KINK IS BORN Christmas Day, 1968, and a time of change was taking place as we prepared to move into the new decade. Man was about to walk on the moon, demonstrations were taking place against our military involvement in Vietnam and Richard Nixon was about to be sworn in as president.
King Broadcasting out of Seattle, owned by Dorothy Bullitt, decided to start an FM radio station called KGW FM in Portland, Oregon where they already owned KGW TV and KGW AM radio.
FM stations in the 1960s were rare and a huge gamble as virtually no one listened to FM radio. However, Mrs. Bullitt , never one to be deterred, hired John David to build KGW FM, an all automated “beautiful music” station. Here's an early brainstorming memo.
*To learn more about Dorothy Bullitt and her remarkable life watch the video to the right.
Because FM stations were such a risky investment this new station would only be owned by KING Broadcasting for 3 years and then sold in hopes of making a profit. KING Broadcasting already owned a television station (KGW TV) and an AM radio station (KGW AM) so not much money or energy was put into their soon to be FM station (KGW FM).
John David decided he wanted to do more with this new FM station and play rock 'n roll rather than “beautiful music”. He also wanted different call letters. Here's a memo from 1968 discussing which call letters to choose.
John David realized that the only station in the area playing rock was KISN AM and, more importantly, no FM radio station was playing rock. John decided to hire a guy by the name of Jeff Douglas in the fall of 1968 to help format the new station. Jeff Douglas was a 22 year old kid, just out of college with practically no programming or on-air radio experience, but he worked around the clock to get the station its signature sound. The original format was AOR “Album Oriented Rock” and played Top 40 hits. Here's our first album shipment.
With $350,000 KING Broadcasting purchased a 100,000 wt antenna, office space, mixing board, cart machine and turn tables. Now all this insignificant FM radio station needed was a name.
Jeff Douglas wanted something catchy and easy to say. KINK was the perfect match. It was easy, catchy and closely related to KING Broadcasting’s call letters and not, as some people believe, related the rock group The KINKS. But before KINK could legally be the station call letters, Jeff Douglas had to make sure KINK wasn’t already being used elsewhere. He called the FCC, and unfortunately he received bad news; a shipping company out of California was using those call letters for one of their ships. He decided to call the shipping company in hopes of purchasing the call letters if the shipping company was will to sell. To his delight Jeff discovered the ship using the KINK call letters sank two years prior leaving KINK free and available.
Now that KINK had a name, format, location, equipment and at least one DJ (Jeff Douglas) it was ready to hit the airwaves.
December 25, 1968 at 6:00 a.m. KINK went on the air as KINK The Underground Link at KINK 102 fm. However, as we all know, KINK broadcasts at 101.9. Well, in those days radio dials didn’t have 101.9. They only had 102, so that is why KINK for so many years called itself KINK FM 102. “If we ever said KINK 101.9 fm we got in trouble,” recalls Les Sarnoff.
Pictured above is KINK's first advertisement, which ran the day before KINK went on the air.
KINK’s studio at that time was all of 2 small rooms or “closets” as Jeff Douglas remembers. A combined total of 460 square feet was all the room KINK was given. This allowed for 2 turn tables and 2 cart machines under the turn tables (pictured right).
For the first year KINK was all automated because there were only 2 people running the entire station - John David and Jeff Douglas. Listen to Jeff’s story of the first day of KINK and how he slept in the women’s bathroom because it was the only place that had a bed.
After the first year KGW AM adopted the same AOR Top 40 hits format and Jeff Douglas decided to take the station in another direction. He started playing folk music with some rock and in his words, “basically made it up” as he went along. Here's a playlist from October 1969. This approach helped the station differentiate its self from all the other stations. Listen as Jeff Douglas explains this shift.
1969
Jeff Douglas hires Bruce Funkhauser to host the evening shift as Jeff continues to host the morning shift. Soon after that Jeff Douglas becomes the station manager and Bruce becomes KINK’s second Program Director.
Jeff also hires Mike Bailey in 1969. Mike uses the moniker “Lee Nelson” during his first stint at KINK. He would go on to use one more nick name before finally using his own name on-air. Listen as Mike talks about why he used different names on-air.
During this time KINK is "Free Form." If a DJ liked an artist they played them. Because of this, many artists got their start on KINK over the years. One such artist happened to be the college roommate of KINK Program Director Bruce Funkhauser’s wife. Listen here to find out who that artist was.
The 1960s have come to an end and the dico filled 1970s are not far away. Needing only to survive for 2 more years, the future of KINK is uncertain. John David and Jeff Douglas are working 16 hour days to keep the station afloat and scraping by on literally no budget. Little do they know that in just a few years KINK will develope a following that will help transport this "insignificant" FM station on a beautiful journey through time. Let's find out what happens next...
Jeff Douglas wanted something catchy and easy to say. KINK was the perfect match. It was easy, catchy and closely related to KING Broadcasting’s call letters and not, as some people believe, related the rock group The KINKS. But before KINK could legally be the station call letters, Jeff Douglas had to make sure KINK wasn’t already being used elsewhere. He called the FCC, and unfortunately he received bad news; a shipping company out of California was using those call letters for one of their ships. He decided to call the shipping company in hopes of purchasing the call letters if the shipping company was will to sell. To his delight Jeff discovered the ship using the KINK call letters sank two years prior leaving KINK free and available.
KINK’s studio at that time was all of 2 small rooms or “closets” as Jeff Douglas remembers. A combined total of 460 square feet was all the room KINK was given. This allowed for 2 turn tables and 2 cart machines under the turn tables (pictured right).
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