back when racing broadcasts actually attracted listeners!
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4BK also broadcast races for many years but dis continued them I think in the mid 70s.
I didn’t know that, I wasn’t here in Brisbane in the 70’s,I only remember 4BC having racing broadcasts until late 1991
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Yes 4BK had Keith Noud calling Brisbane Races Des Hoysted in Sydney & Bill Collins in Melbourne Keith Noud called races on the ABC for many years before moving to 4BK replacing Tom Foley.
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4BK would have got interstate races through 3DB. In Victoria for many years there were three racing stations: ABC Radio 2 (the regional network, with Joe Brown and later Greg Miles calling all Melbourne races, they often interrupted the 3LO football call)), 3UZ (with Bert Bryant as its chief caller) and 3DB (Bill Collins, he also worked for HSV-7 doing sports reports on the news and heading the racing coverage on World of Sport). 3UZ used to have country music playing in between races. Then around 1984 3UZ dropped horse racing for a full time “hits and memories” format called “mUZic” (I remember the bumper stickers), while 3DB was the only Melbourne racing station. This continued until 1988 when the Victorian TAB and racing clubs bought 3UZ and they took over from 3DB as Melbourne’s only racing station. 3DB couldn’t survive without racing, so its new owners ARN changed format to “Classic Hits” and name to 3TT. At that same time ABC radio ceased broadcasting Saturday racing to its country stations.
Also late 1991 was when Brisbane racing broadcasts changed from 4BC to TAB Radio (which took over the 1008 frequency from 4IP which closed down at that time).
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From “Radio Stations - Hourly Logs” thread:
Still on the topic of 2WS, here’s an aircheck of them from April 1986: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KL9MhNVMYCY
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Here’s a full morning show with Clive Robertson on 2BL/ABC Radio Sydney from 1977. Mainstream music seems to take a much more prominent place than it currently does on ABC radio.
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It’s almost all music at 5pm in the afternoon, unheard of now.
Today marks 15 years since C91.3 at Campbelltown in Sydney’s south-west first went to air.
The WIN-owned station, who also owns i98 in Wollongong, was launched on 15th August 2001, just 4 months after Nova 96.9 took the Sydney airwaves by storm. It was also the time when WSFM & 9inety6ix.1 (now The Edge) was preparing to move out of Seven Hills in Sydney’s west to North Ryde, providing the perfect opportunity for C91.3 to fill the void, at least for Campbelltown & the Macarthur region.
Its original line-up consisted of Rob Duckworth for breakfast, Stuart Cranney in mornings, Byron Webb (now at Smooth) in afternoons, Rob Doorey in drive & Nick O’Rourke at nights. Its original music positioner is “The Biggest Variety of Rock & Pop”, but was more rock-skewed from memory. In fact, it was probably the earliest example of a ‘variety hits’ (aka “Jack FM”) format on any commercial FM station within listening distance of Sydney before Triple M, 2GO, Vega (now Smooth) & Wave FM followed that trend a few years later. The best known music feature for the station was the “Classic 9 @ 9” at 9am weekdays, where Cranney plays 9 songs with a particular theme. That ran from August 2001 to December 2005.
In 2006, the station became more CHR-skewed, with the “Classic 9 @ 9” dumped from the schedule after Rob Doorey (who has moved from drive) took up the breakfast slot, which was extended to 10am. In 2008, the station then took the same music log as i98. In that same year, Stuart Cranney was dumped from the station after 7 years & a number of voicetracked/networked programming from i98 was introduced, which meant that on weekdays from 12pm, C91.3’s programming came from Wollongong. That meant that the station was no longer as local as it was compared to the first few years, and as a result, the station’s popularity in the region was plummeting, marking 2008-09 as a dark period for C91.3.
In 2010, Rob Doorey moved to mornings to make way for Jabba to take up the breakfast slot. Local afternoons & drive programming was reinstated, with Mike Goldman doing drive. In that same year, the station also reinstated its own music log.
In early 2011, after Jabba & Mike Goldman left the station after they didn’t want to move to the region, Stuart Cranney returned to the station to do breakfast, which aired until 10am. This also sees the return of an old music feature favourite for the station, now titled “Cranney’s 9 @ 9”, which aired until 2014. Also in that same year, the station reinstated its local evening program. In 2014, Josh & Lyndal took up breakfast, with Stuart Cranney moved to his original timeslot of mornings & Rob Doorey to afternoons. Last year, Rob Doorey was made redundant from the station, leaving Stuart Cranney as the only person left standing (despite being absent between 2008 & 2011) on the station since it first came on air.
Today, C91.3 is perhaps the most live & local commercial FM station anywhere in the Sydney region, especially with most of the metro commercial FM stations taking national programming from drive time onwards. Its key point-of-difference isn’t so much about the music played, but more about its localism that is relevant to Campbelltown & the Macarthur region.
On that note, happy 15th birthday, C91.3!! 
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Back in the late 1930s and early 1940s the Australian government declared the Jehovah’s Witnesses a subversive organisation, consequently shutting down their radio stations 2HD, 5KA and 5AU, and nationalising 4AT. Two other stations owned by the Jehovah’s Witnesses 7AD (what was 7UV) and 7BU would have been shutdown but were sold before action was taken.
I knew the government had nationalised in the late 1920s the stations that would later form the ABC in 1932, but I didn’t know that they had nationalised another radio station.
From: National Archives of Australia, A467, SF43/26.
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Here’s a week of radio programs in 1977 for Melbourne taken from “Scene”, the weekly TV and showbiz paper.
No FM stations on this page although ABC FM does get its own separate listing on another page. 3MBS and 3RRR (then 3RMT), both on air by 1977, don’t rate a mention at all. AM stations 3EA (what is now SBS Radio) and 3CR also nowhere to be seen.
Some familiar names among the AM dial, though. John Burgess and Brian Bury on 3MP. Peter Hitchener on 3AW. Philip Brady even then on 3AW. Greg Evans no doubt topping the ratings on 3XY. Barry Bissell, later to be heard on Fox FM, was on 3DB. Don Lane and Bert Newton in mornings on 3UZ. Mary Hardy doing afternoons with Geoff Manion on 3AW.
And even then there was AM on 3LO at 8am, while PM was only on 3AR. These days I think PM is on both ABC Local Radio and Radio National.
And 3GL looking very much like a country station, not exactly tackling the Melbourne stations, with music and magazine programs, the trots, gospel and Greek music on Sundays, and closing down overnight!
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It’s sad we’ve lost talk radio in Victoria to just two stations, and the rest sports. Would have been interesting to see 3GL continue on AM and see what would have happened.
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today’s equivalent to 3GL’s then-format now would be the community radio station Pulse FM which carries a similar variety of programming such as sports coverage (albeit no racing), country music, religious programmes and magazine programmes.
Back then there used to be three stations carrying racing: 3UZ, 3GL and 3DB (the latter only doing Saturday races and sometimes Saturday night and weeknight trots).
Surprised that 3AR gets a bigger column than the other stations.
I suspect it’s to do with the programs on 3AR being shorter in duration, thus more detail required.
Another current program still on air is Family Counselor on 3UZ now RSN with Fr Gerard Dowling.
He had a few years at 3DB after 3UZ dumped racing and much of its programming in 1983. I’m not sure at what time Father Dowling went back to 3UZ, though. (Maybe when 3DB did much the same and axed most of its programming after it lost the rights to cover racing before it got sold off entirely)
Radio Auditions, shown on this 1977 listing, was also axed by 3UZ in 1983. I remember my grandmother listened to the show but all I can remember of it was that contestants were judged and awarded a number of gongs. I don’t remember anything of the acts. I think the highest number of gongs you could get was 3 or 4 or something like that. Even back then I thought it seemed very dated, like some remnant of the ‘olden days’ of radio from the 1950s but somehow had survived unscathed until the 1980s.
EDIT: Just found this article on The Age from 1980, just as Radio Auditions was starting its 37th year. So it dates back to the early 1940s and it seems very little had been changed in the show’s format in that time except that it had gone from going to air live to being pre-recorded.
The article does mention, however, that Radio Auditions was one of 3UZ’s highest rating hours even as late as 1980 and that one of its star contestants was a young Barry Crocker. The show was sponsored by Safeway supermarkets, who at the time also happened to sponsor the show’s TV equivalent, New Faces with Bert Newton on Channel 9.
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Some Brisbane radio history - a TV commercial for 4BK from 1983 - “Playing one great soft rock song after another.” 4BK 1300 was actually on 1296kHz though it had originally been on 1300 before the 9kHz frequency spacing was introduced. It is now 4BBB aka Hit105.
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How on earth did this fare in the ratings?
I remember listening to Safeway Radio Auditions on Sunday mornings on 3UZ (growing up in the country it was one of the more powerful signals of the Melbourne commercial AM stations and as such it had a huge reach of much of Victoria), it was on before Newsbeat, then What a Week it Was, then country music all afternoon and early evening (including Nick Erby’s country music show and American Country Countdown with Bob Kingsley) before The Family Counsellor. I do remember John McMahon hosting, Shirley Radford’s piano accompaniment to many of the acts, and some acts were good and others were shocking! I also remember the plugs to Safeway New Faces that night on Channel 9.
Today’s equivalent would be the Hillbilly Hoot, live to air on Three D Radio 93.7 in Adelaide every Monday night, where anyone can get up and do a song live on the radio. The only difference is acts are not judged, there are no $10 shopping vouchers (although there is a meat tray raffle) as prizes, and everyone has a good time doing it!
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I remember being in the Flinders Ranges in South Australia in the 1980s and receiving 3UZ as clear as a local station. Very strong signal and i guess almost a clear channel, i don’t think anywhere else at least on the Eastern states had a station on 927.
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You just know when you make a post like that, someone will contradict you! Also on 927 4CD Gladstone (now 4CC) 
From Brisbane, I found that 3NE originally on 1600 (now 1566) was the clearest Victorian commercial station. Of the Melbourne stations 3KZ (1197) and 3DB (1026) came in pretty well and both were clear frequencies I think. (Frequencies from memory may not be right).