Joe Bartlett's Goodbye

Joe says goodbye to his Saturday Morning Show listeners as he prepares for retirement.

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Now more of the Saturday Morning showon seven to ten wo R. Here
again is Joe Bartlett. All Right, good morning, and sadly, this
is my last Saturday's show as I'mgoing to retire at the end of the
month. And I gotta tell you, honestly, I can't tell you how
long I've been doing this. Iused to rely on my friend Doug Parcels
to keep track of these things,but sadly we lost him a couple of

(00:25):
years ago. So from my recollection, I think it started back in either
two thousand and five or two thousandand six a George Meet our traffic guy,
and I went to the owner ofa station at the time, Red
Buckley, pitched the show to himbecause you know, they really had nothing
going on here on Saturday, andhe gave us a shot. And when
it began, it was just acouple of guys hanging out on the radio

(00:46):
talking about things. It was fun, and I think it was like a
three hour show at first, andobviously it's been shaved down to just an
hour with me and the last holdout, Mike from o'harris, who had just
heard from you know. When Ifirst started, it was an opportunity to
use my creative side, because backthen news was pretty straightforward. It's not

(01:07):
the opinionated, bias, splintered messthat we have today. And it's been
great to be part of war allthese years. And you know, it
started when my radio career started backin nineteen seventy two. I was just
out of community college majoring in computerprogramming at that time, and I started
at a station called w A bY in Albany. I was playing tapes

(01:29):
overnight. Then I got a fulltime job at wk AJ in Saratoga Springs,
and I considered that my college education. I considered that I graduated from
Kent Jones University. Kent Jones wasthe owner of that station, and he
was a doozy, a tough guyto work for, and you learned an

(01:49):
awful lot. And I learned morein those four years working at w KAJ
than I could have gained in eightyears at any college. And from there
I went to well w t RI when Troy was a rock station,
and then eventually to w ROW inAlbany, which was interesting because w ROW.

(02:09):
From there I went to w oR. So the letters are similar,
and believe it or not, Thisis kind of creepy. The telephone
numbers for both newsrooms were the samenumbers, just in different order, so
that the number in the Albany stationthe same telephone numbers, just in different
order as when I went to warin New York. Was kind of kind

(02:29):
of creepy, but you know,I guess it must have meant that this
is where I needed to be priorto moving to w R. It was
the summer of eighty six. Iwent into the city for a week to
be part of the coverage of thebi centennial of the Statue of Liberty.
Because at that point I started nineteeneighty actually being on WR as a stringer.

(02:52):
I covered the Albany legislature and hereI am just this dumb route from
Albany, had no idea when Igot down there where the GW Bridge was.
The next thing, you know,I'm doing stories in New York.
Then short time after that I wasoffered a full time job, and then
within eight months of being hired,approximately eight months, I became the managing

(03:15):
editor, taking over for John McConnell. I think he went to United Stations
eventually went to head ABC. Amonth or two later. The news director
Bernie Gershon went to ABC and thenI became the acting news director. So
it's been a fun run. Andyou know, radio is huge. When
I first started, there was noreal cable morning TV shows were really not

(03:38):
what they are now. Obviously,no internet or digital media to compete with.
And when I first arrived in thenewsroom, believe or not, it
looked like the newsroom from a majornewspaper. It was a huge, whole
room, whole office, a sectionof the building. We had an editor
in the middle of the room satthere on an elevated desk. Writers who

(04:00):
wrote. One wrote for the tophour, one wrote for the bottom hour.
We had desk assistants who had gatheredthe audio and the sound bites and
they would take the phone reports infrom reporters. They would rip the news
wire. At that point we stillhad news wire, but we were just
transitioning to computers. We had afull time sports guy, we had a
full time business reporter. We hada guy doing the weather, our own

(04:24):
weather guy, and of course GeorgeMeat flying the helicopter, and that was
big stuff. And obviously that's allchanged and we covered the major news.
We didn't get it from our networksat that point. I remember early on
when I got there, Pana oneoh three was blown up over Scotland.
We sent a guy to Lockerbie,Scotland. There was an earthquake in San
Francisco. We sent a reporter atSan Francisco. Didn't rely on anybody else

(04:45):
to do that. I remember MarioCuomo going to Russia when he was exploring
a run for president. I gotto go with him. It was amazing.
It was an amazing trip to Moscowand Saint Petersburg, Leningrad. We
used to broadcast live from at Hampshirepresidential primary. Would go up there Hampshire,
freeze our butts off and follow thecandidates around, and we covered all

(05:05):
the political conventions live, every inaugurationand it's been a great run. I
remember one of the highlights, manyof the highlights, but one highlight I
remember is John R. Gambling wasgoing to broadcast from around the world for
two weeks in a different city everyday around the world, different city for

(05:25):
two weeks, and obviously he neededpeople to do the prep works for him.
So I went around to a lotof these places to pre record the
stories for him or get the youknow, the information he's going to need.
So I remember the strip Manchester,England, London, England, Munich,
Berlin, Bahrain, Singapore and KualaLumpur, all in about a week

(05:46):
and a half. It was.It was an amazing trip, you know,
between different languages, different currencies,different hotels. Your head was spinning.
But you know, it's obviously alot of things have changed. I
survived three for an owners, startingwith r KO, then they sold to
Rick Buckley. It was great anda kind guy, and then the current
owner I Heard Radio, which it'sbeen very, very good to me.

(06:10):
And you know, over the courseof the years have been a lot of
changes to the morning show too.I mean I started with John a gambling
It was a giant in his day, and of course his son, John
R. Came to continue the traditionof gamblings hosting the morning show and that
lasted for seventy years until surprising JohnR. Was fired. I'll never forget
that day. It was just arrivingat a soccer game and John calls me

(06:32):
and says I've been fired. What, Oh my god. His replacement was
Ed Walsher, guy who I didknow, and John at least got a
chance to say goodbye. He cameback. I think it was a Monday,
and then a Tuesday I had tofill in for the morning show for
John R. Gambling after he'd beenreplaced him. So obviously the listeners were

(06:55):
very very upset, to say theleast, And yeah, we got through
it. So Ed who was eventuallyfired. I worked with Don hanover and
then John came back and it's look, it's it's It's been a great time
and the last couple of years havebeen very, very good, and at
some point it just has to end. So I have a lot of people

(07:15):
that I would like to thank,So first off, my wife Jean,
who has been my biggest supporter offthe year and who has put up with
the crazy hours that come with thisjob. So I owe a great thank
you to her. Also Bertie Gershawn, who was the first news director that
hired me, and then of courseJohn A. Gambling. Before I was
hired at WAR, I was workingat a radio station, the one in

(07:38):
Albany w Row believe it or not, towards the latter part of that it
was owned by John A. Gamblingand he was instrumental in bringing me to
WAR. I remember every time Iwould see him, he'd say, sure,
beats Albany, Joe. And thenof course his son John R.
Worked with him for many years untilhe retired. I also owe a big

(07:58):
debt to Rick Buckley, who boughtw O. R. And provided me
with a great living, as wellas all the managers that I worked with
him a Rick's right hand guy,Joe Ballada, are general managers, Bob
Bruno, Jerry Crowley, a wholelot of other great people as well.
A great Rick Buckley story. Igotta tell you this. When they were
firing while the changing the Morning showwas me and Donna and they were bringing

(08:20):
John back. Oh my god,I'm done. So I walk into the
office and I don't see the HRperson, So that's a good sign.
So Rick, the owner of GeneralMandress in there and he says, don't
worry, everything's gonna be fine.And at one point, you know,
I asked him for a contract andhe said, you don't need a contract
your family. Rick Buckley, greatguy. Also, I want to thank

(08:41):
the management in iHeart now. Theybought war from Buckley, and very often
what happens when that thing goes,everybody's fired. But they have a great
group of stations here. I wasfortunate to be able to continue to work
here and very very extremely fortunate tobe able to do the last three years
here from South Carolina, so veryvery fortune. Also, I want to
thank before I forget Terry Traam,my news producer back in New York,

(09:03):
who made all of this possible.You know, I couldn't do it without
his support. And I also wantto thank you the War listeners. Miss
getting the chances every week to talkto you here about the top stories and
news on Saturday mornings and during theMorning Show with Lennon Michael introducing you to
some great guests. But I wantto thank you for all of your support

(09:24):
over the years, and I wantto wash you good luck and godspeed.
So long.