heavy-like Formica. We laid 50 layers for each cut. The minimum wage was 40 cents an hour.
Everything was rationed and every month, every adult received a book (similar to food stamps) for gasoline, meat, sugar, alcohol (one pint per person a month).
The day the Armistice was signed, every war contractor received a wire to cease. They sent 18-wheel trucks to collect all materials. No matter what stage the item was in, they picked it up.
1945
Here is a photo of the building on 213 South 21st Street around 1945. Notice the nice cars parked in the alley beside the building.
1946
1946
1948
WBRC-TV on the air on July 4, 1949. It was put IN the FM building that was already on Red Mountain.
1949
When WBRC TV went on the air, there were only 12 TV sets in Birmingham, and they were in dealers' show windows. M.D. Smith III was appointed as Operations Manager of TV. Oliver Naylor was salesman; Evelyn Allen, Traffic; Bob Farris, Film Editor; Felix Lewis, Cameraman; and Hardy Carl, Chief Engineer. Nora Harrimontrec was Artist. So with a staff of seven, we were off and running.
We were affiliated with the DuMont & NBC Television Networks. However, there was no cable connecting us with New York, so all network programs came to us on kinescope or film.
M.D. Smith, III and Mrs. Hanna continued to add equipment and personnel to the TV station. Live studio cameras were added in 1950, and by 1953 the staff had grown to 15. Today WBRC TV, Channel 6, employs more than 150 people.
1951
1952
Election Returns of 1952 when Eisenhower was elected. Note the NBC, Channel 4 logo in the top of the photo. The station changed to Channel 6 shortly after this night. (Early 1953) The FCC said there was too much overlap with Ch. 4 in Nashville, (making viewing in Huntsville very difficult) so the FCC ordered WBRC to switch over to Channel 6. There was a fair amount of expense doing that, but it had to be done.
1953
(By Kirby Jones Smith) After a year, we started our own broadcast station and formed a corporation.
1955
Here is M.D. Smith, IV standing under sign on 7-27-02 and another of the road sign on the highway.
1956
M.D. Smith, III resigned from Storer Broadcasting to devote full time to the radio business and the two stations.
1958
Here's one of the weekly "Family Survey" Top 60 record lists of August 1959. A bit closer shot shows the four DJ's pick hits of the week. The DJ's are Dan Akens, Dick Essner, Jerry Lee (aka Jerome Tisdale) and Dee Scott (aka M.D. Smith, IV). This was list #31 for the 31st week of the year. This week, Dee Scott's Pick Hit of the week was "Tall Cool One" by The Wailers on Golden Crest records.
At WAAY Radio, commercials were played on a pair of Magnecord PT-6, reel to reel, recorders. Each commercial, jingle and promo was on a 3" reel of tape and running multiple spots required great dexterity to rewind and rethread one recorder while the other was playing. The rewind motors would break a finger if it got in the spokes of the tape hub during rewind. You had spare heavy duty leader tape, a tape splicer and splicing tape to continue to replace the leader that would whip off sometimes during rewind or the fast threading you had to do. Spotmaster cartridge tapes that came in later years, were fantastic.
1959-1960
1963
Begins to work for WAAY-Radio as Merchandising Director, engineer and disk jockey. We are planning to put a TV station on the air on Channel 25. Charles Grisham plans to put one on the air on Channel 19. The lone station, WAFG, Channel 31, which has been struggling, decides to get out of the business faced with the impending competition (Sign on Car for ch. 25) and in the Summer of 1963 offers to sell it to Smith Broadcasting for $500,000.00 That is about what was planned to be spent on Channel 25, so it is decided to take their offer. Jim Beasley from Sweet Sue in Athens is the majority stockholder who confirmed the sale. The minor stockholders in Huntsville did not want to sell, but had no choice. The deal was concluded in July and we apply to the FCC for an ownership change. Meanwhile, Channel 19 begins construction on property next to channel 31. Channel 25 is later awarded to the Alabama Educational Television authority. Robert (Cactus) Gay (age 23) is one of the engineers employed by WAFG-TV when it is bought by Smith and stays with the company until the present time. The station was broadcasting on a 125 foot tower with 240,000 watts. Call letters are changed to WAAY-TV.
November - The FCC finally approves the sale and the Smiths take over Channel 31 with a staff of 17 people. M.D. Smith, IV is Operations Manager. Maury Farrell is Sales Manager and MDS, III is a remote General Manager. Channel 31 (WAAY-TV) is affiliated with the ABC television network. Channel 19 (WHNT)also goes on the air in November with a 250 foot tower and 600,000 watts. Channel 31 had ONE Video Tape Machine. It was an Ampex, VR-1000. It used 2" tape. It was monochrome (or course). It took up a space of 4 feet, by 4 feet by 6 feet and that did NOT include the TWO 6 foot high equipment racks of electronics (all tubes) to run the machine. It had massive power supplies and tubes had to be changed every day to keep it running. Only one spot on a break could be on Video Tape since there was no way to splice or edit tapes together. The other commercials had to be Slides and Audio Tape. A picture of Master Control with projectors and slide chain in the foreground and the operator (Lamar Gilbert) at the "switcher" in the background.
When we bought the station, they were reading all commercials LIVE from the announce booth. The first thing we did was put in Audio Cart Machines with trip cues for the slides to eliminate the announcer and the switcher didn't have to read along with the copy and trip the slides at the right time. There was a Live Romper Room show every weekday morning. It was the major production of the day. We used two, mismatched B/W studio cameras. One was a General Electric Image Orthicon camera with a 3 lens turret and the other was a General Electric Videcon camera with a zoom lens. We liked the zoom lens a lot and eventually replaced the turret with another very expensive "Zoomar" zoom lens (as seen in photo) we bought used at a good price. In the photo, M.D. Smith, III is running Camera 3.
The slides for commercials were shot on Black&White "reversal" film. When it was processed it was a slide ready to show, rather than a negative to make a print from. That station had a very small, old B/W film processor that processed 16mm B/W film for the nightly newscast at 6 and 10. It ran slowly at 4 feet per minute and it took 100 feet of film for less than 3 minutes of film, much of which would be edited out and thrown away. However, we tried to only shoot what we wanted to use to save on film costs. If a photographer could get 2 or 3 stories on one 100' roll of film, we thought he was great. Our 6 and 10 P.M. News Casts were called "The WAAY of the World". The station also owned one OLD Auricon sound 16mm camera. It was an optical sound track and the electronics (tubes) used numerous batteries for the filament voltage, plate voltage and motor power.
Late November - Just two weeks later, President Kennedy is shot and ALL TV stations cease broadcasting commercials for 5 days. This is tough for a struggling new TV station.
WAAY Radio, meanwhile, is making a lot of money as the dominant radio station in Huntsville and the revenue is used to pay the losses at channel 31 during these first few struggling years.
1964
1965
Here is an aerial photo of WAAY Radio made about the same time. You see the three tower directional array maintained by Chief Engineer Robert A. ("Cactus) Gay. The center tower is self-supporting and was used originally when the station was daytime only. The other two are guyed and were put up to form the directional array to allow night time power and 24 hour operation.
August - Anita Smith and Wayne Johnson are married. Wayne goes to work at WAAY Radio in June of 1966 after getting a degree in Marketing at U of A.
1967
M.D. Smith, III heard a song in another town, and found out that the music was available for purchase and a special pressing of a 45 RPM Record. The company would either write your song lyrics or you could do them yourself. Mr. Smith decided to have the record made for Huntsville and Ft. Walton Beach (Home of WNUE Radio). He wrote the lyrics for both songs and the TV station pilot (M.D. Smith, IV) flew the company airplane for the aerial shots of the two cities. A month later, "Huntsville, My Home Town" was born. This link is a page with BOTH album covers, words, and the music you can download in RA or .MP3 format.
In 2009, Gareth Stearns used the "Ft. Walton, My Home Town" (version 1) song and put (version 2) old Ft. Walton photos with it. These are the two versions and each is over 30 mb large. You can click to download and view, or "save target to" and save to your hard drive. Thanks Gareth.
August - After both Smith's get Multi-Engine ratings, the station converts to it's first of four Piper Aztec Twin Engine Airplanes. This is the Piper PA-250 (N31TV) with engines of 250 horsepower each. It is 60 miles an hour faster than the Cessna 172.
1968
April - Channel 31 converts to Color Video Tape and Color studio cameras. Having bought a used color film chain/island from WTOP in Washington, DC in 1965 and the first station to broadcasting anything local in color. The Two new 2", Quad rotating head tape recorders (RCA TR-70 and an RCA TR-22 (used but "high-banded" for color)) were a major improvement. Before we only had one Black&White Ampex VR-1000, all tube video tape recorder. It was a monster and good to retire it. It sat in storage for a year with no one wanting it, and was finally sold for a few hundred dollars as parts. The big RCA TK-42 Color Studio cameras were huge. They each had one 3" Image Orthicon tube for the picture and three 1" vidicon tubes for the 3 color guns. The cameras cost $50,000 each. A complete set of replacement tubes was $12,000 per camera. As the first station to broadcast live newscasts in color, we were very proud. Channel 19 had a ratings edge over us, even in B/W, but they also bought new color cameras about 8 months later.
1968
1968
1969
WAAY - PAMS solid-rock-2-song.mp3 1:42 full song.
WAAY - PAMS solid-rock-2-series.mp3 5:49 package.
WAAY - PAMS series 42-q-superstar.mp3 8:14 package.
WAAY - PAMS a-capellas-40.mp3 14:15 package.
WAAY - PAMS 34-cut-27.mp3 6:07 package.
WAAY - PAMS shouts.mp3 6:13 package.
WAAY - PAMS a-capellas-31-32-33(1970).mp3 9:54 package.
WAAY - PAMS series-29.mp3 7:21 package.
WAAY - PAMS holidaze.mp3 2:06 package.
1970
1971
1972
1973
1974
The anchor team that was #1 in 1974 was (Left to Right standing) John Bradshaw (new-weather), Tony Beason (News), Dan Jamison (Sports). (Left to Right seated) Ed Sisson (News) Adrian Gibson (Anchor) and Sam Depino (Anchor).
April 3/4 - The April 3rd tornados (some people refer to April 4th, the day all the destruction was visible) gave us much publicity as the ONLY station with live weather radar to show the storms until ALL TV stations were knocked off the air at 11:05 p.m. when the last tornado crossed the top of the mountain at Monte Sano and Panorama. Fifteen people in Madison County were killed. Many more in other North Alabama Counties. The stations were off the air for 2 days. Phil McHugh of McHugh-Hoffman Consultanting was in town for a consulting visit at the time. Parkway City Shopping Center was nearly destroyed. It was later rebuilt as a Mall with covered center walkway. (Note: in 2001-2002 it was rebuilt again as "Parkway Place", a two-story and greatly enlarged Mall.)
Governor George Wallace (then in a wheel chair) sent our station a personal letter thanking us for our Radar Coverage warning the people of North Alabama and likely saving many lives in the area.
1975
We had a great set of music jingles used with on-air promos and radio spots. They basically said, "Look for us, we'll be there, 31 News is Everywhere." M.D.Smith, III and IV wrote the lyrics together for these jingles. The 60 second cuts could be split into two 30 second cuts for variety. Here are three versions in .mp3 format of about 1 mb each. 31 News Everywhere - Male - Full 60 vocals.mp3 which I think is the best cut. Then 31 News Everywhere - Female - 60 Vocal.mp3 and finally the "bumper"31 News Everywhere Bump vocals (long donut).mp3 which allowed for putting words inside the jingle.
1976
Two nice close-up shots of Dave Stanley with the TV Monitor and Two-Way equipment. The other is of Ken Rainey on the freshly designed weather set.
" The Great American WAAY" was the Radio Theme during these few years and among other items, the "Great American WAAY" belt buckle in both pewter and bronze was created. Bob Baron was behind this idea and M.D. III hated to spend so much money. He got more of the pewter to give away, because they cost so much less. Here's a good close up of the WAAY buckle in Pewter ...... and the WNUE buckle in Bronze. These are rare collectors items. Thanks to Don Roden for the last two images.
December - The Chamber of Commerce of Huntsville announced that due to declining interest and sponsor support, there would be no annual Christmas parade in Downtown Huntsville that year. Bob Baron with WAAY-Radio, M.D. Smith, III and M.D. Smith, IV all got together and decided that WAAY Radio and TV would put on an "All Volunteer Christmas Parade" Everyone pitched in building their own floats, entries, and bands, and the Parade went on. That was the FIRST and TWENTY years later, WAAY-TV still has the commitment to see that our all volunteer Christmas Parade takes place. The location was moved from the route around the courthouse downtown, to a route starting beside the Huntsville Hilton and passing the Civic Center and looping the downtown area because of the size. The event attracted over 211 entries and close to 50,000 spectators.
December - Our 1,000 foot new tower nears completion (we began transmitting on it in January of '77) and we designed a special Christmas Card to send to all our clients and friends. Our tower is the tallest thing around and we figured it was so high, that even Santa might get tangled up trying to fly over it. Here is the outside and inside of the card.
1977
A coffee mug was created with the "Still The One" logo and the 31 worked in. The reverse side of the mug had the full size 31 logo and call letters. The heavy, serif "31" has been used for many years. Soon after we would adopt the more modern 31 logo with the circle around it similar to WABC-TV, Channel 7 in New York. (See 1979)
1978
1979
1980
May - Channel 31 has great ratings after several difficult years against Channel 19 and so we celebrate with a picnic on the front lawn. Some of those attending of interest: Bob Baron (Weatherman), Don Roden (was asst. chief engineer and after short time as engineer with Ch. 54 who came to town in 1985 ,went on to be Chief Engineer of channel 19 before leaving for private business) and the NewsHound, as he was called, Dick VanValkenburg, who did all the wreck and hard news coverage with a Cannon Scoopic 16 film camera for years. He died from one of several heart attacks he had. Dick died in December of 1986. The ratings for the book were:
HOMES Arbitron 6pm 31 71,000 19 59,000 48 14,000 10pm 31 51,000 19 39,000 48 12,000
1981
August, 22 - (From 1979 to 1980, M.D. IV lost many pounds with Weight Watchers and begins exercising in races, including the budding new sport, Triathlons.) There were none in Huntsville, so M.D. IV, with the help of Bettie Higgins, Channel 31 puts on our first of many annual 3in1 Triathlons. A 3 mile run, 6 mile bike and 400 meter swim at the Natatorium. We have 400 entrants (and more wanting to do it) the first year. It peaks at 600 entrants in 1985 and then drop back to 400 in the late 80's and early 90's) The Sub-Theme of this event has always been, "To Finish Is To Win."
1982
April 13, - In record time, Channel 48 returns to the air. WAAY-TV runs a letter in the newspaper welcoming them back on the air.
1983
The press package face looked like this and went to all radio and newspapers in the area. At the reception, members of the staff of WAAY-TV, Channel 31 lined up to be introduced by General Manager "Commander" M.D. Smith. All women's uniforms were authentic. The women's came from the nation's only Army Corps Museum at Ft. MCClellan. Note the hair styles.
Other photos of the event include
1. Jim Marsh (anchor), Julie Martin (promotion), Carl Spurlock (producer) and Lee Baker (artist).
2. A Huntsville Times photographer admiring Heather Burns (anchor) and Helen Howard (reporter).
3. Here General Manager M.D. Smith talks with the press just before the Ralph Bellamy speaker phone call.
4. Special guests also included REAL retired military officers and their wives.
5. This photo is of "Commander" M.D. Smith and Program Director Bettie Higgins who is wearing a 1942 WAC uniform and cap with the rank of Major.
6. In this typical ladies pose of 1942, we see Helen Howard, Heather Burns and Debi Benson.
7. A special cake with the Winds of War logo was created and shown here by Bettie Higgins.
8. This pose includes the tall Bob Baron (weathercaster) with Heather Burns (L) and Helen Howard and Debi Benson (R)
9. This photo includes News Director Mike Sullivan, Bettie Higgins and Mike's Wife, Patty Sullivan (we drafted everybody).
10. City Council Woman Jane Mabry (tall-center) "joined up" with staff members mentioned above.
11. The 31 News cars sported a triangular signboard promoting the February 6th series premier.
12. As a result of the WOW party, here is one newspaper article by Judi Moon from The Huntsville Times
13. Another newspaper photo with our women "Saluting their superior officer."
This was a major event and promotion of it. ABC gave us special credit for our local efforts in a future Affiliate Meeting the next June. M.D. Smith, III the CEO of Smith Broadcasting was particularly proud of this event since he loved promotion in Radio and TV stations.
*****************************************************
1985
M.D. Smith, III died from the cancer on September 20, 1985. (Born Feb. 20, 1917 - Died Sept. 20, 1985)
Kirby Jones Smith (She prefered to be called Elizabeth Kirby Smith) becomes Chairman of the Board, with members M.D. Smith,IV,
President -- Anita Smith Johnson, Vice President -- Ralph Dowdy, Member.
1986
1987
July - Scott Smith joins TV as Art Director after several years working for printing companies as commercial artist.
November 30 - First 5:00 p.m. newscast begins on Ch. 31. We were the first in the market and for 2 years had the ONLY 5:00 show. It became #1 over a sit-com and a game show and finally Ch. 19 added their own version that had less than half the numbers our show did by then. Ch. 48 expanded their 5:30 news back to 5:00 in 1992.
November - The Fall 1987 Ratings in Both Nielsen and Arbitron show 31 a big leader. See either the small 68k version or view the easier to read, larger 241k version of the numbers.
December - Brent Smith begins work striping La-Kart carts for production. Later transfers and becomes a switcher and master control operator.
1988
July - The board decides to give one last major try at WNUE to make it successful and drop the AC and satellite service and go back to live DJ's and the HIT (Top 40) Radio sounds that made the station famous. It was "NUE HITS 14" and it sounded great. The new logo designed by Scott Smith was put on a new coffee cup sporting Orange & Yellow lightning bolt. It was good old TOP 40 in 1988 and music was still on 45 RPM records, but was beginning a transitiion to CD's. Ratings did jump up several notches and the station was well listened to in the Ft. Walton area. However, getting and/or keeping competent sales personnel was all but impossible and after one year and two months( Sept. 1989), with losses large and continuing to grow, the station was also taken off the air and put on the market to sell.
September - A frequency is opened in South Pittsburg, Tennessee (near Chattanooga) and M.D. Smith and Robert "Cactus" Gay apply for it in the name of Smith Broadcasting. Later Cactus becomes the other partner. The Construction Permit (CP) was authorized in October 1989, but the change in Authorization to Marson Broadcasting (the new partnership) did not take place until April 23, 1990. Construction began immediately.
1989
1989
November 15 -
A freak tornado rips through Huntsville and destroys Airport Road
businesses, apartments, Jones Valley Elementary School and many homes on Tony
Drive. Eighteen people were killed. Channel 31 was the ONLY station to have a generator and be
able to stay on the air that night for extensive live and taped coverage. We got much praise from that
wise move. Some time later, other stations got a generator, too.
Later the TV station raised $26,000.00 for the Red Cross Disaster funds (see Feb. '90 for details).
1990
November - WKXJ-FM goes on the air on November 5, 1990. This is the first bumper sticker for 97-Kicks. It is a "Hot Adult Contemporary" format. M.D. Smith, IV and Robert A. (Cactus) Gay own the station under Marson Broadcasting. (Marson is an old name used by M.D. Smith, III during the war years in his manufacturing plant, Marson Company. It was the "Mar" from Marcellus and the "Son" from Davidson that formed the name.
The "oldies" music was bought on 10" Reel-to-Reel tapes and dubbed with great effort to the old "carts"(many came from WAAY and WNUE radio). Carts were the cartridge tapes that played commercials and music at the radio stations in the 80's to keep music sounding better and not getting scratched and dirty as in the early days when the actual 45 record was played on the air. The looked very much like the old 8-track music tapes, but were built differently. However, all the NEW music of the 90's came on CD and was played on a home type CD player. Eventually a new music "oldies" library was bought and the cart tapes were retired for music. A few years later, all commercials were put on computer disk and the cart machines were taken out of service forever.
September - The general manager, Harmon (Dutch) VanBuskirk, of WNUE for 25 years, finds a partner, Neil Braswell and decide to buy just the frequency and transmitter & tower and lease the building for 2 years. Dutch gets back on the air in October 1990 with a "Talk" format. It is satellite news and talk and Dutch has some live phone-in talk shows.
1991
November - Channel-31-TV ratings come in to show our station the dominate news leader in Huntsville. The station is #1 for ALL newscasts, seven days a week in ratings, share and households. This is the strongest position the TV station has ever been in. The other stations continue to cut staff. Now both channel 48 and channel 19 have staffs of about 75, while channel 31 has a staff of over 125 with the plans to begin a new noon newscast on June 1, 1992.
1992
1992
June 8 -
Ch. 31 becomes the first station to Close Caption ALL its local
newscast for the hearing impaired. Ch. 19 began a year later.
There was a large reception and celebration held. The local AIDB (Alabama Institute for the Deaf and Blind) and other officials and dignataries attended the announcement at the Huntsville Hilton. Here, Mayor Steve Hettinger addresses the audience (with person "signing" what is being said). There was a special memorial cake made with both the WAAY-31-TV logo and the [CC] logo on it to honor the event.
This also happened to be Mr. and Mrs. M.D. Smith, IV's Thirty-First (31) anniversary that same night. Judy Smith received a special flower arrangement and a "Circle 31" gold necklace made the same as the 31 logo pin anchors wore a few years before.
August 22 - The 12th Annual 3in1 Triathlon takes place. A special Star 31 Mug was created for winners in the age divisions. As always, the slogan "To Finish Is To Win" appears.
1993
April 15 - It is announced that Channel 31 has re-hired Bob Baron who left Channel 48 and he will be doing weather forecasts along with Gary Dobbs after a year of working behind the scenes (due to previous contract restrictions keeping him off the air for 12 months.) Several nights later, severe weather hits the area and the new "31 Storm Tracker" does a superb job tracking and predicting where storms will move. It is the only tracker on TV in the valley. Others add similar capabilities some months later.
April 17-19 - Ch. 31 begins Weekend early morning news from 6:00 to 7:00 a.m. on Saturday and Sunday.
Ch. 31's Monday through Friday 6:30-7:00 am news expands to a full Hour from 6:00 to 7:00 a.m. and we move the WAAY-TOO-EARLY program back to 5:30 a.m. (W2E later expands to one hour also beginning at 5 a.m.)
Summer - We decide to become a 24 Hour News Station presenting MORE NEWS around the clock. Our new coffee cup this year shows 24 Hour logo. We are already doing newsbriefs every hour on the hour, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Sports on the hourly Newsbreaks was included.
August 21 - The 13th annual "31 3-in-1 Triathlon" takes place at Old airport and Natatorium.
November - WKXJ-FM, 97Kicks begins broadcasting with a 99.3 Translator in the Chattanooga Metro area. Now with the 50,000 watt main transmitter on 97.3 covering the rural area and the new translator covering Chattanooga, the future looks brighter for the profit potential of the radio station. On this, its 3rd annivarsary (Nov. 5) it still is not making significant profit, but paying its own way. We decide to make the sound even "hotter" and are successful in getting teens and young adults with the "Hot Jammin' Kicks-FM" sound and logo. (both this and original sticker artwork done by Scott Smith).
1994
1995
1995
August 19 - The 14th annual "31 3-in-1 Triathlon" takes place at Old airport and Natatorium.
August 25 - SHOALS STAR RADAR comes to the valley. This is a high powered Enterprise Electronics Corporation (EEC) weather radar mounted in a Winnebago Motor Home. It is taken to the Shoals and put in service as an early warning radar for areas west to the Mississippi river. It has the Baron processor on it, which can see 16 levels of rain.
November - Channel 31 announces the opening of THREE new area bureaus. They are located in Guntersville (Marshall County), Scottsboro (Jackson/DeKalb counties) and Fayettville, TN (for Tennessee counties). This brings to FIVE, the area bureaus covering the whole 31 viewing area with regional/area bureaus for a local focus on news, un-matched by any other TV station. We also can get to News Events faster with AIRSTAR, a twin-turbine prop-jet MU-2 aircraft.
1996
December 7 - The tradition continues-- WAAY-31-TV held it's 20th Annual Christmas Parade in Downtown Huntsville. In order to commemorate this tradition that started in December of 1976, a special anniversary patch was made.
1997
May 23 - Mrs. M.D. (Elizabeth Kirby Jones) Smith, III (age 80) (born Sept. 29, 1916 - died May 23, 1997) passed away after a long period of declining health. M.D. Smith, IV continues as President and General Manager of WAAY-TV. Anita Smith (sister) and M.D. Smith, IV now co-own Smith Broadcasting, Inc. and the TV station.
June - The Storm Team (weather team) of Gary Dobbs, Adrian Gibson and Kristen Cornett take to the air. Kristen is also trained to drive and operate a remote weather station (Feb. 98) with GPS tracking called the Storm Chaser van. There is much focus on the weather in these years.
1998
1999
2000
2001
M.D. Smith, V ("Dee") had been involved with the web site design and updates. Dee and his wife Kristen had their first child on 01-01-01 (it was snowing this day) and named him M.D. Smith, VI and call him Marc.
2002
2003
Certainly it has been more difficult for ISP's in the last few years and a lot of them have folded up. HiWAAY continues to improve the bottom line and while not making much money, we are not losing it, either. On this occasion, the 8TH (see logo) Birthday, we had a cake to share with staff and friends. Gathered behind the cake are (L to R) M.D. Smith, Redge Swing (General Manager), Charles Boley (dept. manager and one of oldest employees) and Scott Swing (Redge's son who is a "long-term" salesman). And closer, M.D. Smith cuts the cake to start the celebration.
A gathering of as many staff members as we could locate from the years 1963 to 1999. MDS IV created the "31alumni.com" website before the event. Here will be found tons of stories of past 31 Alumni (and current employees) along with many photos of them then as well as now. Great addition to the history website you are reading now. Here is the opening paragraph of my "welcome" speech from the web site.
"To have 50% of the adult audience for a newscast is powerful stuff. Yet, that’s what Channel 31 did in the 70’s, in the 80’s and early 90’s. We hit numbers that made history. All of you here tonight were a part of either the building process to get there, or being on top and trying to stay there. Either way, it was always a challenge, usually fun and at the same time we always had to make a profit to stay in business and grow. "
The photo is of Ken Rainey and Dave Stanley (weather and news anchors of mid 70's) with me. You will find many photos of the reunion taken at Ditto on that date and news about 31 that has occured since, like the tower collapse.
2005
Two new products have been added this year to compliment the range of services that HiWAAY offers.
The first one is the Rocket Access accelerator for dial-up access. Running this software will increase speeds up to five times normal. Of course if you want blazing speed, you sign up for Broadband DSL service.
The other service is the HiWAAY Computer Clinic for sick computers. The clinic will wipe all the viruses, spyware, worms, trojans and other bad infections from your computer and add several protections programs to keep your computer healthy and non-infected in the future.
2006
HiWAAY Internet Services launches the Network Services Division. Customers can now have HiWAAY install and maintain their LANS and equipment in addition to all their hosting, serving, and connection needs to the internet.
HiWAAY Internet Services moves to a new and more modern facility on Drake Avenue. More spacious parking in a village park atmosphere filled with other technical companies and doctor's offices.
2009
After M.D. Smith, IV takes over as General Manager of HiWAAY in late 2008, son Bryan Smith moves from the Birmingham office to Huntsville to become Operations Manager and a more key part of the family business.
2010