When I was a kid in the 1970's, I wanted to be a disk jockey. During the day, everyone in my small Southern town had their radios tuned to the local radio station. Pop and country music, local commercials ("Come down to Honest Dave's Car Lot - we'll fix ya'all up!"), and the news and Paul Harvey at noon. But at night I'd lay in bed fine-tuning my transistor radio to pick up WLS in Chicago (top 40 radio! Rock and roll!).
Ah, those were the days. Nearly every voice on the radio was someone I knew... and then one day, it was MY voice.
I attended the small country school outside of town (we proudly graduated 25 in 1978, thank you). Since we were much smaller than the town school, no one noticed our Class-B basketball games or the upcoming Senior Play. So one year an upperclassman started a little 10-minute radio program on the local station, which gave the name of the high scorer in the last game, the date of the next game... stuff like that. When I was a junior, I took over the spot. I wasn't very good and no one bothered to suggest how I could be better, but at least I was on the air and got the job done. Afterwards, I'd hang around the station chatting with the "real" DJs and wishing, wishing, wishing that I could do that.
Looking back, I must have been a real pain - this kid who obviously was starstruck by the idea of radio and didn't catch on to the low pay, bad hours, and general ordinariness of the job.
But what I really liked was that the people I could hear on the air were people I knew - one of the DJs was the father of my friend, the commercials were usually locally produced (like Honest Dave), and you could call in to request a song or win tickets to the movie theatre. It was all local, relevant, and important.
Fast-forward through more years than I'm willing to admit. I now live near Seattle 'cause the South, for all its charms, has more than its share of heat, humidity, ticks, chiggers, and rednecks. I'm involved in the community, raise my daughter, work my job, and generally have a good life.
A few years ago, my best friend D took on a shift at our local non-profit radio station, part of the media program for the school district. The kids learn radio production, broadcast the football games, record public service announcements during school hours. In the evenings and weekends, adult volunteers have two- to three-hour programs, and are generally in charge of their own content. She took a two-hour Saturday morning slot, pulled out her CD collection, and just jumped in. She asked for some help, so I pulled out my CDs and jumped in with her.
She'd get information from the local library about events going on around town - the summer parade, free movies at the library, a garage sale to benefit someone who needed chemo - and would talk about these on the air (The Talk). She'd take requests, ask people to call in with their events, and yes, give the date of the next football game.
This was just what I loved about radio as a kid - local, relevant, and important. Plus, we got to play our favorite music... who wouldn't love that?
A couple of years ago, I started to be on-air with her. We'd play music for an hour, stop and spend 15-30 minutes talking about local events, then go back to the music. The show has since morphed into more me and less her (schedules and obligations being what they are), but The Talk is still a big part of the show, regardless of who is on the air. We've broadcast live from the parade and American Cancer Society events, interviewed local and nationally known artists, and kept the community informed and (hopefully) entertained.
Last winter, the power went out in a remote part of our community for a week and all the volunteers came in, fired up the generator so we could stay on air, huddled over coffee in our coats, and spent days letting our neighbors know where they could go for heat, food, and companionship.
Which brings me to my larger point (sorry, I like to take the scenic route). As we all know, the media is being increasingly consolidated - taken over by the big corporations who only care about the bottom line. I'll bet it's the same in your neck of the woods. If there is any local information, it's probably just traffic reports or ads that are inserted in the middle of programming-from-who-knows-where. What happened the last time you tried to phone in a song dedication? Have you even tried - or did you know it wouldn't get on and so didn't bother?
Community radio, though.... Where else are you going to find out what's going on where you live? We're one of the last holdouts against media consolidation. Our signal doesn't carry far, but it can be heard by those who need it.
If you are the owner of a small business, consider advertising on the local radio station. Rates are usually very reasonable, and your message goes directly to your target audience.
Oh, and I'm going to put a plug in here for your local newspaper, too. Same principle - local people, local news, local concerns. I love the Letters to the Editor section of our town's paper. This is where I find out what people are really thinking, regardless of what the national talking heads say we're thinking.
Sure, joke all you like about tuning in and hearing the hog report. But you know, Farmer Fred out there needs that hog report. Who knows, maybe the next news bit will relate to you. Maybe it'll be about the high test scores at your son's school. Or the results of your daughter's softball game last night. Or maybe - just maybe - it'll be a friendly voice telling you where you can find heat, food, and companionship on a long, cold night when your power goes out and you feel all alone in the world.