DJ Powel Crosley Jr. and the mystery of 8CR

 

How or when Crosley wrote the above pamphlet I do not know. It's obscure ephemera. But powell has always been involved writing his own history. Wikipedia clearly states that Powel Crosley Jr.'s company "operated" WLW. The Cincinnati Enquirer states that he founded WLW. These are two very different things. So let's get specific. In 1921 the Crosley Manufacturing Company was issued two radio station licenses: one for a standard amateur station, 8CR, located at 5723 Davey Avenue, Cincinnati, OH.  The other for an Experimental station, 8XAA, located at the company's Blue Rock Street factory building in Cincinnati. Neither of these stations is WLW. More here.  The definitive book on the topic is Not Just a Sound; the story of WLW by Dick Perry. He noticed a problem in the official history

WLW became WLW in March,1922, if that helps. Some say the original call letters were 8CR, and those of you who are fond of old call letters, as I am, are probably wondering where 8CR vanished. Well, the only record of 8CR's existence seems to be in the news releases that Crosley, Jr., himself wrote. He said 8CR was the forerunner of WLW. The Department of Commerce, then licensing stations, has no record of it; the department says his first station was the aforementioned 8XAA. Shall we leave that discussion to the ages?

Crosley, Jr., is the source on the connection to 8CR. He was making the claim at least as early as 1938. Every version I read is slightly different. But for it to be true the  8CR facility would have to be located in Crosley's College Hill home. The location today is a car park. Precision Equipment Co made his transmitter. But at the time Crosley was primarily a maker of auto parts. He didn't make his first retail radios until 1921. The radio band in Ohio was a really happening place in the early 1920s.

Most biographies start in 1921 when Crosley moved his 8CR transmitter to his factory. It implies that it was also licensed in 1921 which is not the case. From the Bulletins below we can see that it was issued in February of 1920. So before proceeding I took a look at the Special Land Station in the Department of Commerce radio Service Bulletins [LINK] for 2020 and 2021, paying special attention to find all of the relevant call signs. *Note: I'm skipping the issues with no Ohio-relevant entries. There were no Ohio stations of this type in the 1919 bulletins, and no bulletins at all in 1918 due to WWI. You will see some incongruities I cannot account for such as 8YR being licensed to Oxford, OH twice. I also cross-referenced the listings with the canonical source: earlyradiohistory.us.

Bulletin Date	Calls	Owner	Location
Mar. 1915	8ZX	Harry S. Weber	Canal Dover, OH
Mar. 1915	8ZF	Henry M. Rubel, Jr.	Cincinnati, OH
Mar. 1915	8YO	Ohio State University	Columbus, OH
Mar. 1915	8ZU	Doron Bros. Electric Co.	Hamilton, OH
Mar. 1915	8ZM	Ross McGregor	Springfield, OH
May 1915	8XW	Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.	Warren, OH
Aug. 1915	8YP	Ohio University	Athens, OH
Sept. 1915	8ZH	Clayton M. Howe (Hughes H.S.)	Cincinnati, OH
Sept. 1915	8YL	J. E. Collins (Board of Education)	Lima, OH
Oct. 1915	8ZT	John J. Grossman	Tiffin, OH
Dec. 1915	8ZD	Keith Henny	Marion, OH
Jan. 1916	8ZI	Roy C. Burr	Norwalk, OH
Jan. 1916	8ZG	Henry W. Campbell	Ironton, OH
Jan. 1916	9ZO	Ross Gunn	Oberlin, OH
May 1, 1916	8YR	Miami University	Oxford, OH
Nov. 1, 1916	8ZL	Willis K. Wing (Scott H.S.)	Toldeo, OH
Mar. 1, 1917	8ZQ	Charles K. Brain	Springfield, OH
Feb. 2, 1920	8ZV	Henry L. Ley	Canton, OH
Feb. 2, 1920	8XB	Precision Equipment Co.	Cincinnati, OH
Feb. 2, 1920	8XF	Emil J. Simon	Cleveland, OH
Feb. 2, 1920	8ZY	K. A. Duerk	Defiance, OH
April 1, 1920	8XI	Ohio State University	Columbus, OH
April 1, 1920	8ZI	Adelbert J. Gogel	Toldeo, OH
May 1, 1920	8ZX	Harry S. Weber	Dover, OH
July 1, 1920	8ZJ	Hughes High School	Cincinnati, OH
Sept. 1, 1920	8XC	Glen L. Martin Co.	Cleveland, OH
Oct. 1, 1920	8ZH	East High School	Cincinnati, OH
Oct. 1, 1920	8ZE	Norman A. Thomas & Edward Manley	Marietta, OH
Oct. 1, 1920	8ZT	George M. Withington, Jr.	Marietta, OH
Oct. 1, 1920	8ZA	Charles J. Murray	New Philadelphia, OH
Oct. 1, 1920	8ZG	A. J. Manning	Salem, OH
Oct. 1, 1920	8ZB	Earl S. Ensign & William P. Van Behren	Toldeo, OH
Nov. 1, 1920	8ZP	Edward I. Deighen	Cleveland, OH
Dec. 1, 1920	8YR	Miami University	Oxford, OH
Dec. 1, 1920	8ZL	Charles Candler	St. Mary's, OH
Jan, 3, 1921	8YK	Ohio Wesleyan University	Delaware, OH
April 1, 1921	8ZN	J. W. Kauffman	Ashland, oh
April 1, 1921	8XY	Cino Radio Mfg. Co.	Cincinnati, OH
April 1, 1921	8YS	University of Cincinnati	Cincinnati, OH
April 1, 1921	8YM	Richard H. Howe	Granville, OH
May 2, 1921	8YT	Mount Union College	Alliance, OH
May 2, 1921	8YX	University of Cincinnati	Cincinnati, OH
May 2, 1921	8XV	Frederick S. McCullough	Cleveland, OH
May 2, 1921	8YU	Young Men's Christian Assoc.	Dayton, OH
May 2, 1921	8ZAA	J. Warren Wright	Springfield, OH
Aug 1, 1921	8XAA	Crosley Manufacturing Co.	Cincinnati, OH
Nov. 1, 1921	8YO	Ohio State University	Columbus, OH
Dec. 1, 1921	8ZAC	Clifford, OH	Barnesville, OH

You will notice that 8CR is not on that list anywhere. The numeral 8 matches the radio Inspection District. But only certain call letters were granted in that period and the middle character is always a Y, Z or X.  8XB is a plausible first call sign for WLW. It matches the time period, location and Dept of Commerce records. But it actually became WMH.  

In August 1923 8CR belonged to Wilbur E. Cook of 552 Ferdinand Ave., Detroit, MI. In July of 1914, 8CR was licensed to Allen W. Coven located at 446 Earl Court, Elyria, OH and operating at 35 watts, not 20 or 30 as most often cited. It is not a "special land station" but an "amateur station" not that the technical difference was as clear cut as it is today. Later he took the call sign with him to 1122 West Ave., Elyria, NY. Then in July 1916 the calls are reassigned to Johnson J.H.E. of 319 Glenn Ave, Springfield, OH. In 1919 and into 1920 8CR belonged to Ralph R. Chartener of 47 Allen Ave. Pittsburgh, PA.

If you look at the Amateur Radio Station list of 2021 [SOURCE] or the Citizens Radio Call book [SOURCE] of 1922 there are finally entries for 8CR that match the Crosley story.  On page 87 it lists 8CR as being owned by Crosley Mg. Co and located at 5723 Davey Ave.. Cincinnati, OH. But that's after the 1921 date. A 1924 issue of the Crosley Broadcaster makes no mention of 8CR. [SOURCE] It's quite clear that Crosley was misremembering, or possibly lying, though it's unclear why.

Precision Equipment was founded in Cincinnati in late 1918 by Thomas E. New. Actually it was first founded as the Precision Engineering Association, and the name changed to the Precision Equipment Company before 1920.   They operated a store at 2437 Gilbert Avenue, in the Walnut Hills section of Cincinnati. In February of 1920 the Commerce department issued a license for 8XB. According to an anecdote from Harry F. Breckel they operated without a license prior to that with the fake call sign PC. In 1919 they mostly made test broadcasts. In February they began airing photograph records. In December of 1921 they were assigned the WMH call sign which when they were all assigned to 260 meters they had to share with WLW. Crosley bought our Precision in early 1923 and merged the companies and shut down WMH.

Shortly before buying Precision and WMH, Crosley was assigned the license 8XAA in August of 1921. In the book Golden Throats and Silver Tongues, Ray Poindexter specifically wrote "In the summer of 1921, he bought a 20-watt transmitter and began broadcasting recorded music over 8XAA, the forerunner of WLW."  But in the July 1928 issue of the Crosley Broadcaster, he claimed that 8XAA was licensed for an aircraft. [SOURCE] The Commerce guides routinely routinely mobile radio stations with the note "mobile" and this one did not, not in 1921 anyway. Maybe he confused 8CR and 8XAA or just preferred the 3 letter call sign. They were already no longer issuing them.

Perhaps the calls were re-used in 1928? But that seems very unlikely as he didn't have the call sign very long.  In 1924 the Dept. of Commerce moved to Morgantown, WV at the West Virginia University, Dept. of Physics. This matched an entry in the the Citizen's Call Book of 1926 [SOURCE]. This differs slightly from the Dept of Commerce radio guide for 1925, which assigns the calls to Mason, OH at the United States Playing Card Co. I credit that to the lag in printing the Citizen's call book. More here and here.

WLW applied for and was granted several power increases over the next six years. By 1927, WLW was transmitting with 50,000 watts.  You probably know him better as a manufacturer of radios, whose brand name continues to live on. More here.

broken piano noises

Sometimes when you flip over a rock you find amazing things. Lets' start with the meme I saw. Let's also briefly revisit the definition of meme. Per Merriam Webster:

 /mēm/
an amusing or interesting item (such as a captioned picture or video) or genre of items that is spread widely online especially through social media

A meme acts as a conveyance to transfer cultural ideas, symbols, or practices from one person to another. The definition is already blurring, as AI is already being used to auto-generate memes which lack creator intent but they match the format of "real" memes. A LOLCAT is an easily understood meme. Anyway thank you Richard Dawkins. 

What grabbed me was the music more than anything. I like noisy music. There was no artist profile connected. The attribution was simply given as "old doll (out of tune piano)emptiness, love.nicotine." I found a video on YouTube posted by bluerra-sai with the right key words but it was clearly labeled "!! THIS IS A COVER; THE ORIGINAL COMPOSITION IS BY MUSIC ATELIER AMACHA !!" It's similar but definitely a cover of the one I first heard. I might even like this one better.

 

Eventually I found the version I first heard. The song appears on Amazon, Spotify, YouTube and other streaming services. "℗ 2024 emptiness & love.nicotine, under exclusive license to Kurate Music Ltd." They have a whole YouTube channel named Emptiness. The original piece I heard is here.

Attribution varies across sites. Sometimes it's Emptiness, Sometimes Love.Nicotine othertimes both like Simon & Garfunkel. There the instrumental is attributed to Atelier Amacha. The take away here is that this is not the original. It is a cover. The version by bluerra-sai is just a different cover.

So who is Atelier Amacha? Thankfully bluerra-saigave a link because I couldn't find anything useful on Google. (an increasingly frequent outcome) amachamusic.chagasi.com The website is in Japanese, but Google translate does a decent job. It turns out to be a source for royalty-free music. I'll quote "At Amacha's Music Studio, we distribute music created by the site manager Amacha as a hobby as free material..." Apparently this tune made it into some manga RPG called Mad Father released in 2012. That version has lyrics. That's the kind of rabbit hole I'm afraid to click on. More here and here.

But here I at least heard the original: a synthy somewhat spare arrangement. The "broken piano" arrangement only exists in the cover tune. But there are dozens of versions, even piano tutorials, sheet music. It lacks the noisyness of the version that first caught my attention but I can hear that same tin-pan alley quality that made it so captivating in the first place. 

 But there was one more rock to flip over. I pulled up the ASCAP - ACE Repertory site. The title is unique enough that I found it immediately. The writer is registered as Brock Mike, the publisher as Flomper Music LLC. Bluerra-sai appears as the performer, so that's the cover version I found. The phone number listed under Flomper belongs to a New York restaurant, Inside Park. The email is a hotmail address. I am mostly left with questions Is Brock Mike also Atelier Amacha?  It's doubtful. Who are emptiness & love.nicotine? I think all I learned is that a meme is everything that Dawkins thought it was.

Radio House Books

This is more obscure than it probably should be. I found a book on the imprint "Radio House Books." It's publisher was George W. Stewart, Inc. His operated from at least 1936 and 1951. The earliest book I found was The Stewart Simplified Method of Mimicry and Parlor Amusement. I suspect that's a different Stewart. The other works are all primarily from the 1940s and also primarily non-fiction: history, criticism, economics, sociology and a little bit of English drama. The address in the book plate is 67 W. 44th Street, New York, NY. Note on disambiguation: there was a well-published professor at the University of Iowa by that name, a few notable military men, and a newspaperman. These are all different George Stewarts.

But then there is our George W. Stewart. He was the author of "I Have a book" published in 1940. I found a copy of the Who What Why Is radio text scanned on line. [SOURCE] It refers to the Jerome Still book as "Still in preparation."  

 

In the introduction of The Radio Station, Jerome Still thanks Robert J. Landry which is an interesting connection. Landry even writes the introduction to the book. Landry himself is a mystery. In 1963 - 1979 the editor of Variety was a Robert J. Landry. He also wrote a book This Fascinating Radio Business, published by Bobbs-Merrill in 1946. Back in the 1940s he was the Director of Program writing at CBS.  The 2004 Encyclopedia of Radio confirms they are one and the same. Jerome Sill also thanks Sherman Marshall at WOLF, Nathan Lord of WAVE, and Joseph Creamer of WOR, all unknown radio men today.

Title	Author	Year	link
Who, What, Why Is Radio?	Robert J. Landry	1942	LINK
All Children Listen	Dorothy Gordon	1942	N/A
The Radio Station: Management, Function, Future	Jerome Sill	1946	LINK
Time For Reason About Radio	Lyman Bryson	1948	LINK

The three books are all rare, but none more so than the Dorothy Gordon text. She was the moderator of The New York Times Youth Forum, a weekly radio and television program on WQXR. It aired from 1943 to 1960. In 1960 it was picked up by WNBC-TV and aired until her death in 1970. The program brought together a panel of high school AND/or college students and an adult guest in discussion. Gordon won a McCalls Golden Mike award in 1952 [SOURCE] and a Peabody award in 1963 [SOURCE]. In 1942 the book some classroom discussion guides mention Gordon's book. All together she wrote at least 7 books.

• Sing It Yourself - 1928
• Around The World In Song - 1930
• Dorothy Gordon's Treasure Bag Of Game Song 1939
• Come To France 1940
• Knowing The Netherlands - 1940
• All Children Listen 1942
• You And Democracy - 1951

The Jerome Sill book is easier to find, and will cost half as much as the Gordon text. I saw one with the dust jacket on eBay. This appears to be his only book, thought it's widely quoted in other radio station management texts. A similar Jerome Sill worked in advertising in the 1930s into 1940s writing for Advertising & Selling magazine. There was  Jerome Sill of WMLO Milwaukee who led an independent station revolt in 1947 against a new NAB code. Jerome Sill pops up as the Promotions director of WNEW in 1944, formerly of the Aarons, Sill & Caron an ad agency in Detroit. I think these are all the same man. His letter of protest was widely quoted:

"Should this code be adopted in it's preset form, we might be in the position of being forced to withdraw from the NAB or be dishonest in our tacit acceptance of a code to which we could not sincerely subscribe. We would choose the former course."

If it's him he appears as the general manage of WMIL in Milwaukee in 1953, part owner of WREX in Duluth. He founded WAGE-TV in Greenbay in 1954. There was a Jerome Still who owned WFPG in Atlantic City, New Jersey 1960 and 1961, perhaps the same man. as the primary share-holder of WFPG Inc. he acquired the station in 1956,

 

The interval between the book publishing dates is peculiar. Two books the first year, then none for 3 years, and then one for another two. The Lyman Bryson book does advertise the prior three titles but it's unlike them in other ways. The first three books analyze radio management, and radio programming. Bryson's book is a transcript from a series of talks on CBS from the series "Time For Reason."  The show ran for 27 weekly episodes airing Sunday afternoons from December 1946 to June 1947. Bryson went on to become a frequent guest on the radio game show Information, Please. 

Bryson had been a teacher at Columbia University, but he also moderated The American School of The Air, Invitation to Learning and from 1938 to 1946 he hosted the publish affairs program The Peoples Platform. In many ways it was the adult version of Youth Forum, assembling a panel of laypeople to discuss areas of national interest. Publishers Weekly wrote a review in 1948 in advance of it's February 19th release date.

Some mysteries persist. There was never a fifth book in the series and George W. Stewart seems to stop operating in the early 1950s. The latest books are in a new series, a "Cookery Library" with a series of specialized cook books on coffee and cheese and a random Bible Quiz. In 1951 he published a book about war propaganda and by all appearances, nothing after that.

DJ Earl Hart

Often by the time I discover an obscure radio figure, they're already deceased. I either start or end that research with their obituary, often it's all that exists in terms of a biography. In this case, Earl published a cook book while at 950 WBKH-AM. The notes don't give a date but do state that his program had been on air for 21 years at that time. On the back is his old address "3019 Magnolia Place, Hattiesburg, MS 39401

Through an obituary I learned that Earl Hart was actually named Earl Bernhardt. He died in December of 2019 at the age of 80. This obit doesn't go deep into his time as a DJ, but does touch on it a little mysteriously.

"Earl was the owner of Tropical Isle Inc. and is known as the Co-inventor of the world-famous Hand Grenade. Prior to his career in New Orleans, Mr. Bernhardt was a country music radio personality known as ""Earl Hart"" in Hattiesburg for 27 years."

From context  I gather that Tropical Isle is a bar or cafe, and I think the grenade is a cocktail and not munitions. I later learned that the "hand grenade" is a hugely popular cocktail in New Orleans. There is an enormous body of information on his frozen daiquiri drink, but very little about his radio career. Even in that first obituary the connection to radio is tenuous. It's only in one comment that John Holton confirmed that Hattiesburg station to be WBKH.  He comments:

"I worked for Earl on the weekends at WBKH Radio Station in the 60s. Earl was a pleasure to work for. On the weekends the station played Rock & Roll music. Earl kicked things off on Saturday morning followed by a man named Don Purvis. Both were very popular personalities."

With the surname Bernhardt we can find more, including a second obituary on nola.com. They too were more interested in that cocktail "The lime-green 'hand grenade', served in a tall-necked, translucent plastic container with a smiling image of a grenade at its base, is nearly as ubiquitous along Bourbon Street as tourists wearing Carnival beads." But usefully sharing that Bernhardt's path to drink creator and French Quarter bar baron came after his time in radio.

In 1939 Bernhardt was born in Jackson, MS. He studied journalism at the University of Southern Mississippi. The campus station there is 88.5 WUSM. I have no proof that he was a college radio DJ. In fact he was already working on WFOR when WUSM signed on in 1973 so it seems very unlikely at the age of 34. He he was purportedly a well-known morning radio personality and country music DJ at WBKH by the early 1980s.

So if we assume Bernhardt was on air my even the mid-1980s, that would but that cookbook in the early 2000s and it looks older than that. But I can narrow down the timeline. The 1985 Broadcasting and Cable yearbook lists Earl Hart as the general manager of 950 WBKH-AM.So does the 1987 issue. But his name goes back earlier. In the 1972 yearbook he's listed as the program director at 1400 WFOR-AM. We know He's moved up to GM by the 1974 issue but WFOR is now on 1440. Earl certainly had a career as a DJ before going into management, possibly as long as 10 years a from the timeline. There is little information about that time. In the Country Roundup column of the July 1967 issue of Cashbox there is a single line about Earl:

"Earl Hart at WFOR cables that the station has just gone C&W and is in desperate need of  records. Disks should be sent to him at 2414 W. 7th St., Hattiesburg, Miss..."

In 1967 Earl was about 28 years old, and probably still a DJ. His career in career as a manager and cocktail maven was still way ahead of him. Anyway, Bernhardt and a "college friend" got a concession booth at the 1984 Louisiana World Exposition in New Orleans. They served daiquiris and made bank. Bernhardt took that money to start Tropical Isle. Offbeat magazine bridged some gaps in the story [SOURCE] But it disagreed on the timeline. It has him as a morning personality in 1980, but still on WBKH which fits a bit better. Thought the article states he was on several stations and I only found two.

Today WFOR is a simulcast of 92.7 WMXI, a sports-talker. On 950 is now WHSY, different sources list is as classic country "The Legend" or a a talk radio simulcast of WHSY 105.9. When I tuned in today online I heard a tutorial on reloading shotgun shells. That's pretty country.

WDAN Party Line

I bought this coffee mug. I had never heard of the radio program and that's just the sort of thing that gets me curious. I discovered her obituary in the Danville Commercial News, June 26th 2008. Her name also appears, memorialized in the R&R December 2008 issue. [SOURCE] Thus I found the name of the program's host: Jeanne Eisenhauer. Thankfully it also gave her age so I also knew she was born about 1935. She was in broadcasting for 50 years working her way up from a job as a clerk to a radio host at Neuhoff Communications.  [SOURCE] That newspaper described her career:

Eisenhauer began in the radio station by doing clerical work. That progressed to an early program called Listen Ladies. But she is probably best known for a mid-‘80s program called Party Line that ran for several years, which she hosted with five people, including the mayor himself.

Her first show at 1490 WDAN-AM was called "Listen Ladies" than "Party Line" aired from 1984 until 1987 where she was part of a round table of personalities which included both Dr. John D. Bromley and the local mayor. But because of a quirk of fate I can't identify which mayor. David S. Palmer was elected in 1975, re-elected and severed until his death in 1985. Wilbur Scharlau was appointed by city council as a acting mayor, but subsequently appointed Hardin W. Hawes as acting mayor. Hawes subsequently quit. Scharlau had previously been convicted of "official misconduct" but that didn't stop the city counsel from re-appointing him. He remained until Robert "Bob" E. Jones was elected by popular vote. (Scharlau died in 1989) My suspicion is that it was David S. Palmer

The State of Illinois reports that Eisenhauer was the first woman to have a talk show on the station; and they did so by decree. [LINK] In her time there the station had five owners and she out lasted them all. In February of 2024, Neuhoff Media sold their Danville and Decatur radio stations to Champaign Multimedia Group for $2 million meaning so she missed that 6th owner. But I thought it would be interesting to identify all five.

• 
  1935 - WDAN signs on at 15,00 watts daytime only owned by Northwestern publishing. A Billboard article from 1943 mentions that by then it was being operated by the Danville Commercial News. 

• 1953 WDAN-TV signs on. The Television Almanac of 1959 lists all the same executive staff as Ch 24, WDAN-AM. Odd claim to fame but Gene Hackman was a cameraman for the TV station. More here.
   
• 1958 - This is the year Jeanne Eisenhauer was hired as a clerk. The station is owned by Northwestern publishing, and is a CBS affiliate. Robert Burow is the GM, Max Shaffer is the SM, Honore Ronan is the PD. Ronan and Shaffer had been there since at least 1946, and remained there until at least 1964. Shaffer and Honore Ronan together hosted an Almanac program on the TV side. I did find an image of the latter. Eisenhauer  and Ronan both being active in community theatre, I suspect that's how she was first hired.[SOURCE] Another Danville Light Opera program states that Ronan started as a receptionist at WDAN, and became program director 3 years later. She was the voice of Listen Ladies for over 20 years. I believe that she co-hosted that program with Eisenhauer.

• 1960 - WDAN-TV is sold to Plains television Corp, becomes WICD-TV. 

•  1967 - The 99.1 WDAN FM stick signed on in October 1967. 

• 1971 - Northwestern sells the AM and FM operations to First Danville Radio. The ownership was comprised of employees including Max Shaffer, John Eckert, and Bill Shoup.They changed the FM call letters to WMBJ. It's programming was partially changed to automated playback but still simulcast the morning program off the Am side.
  

• 1977 - Sangamon Broadcasting purchases First Danville Radio and fully ended the WDAN AM/FM simulcast. They change the format of the FM stick to emulate the WTAX-AM/WDBR-FM stations they operated in Springfield, changing the FM calls to WDNL. More here.
  

• 1986 - bought by David Keister Stations, a change David Quick described as "devastating." In 1983 Keister already owned WCBK-FM, WMCB-AM, WCHO-AM, WOFR-AM and WCNB-FM. In 1985 he also had WIQU. In the 1987 R&R Directory that changed to WBCI, WIFE, WCNB, WOFR and WCHO. By 1995 Broadcasting & Cable list them as owning: WBWN-FM, WIOU-AM, WZWZ-FM, WBAT-AM, WKNV-AM, WFMG-FM and WCJC-FM. Sounds like a mess.  1987  Broadcasting and cable lists the owner as Sangamon Broadcasting-Danville Inc. and since 1977 as if Keister never happened.  Initially I could not reconcile this with all the information about the David Keister acquisition.  Then I found a note in the WDNL history. [SOURCE] "WDAN/WDNL sold the first time to a group from Indiana, but the sale fell through on the closing day."
  

• 1988 - Both 1988 and 1989 Broadcasting and cable yearbooks lists the owner as MAJAC Inc. Doug Quick was General Manager at WDAN/WDNL during the last years of the Majac ownership. It was owned by Jack and Marc Steenbarger a father-son team. In that era WDNL-FM was upgraded to 50k watts.
  

• 1990 MAJAC Inc. sells the stations to Neuhoff Broadcasting

• 2008 Jeanne Eisenhauer passes.

 

Assuming we can ignore David Keister, I think we have our five. Eisenhauer had retired from radio in the late 1990s but was wooed back by Neuhoff Broadcasting to co-host the Master Gardener’s radio show on WDAN. She was forced to retire for real in 2007 after a stroke.

There was a "Party Line" program on WHAM around 1943, and there was a "Listen Ladies" program on WHBF in 1942, both with no connection to Eisenhauer's shows. But in other random notes, I found that from 1983 to 1997 WDAN had a Program director named Scott Eisenhauer, and a Traffic director Gene Eisenhauer. I think these are her kids!

WDAN celebrated its 70th anniversary in 2008. They first signed on in October 1938. Jeanne Eisenhauer had conducted reunion interviews at their 50th anniversary in 1988.  Unfortunately she died before their 70th anniversary celebration, but her memory was made a part of the event.