The History of LGBT Radio (Part 1)

The program The Gay '90s aired on 1420 WHK-AM in Cleveland, OH starting in 1993 and lasting over 6 years. Clevelandhistorical.org goes as far as to call it "The nation’s first gay and lesbian talk radio show."  It was certainly one of the earliest, but probably not the very first. But some of the nuance here may be ontological.

One of the most famous homosexual authors of all time is William Burroughs, who famously said “I have never been gay a day in my life." But host Buck Harris opened the program with the following words “Good evening Cleveland… Welcome to The Gay 90s, the voice of Northeast Ohio’s gay and lesbian community. It is the intent of this show to provide programming that represents the diversity of our gay and lesbian community..." This was a LGBT focused radio program. There was no ambiguity.

The name was a pun. The Gay Nineties is an nostalgic term which refers to the decade of the 1890s, though popularized only retroactively in the 1920s. (The modern usage of the word gay shows up around the same time in a work by Gertrude Stein.) The book Queer Airwaves: The Story of Gay and Lesbian Broadcasting by Phylis W. Johnson and Michael C. Keith had only a little to say about the The Gay '90s.

"In March 1993 another commercial outlet began to experiment with gay talk. Cleveland's talk radio WHK-FM initially aired The Gay '90s on Friday nights, 9:00 PM to 11:00 PM, but soon moved it to Monday nights to reach more young people. Despite the shows success with listeners and advertisers, Program Director Paul Cox believed that syndication was not in it's near future. Cox didn't think America was ready for a gay talk show, adding that "it would take a lot of GMs and PDs with a hell of a lot of courage" to syndicate a gay talk show in the United States."

Mr. Keith also mentioned the program in his book Radio Cultures: The Sound Medium in American Life but sadly the call sign is typoed in the one line reference of my 2008 printing as WHF. The program aired on Friday nights, starting at 9:00 PM. The two-hour show later moved to Mondays. Buck Harris had a background in public health policy, not broadcasting. In 1984 he was appointed by Cleveland Governor Dick Celeste as a Gay Health Consultant to the Department of Health. As he set up AIDS programs in the state, he did radio and TV interviews which elevated his public profile, and also gave him the experience he would later need for his own show. He certainly had the voice for it. More here and here.

Harris did some fill in at WHK-AM and liked it so much that he offered to buy airtime and get his own advertisers. When the show debuted on March 26th, 1993 the radio station was greeted with a bomb threat. The threat was taken seriously, after the broadcast, police escorted Harris and station staff to their vehicles. There was no bomb, though Harris continued to get death threats. The radio program continued uninterrupted for another 6 years. Except for in 1995, when the show was pre-empted twice when the Cleveland Indians made the World Series. Subsequently Harris moved the show to 1300 WERE-AM. More here.

The final program was on July 11th, 1999. The program had hosted Congressmen, Grammy Award winners, singers, songwriters, artists, civil rights activists, and radio call in talk like no program ever before. I think what distinguishes the show the most is what a commercial success it was. Buck said in a 1996 interview that he didn't make money on the program. But The Gay 90s proved that the potential was there. The show was one bold syndication away from national success. Buck Harris died in September of 2018 from complications of lung cancer. He was 70 years old.

The Interracial Goodwill Hour

I keep reading about this show.It was mentioned in both the Fats Domino biography "Blue Monday" and the history of Detroit Rock "Grit, Noise: Revolution: the Birth of Detroit Rock n' Roll." Both were fleeting references but; "The Interracial Goodwill Hour" has a certain memorably over-wordy awkwardness.

The program ran nightly Monday through Friday on 1400 WJLB-AM in Detroit, his home town. He was a high school drop-our who found a second chance in radio.  In some ways he followed in the footsteps of a  fellow DJ on WJLB named Jack-the-bellboy.  But Randle wasn't as low key as Jack.  Randle saw the airplay of black artists as political not just musical.  Allow me to quote from Blue Monday:

"The seed's of Randle's revolt were sewn in the working-class politics of his father, a union-organizer during the Depression.  In 1944 after race riots in Detroit over war jobs killed more than thirty blacks  the twenty-one year old Randle hosted the The Interracial Goodwill Hour jazz radio show.  "I did anything I could to subvert the system," says  Randle, who hung out in the black community and ran a jazz night club. "I was playing black music to say to the white establishment "Fuck You!"

Calling it a jazz show was a bit narrow.  He spun rhythm and blues music and hot jazz.  It ran for only 4 years.  In 1949 his program was canceled and he moved to 1490 WERE-AM in Cleveland. As a pioneering disc jockey at radio station WERE-AM.  Randle was a huge taste-maker in the 1950s.  He broke almost every Fat's Domino single.He was pivotal in the pop crossover of Fats.  

At WERE Randle was fired by his Program Director for playing Sister Rosetta Tharpe's version of "Silent Night."  But the station owner rehired him, he had a lot of listeners and got a lot of attention.  In 1954 Downbeat magazine called him "the single most important and powerful record-spinner in the country."  They didn't say that about Alan Freed.  that was before Freed even got his first gig on 1010 WINS. In the 1950's while rock n' roll was on the upswing Bill went back to school at Case Western Reserve University. He got his PhD in 1955, and went on to rack up nine more degrees.  He was still DJing 2-7 Monday through Friday and flying to New York to Host a Saturday afternoon show on WCBS.  Not bad for a high school drop out. He started doing freelance A&R which he continued to do well into the 1980s.He died on July 11, 2004 still on air, still in Cleveland but now on adult standards WRMR.

In January of 2000 Rep Dennis Kucinich [D] read a tribute to Bill Randle on the floor of the House of Representatives. It read in part:

"Bill Randle has been a notable figure at WRMR 850 AM since his being named Top Jock" by Time [magazine] in the 1950s. Randle helped start up such acts as Montovani, Johnny Ray, The Crewcuts, the Diamonds, and even Elvis Presley."