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What WRTI Meant to Me

Posted by Jerry Klein on December 20, 1997

I was never happy about the decision to change WRTI-FM to an all-jazz format. That's the primary reason I was not involved with the station after the change was made. I was student station manager of WRTI-FM during my junior year; in my senior year, I wasn't even on the staff.

About 10 years later, I wrote to Professor Blenheim (prompted, I imagine, by the station crowing about it's tenth anniversary as an all-jazz station). I told him why I disagreed with the decision, and why I felt the old WRTI had been so valuable. I have never showed this letter to anyone else. But now, I feel the time is right to share it with anyone who valued WRTI the way it used to be. And if you're reading this, that describes you.

NOTE: More interesting stuff follows this letter.

Mount Laurel, N.J. 08054
January 9, l978


Dr. Laurence Blenheim
School of Communications and Theater
Temple University
Philadelphia, Pa. 19122


Dear Dr. Blenheim:

I recently came across in my files a few copies of the WRTI-FM Program Guide for the Spring of 1969. When I helped write it, it was the first comprehensive program guide the station had published in ten years; to my knowledge, there has not been another since. But it has prompted me to write to you to share my thoughts about the current operations of the station.

I have been greatly distressed over the past several years by the policy decision that made WRTI an all-jazz station. I realize that there was a felt need to make the station more responsive to the needs of the community surrounding the Temple campus. And I agree that efforts should be made to help satisfy that need.

But I feel the transformation to all-jazz destroys the effectiveness of WRTI as a teaching tool of the School of Communications and Theater, which was and I feel should still be, the primary purpose of the station.

When I was a student, WRTI was available as a resource to any RTF student and to many non-RTF students as well. Its programming was as diverse as the students themselves. There was every type of music being played: classical, jazz, broadway, popular, folk, underground rock, big bands, even WDVR-style "elevator music." And there were diverse other types of programming: news, of the world, the nation, the city and the campus; current affairs, commentary and discussion; ethnic programming, including black-oriented and foreign language programs; religious programs; documentaries; and radio drama. A glance at the program guide will reveal the breadth of the fare.

Granted, this sort of programming is as dead as the dinosaurs in the world of commercial broadcasting. But WRTI should not be a station cast in the commercial mold. It should rather be an electronic coelacanth, bridging the gap between today and yesterday, providing, in the process, worlds of available knowledge.

It is a grave mistake for WRTI to operate as an all-jazz station, for this limits access to the station to those students interested in one narrow area, jazz. A few other students may be able to find niches in news or administration but the range of available choices is nevertheless severely limited. Further, those students who do get to work at WRTI are deprived of the rich background of experience which only a station like WRTI could offer. An alumnus of WRTI today is only prepared to work at one kind of radio station; an alumnus of the old WRTI came away with the breadth of experience to be able to fit into virtually any type of commercial format, and in many non-broadcast areas as well.

I have worked in commercial broadcasting for 10 years, in formats including Top-40, Country and Western, two-way talk, and all-news. The experience I gained at WRTI helped me adapt to each different situation. I fear the same could not be said of more recent graduates.

I have numerous tapes in my library of memorable programs from the old WRTI: some eclectic and eccentric, like the SOME CALL IT MADNESS series; some interesting and richly informative, like Mike Biel's RECORD SHELF or Gerry Wilkinson's 10 part documentary on World War II; some which provide insight into the times, like my own documentary on the Temple dormitory dress code controversy; others which form threads in the fabric of history, like Ron Wertheimer's eulogy for Walt Disney or the 3-hour in-studio concert/interview by a young, yet to be discovered singer named Janis Ian; some just plain entertaining, like the various episodes of Playhouse 90.1; others downright silly, like THE RADIO SHOW series.

Whatever their shortcomings by professional standards, these were programs which are just as alive today as they were when they were broadcast. They were the efforts of young, vital people, trying to say something meaningful, or useful, or entertaining. And they enabled those people to grow as broadcasters, to expand their horizons beyond a pair of turntables and a stack of LP's.

Sad to say, there is no such wealth of material and experience in today's WRTI. It has become a mimic of countless commercial formula-music stations. A person who leaves WRTI today has learned to spin a disc and to rip and read a newscast, but precious little else. They do not carry with them dreams of doing what others have not done. They are mere technicians graduating from a school which should be inspiring artists.

Sincerely,

Gerhart L. Klein (Jerry Klein) SCAT '70

I don't recall that Dr. Blenheim ever replied to this letter, but he did write to me about a month later, in response to another letter I had sent enclosing some WRTI memorabilia. He spoke fondly of the "good old days" and "the marvelous young people" at WRTI. Here is a scan of that actual letter from Dr. Blenheim.

The letter by John Roberts that Dr. Blenheim referred to was the one John wrote for the May 12, 1967 Annual Banquet program, in which he rejoiced in the variety of programming on WRTI-FM.

Interesting footnote: For sevefral years, I was on the professional advisory board for WBZC-FM, the campus radio station at Burlington County College, a 2-year school in Pemberton, N.J. When the station was still in the planning stages, I related my experiences at WRTI and urged the station to adopt a similar approach to formatting. I am pleased to say that they did, to a great degree. I am even more pleased to tell you that WBZC-FM, in its first year of existence (1995-96), won the Best College Radio Station award from the National Association of Collegiate Broadcasters.

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