The year 2007 in radio involved some significant events. [edit] Events - January 8: Nanci "The Fabulous Sports Babe" Donnellan returns to radio after a six-year absence, filling in for local hosts in Florida.
- March 6: Air America Radio restructures, with politician Mark J. Green and his brother Stephen Green at the helm. Among the changes (see also "Closures"):
- April 4: On Imus in the Morning: talk show host Don Imus refers on-air to the Rutgers University women's basketball team as "nappy-headed hos" and starts a national controversy about racism and free speech during comedy.
- April 12: The Imus in the Morning talk show is canceled by MSNBC, and host Don Imus is fired for remarks made about the Rutgers University women's basketball team. The controversy evolved into firing as a violation of the civil rights of free speech.
- June 12: Citadel Broadcasting's purchase of most ABC Radio assets closes, and restructuring takes place.
- June 29: Tom Kent resigns as host of his programs on the TKO Radio Network, the network he launched as a 24-hour network in the same year; he maintains ownership of the network and is replaced behind the microphone by John Landecker and Marty Thompson.
- July 1: Art Bell retires (again) from his weekend hosting gig at Coast to Coast AM.
- July 12: WCBS-FM 101.1 New York drops its Jack format after two years and returns to Oldies.
- July 16: Mike and the Mad Dog become "nationally syndicated" with its first affiliate outside New York State, WQYK in Tampa, Florida. According to host Mike Francesa, more affiliates are in the works.
- July 30: Pardon the Interruption returns to ESPN Radio.
- August 10: ABC Radio discontinues syndication of Larry Elder; his show continues on KABC in Los Angeles and reverts to a local show. All other affiliates are switched over to Mark Levin's show, also syndicated by ABC in the same time slot.
- August 17: Dan Patrick leaves his position at ESPN Radio.
- October 1: Patrick returns on KLAC in Los Angeles and syndicated through the Content Factory.
- October 5: Long-time Pittsburgh CHR station "B94", returns to the air after flipping to rock (and later "male" talk) in 2004.
- October 8: WEXM (formerly WNOU) in Indianapolis, Indiana changes to Christmas music, the first station in the country to do so, as a "stunt format" for the next three months. The first non-stunting stations to change over were KCKC in Kansas City and KOSY-FM in Salt Lake City, for the second year in a row, on the evening of October 31, among several other stations.
- October 29: Astral Media takes over almost all of the former broadcasting assets of Standard Broadcasting in Canada.
- October 31: The Greaseman resigns as host of WMET's morning show to focus on Internet ventures.
- November 3: Roger Hedgecock assumes a position as the host of a national weekly talk show.
- December 3: Imus in the Morning is revived on WABC and the ABC Radio network.
- December 5: J. R. Gach is knocked off the Internet airwaves after a lawsuit involving comments he made in February 2006 is settled for nearly a million dollars.
- December 21: Gary Burbank, WLW radio personality and voice of Earl Pitts, retires.
- December 26 - WIBC in Indianapolis, Indiana moves its news/talk format to 93.1 FM. The station's AM frequency flipped to sports as WFNI.
[edit] Debuts [edit] Closings - The Al Franken Show. February 14. Franken left his show on Air America Radio to run for the U.S. Senate in Minnesota.
- Free FM. In a series of moves beginning in May 2007, CBS Radio phased out the hot talk network by changing several stations' formats and rebranding most others.
- CHUM Limited absorbed into CTVglobemedia June 22
- Classical music station WFMR in Milwaukee ends 51 years on the air when the station flips to a smooth jazz format as WJZX June 26
- Adventures in Good Music: Producer and distributor WCLV announced "with great regret" that it would broadcast and syndicate its last encore episode of Adventures in Good Music with Karl Haas on June 29, 2007.
- July 1 - Art Bell announced his retirement from weekend hosting, effective immediately, but will host occasional shows in the future.
- Greenstone Media. August 17. Women's talk network folds after slightly over a year on the air. The network only gained 8 affiliates in its short life.
- Washington Post Radio. September 19. The short-lived attempt at a long-form commercial all-news radio station in the style of NPR, run by the Washington Post, ended as Bonneville switches its network of stations to 3WT Talk Radio.
- Matt Drudge's Sunday night show. September 30. Drudge left the timeslot; Premiere Radio Networks replaced him with Bill Cunningham.
- ABC News & Talk. September 24. Closed by ABC Radio in restructuring.
- October 18: WPEP at Taunton, Massachusetts has its license canceled so WNSH-Beverly, Massachusetts can increase to 30kW. They were on the same frequency: 1570 kHz.
- Satellite Sisters. November 9. Cancelled by ABC Radio in restructuring.
- Wake Up With Whoopi. November 30. The show, hosted by Whoopi Goldberg, was cancelled by WKTU in New York City after low ratings.
- Doug Hoerth. December 3. Renda Broadcasting, owners of WPTT in Pittsburgh, announce they are not renewing Hoerth's contract after a ten-year run as the station's morning and later afternoon host.
- December 20 - After three years as "Diva 92.3" WDVW/New Orleans flips from Rhythmic/Dance to Adult Top 40 as "Mix 92.3."
- John London's Inferno. December 25. The show failed in syndication due to a lack of affiliates.
[edit] Deaths - Vida Jane Butler, 84, radio announcer, voice-over artist. also known as "Janie Joplin."
- Geoff Cannell, 65, Manx Member of the House of Keys and sports broadcaster, stroke
- Herb Carneal, 83, American sportscaster, radio broadcaster for Minnesota Twins MLB team, congestive heart failure
- Ann Colone, 77, Fort Wayne, Indiana broadcaster
- David Hatch, BBC Radio producer and comedian
- Benedict Kiely, 87, Irish writer and broadcaster
- Chris Mainwaring, 41, Australian footballer for the West Coast Eagles, television and radio sports journalist
- Tawn Mastrey, 53, American radio disc jockey (KNAC), hepatitis C. [1]
- Joe Nuxhall, 79, American baseball player and broadcaster (Cincinnati Reds), pneumonia and multiple cancers.
- Phil Rizzuto, 89, American baseball player, Hall of Fame inductee and sports broadcaster, pneumonia
- Ned Sherrin, 76, British broadcaster and theatre producer, throat cancer. [2]
- Bob Sievers, 90, American radio broadcaster on WOWO (1932-1987)
- Paul Sullivan, 50. Overnight host at WBZ
- Mike Webb, 41. American radio host at KIRO, known for his extreme liberal viewpoints. Killed by an axe murderer.
- Pete Wilson, 62, Long time talk show host at KGO.
- Stan Zemanek, Australian radio broadcaster
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