Up to this point, I had nothing on my mind but radio. However, I was getting older -and for whatever reason my visits to WBBF started to diminish. I had a paper route that got me up at 4am. I had school work, and I’d discovered girls. Plus I was about to embark on a new career. Until the age of 14, Bowl-A-Roll was a place to hang out, play pinball, bowl and goof with friends. When I turned 14, I gave up the paper route and decided to find a “real job”. There was an opening at Bowl-A-Roll for a part-timer and I was up for the job as was Dick Zornow. We’d learned by hanging out and befriending some of the other guys who worked there, that it was pretty easy to fix those big man-eating pinspotters. I was almost as fascinated by those machines as I was radio -just in that they did all of that stuff by themselves. In Charlotte, we had Charlotte Lanes - a 16 lane facility with PINBOYS. One kid watched two lanes. Cleared away the fallen pins, return the ball, and reset the pins. Now I’m in suburbia and the pinboys are history. 32 Lanes, and they were all automatic. I got the job (and Dick Zornow threatened my life) - as well as losing a friend. Here’s a video of how those machines work.

Early in my weekend career I was still delivering papers. I’d get up at 4, deliver the papers and then head down to Bowl-A-Roll. Ray Conrad (Charlie’s brother) was in school, on his way to becoming a hell of a bowler, and working part-time conditioning the lanes. He had to do it at 6am before school. I’d stop by to keep him company, bowl a few games and smoke cigars. (Sorry, Mom.) It was 90 minutes of fun every day…and it cost me nothing. On the weekends, we had to stay behind the machines in case something went wrong. There were leagues, and as soon as we could get those folks out of there they could rake in the dough with “open” bowling. TWO things kept my radio interest alive. One was the Juke Box (and the hits) and the other was the Public Address System. There was a mic at the control desk for paging people when their lanes were ready, when they had a phone call or when a budding young disc jockey wanted to “intro” the songs playing on the jukebox at 6am.

I learned a sport I was almost good at, got PLENTY of exercise running back and forth between broken down machines and almost had a career going as a bowling alley mechanic. That was until the owner’s grandson needed a summer job and I was let go. Immediately I got a job stocking shelves at Agostinelli’s Market. That lasted until I had an argument with the owner and was sent packing. By that time I was driving, and Sy Kurlan hired me as his delivery boy. That way I got to listen to the radio while I was passing prescriptions to suburbia. It was also where I met Jerry Brown. Kurlan’s had a store on Jefferson Avenue in the inner city - a part of the city that was ravaged during the civil rights riots of the mid 60’s. It was before I started working there, but all of a sudden I had to drive into a mostly African-American neighborhood and lots of times was chauffering Jerry back to Jefferson Avenue. He was a very cool cat. It was my first real intterracial experience and taught me a whole lot.

Oh, I was still interested in radio. I picked up the first Beatles records as soon as they came out. We visited WSAY several times off and on, and befriended the Afternoon guys in 1964 - first was Frank Sbelgio (who got in trouble for thanking us on the air for a cake we brought him) and Pat Barrett. Both were Jerry Jack. Both were very good. Frank went on to places like Auburn, Harrisburg, and other points unknown. I don’t know what happened to Pat. I got an Emerson 5-tube radio for Christmas in 1963, and discovered WKBW, WLS, WABC, WCFL, WSAI and some other distant stations. I also discovered Gene Shepherd and Joe Pyne on WHEC. Those were shows where they didn’t play music. They just talked. WHEC used to run “The Shadow” at night as well. It reminded me of the early days of “The Lone Ranger”. I was just fascinated by the medium. Televison was cool, but it couldn’t hold a candle to the fun that came out of those little radio speakers. I got my first FM radio in ‘64, a little portable that would pick up WYSL-FM from Buffalo. That was my introduction to Top 40 on FM. Boy did it sound different. ‘KB would come in from Buffalo (80 miles away) but would fade in and out. WYSL-FM was there, was strong and crystal clear. That FM stuff had something going for it. I also tried to keep my lines of communication open with WSAY. Our high school’s rock band “The Angry Young Men” recorded an album. I was designated to be the one to present it to local radio. That’s cause I knew where WSAY’s offices were. While I was there, I asked if I could apply for a job. I was 15 or so. They said “No, you have to be 18″. I didn’t understand that, ’cause I was working already. I knew how to run a board (in fact had run a board on Pat Barrett’s shift one day -impressed the hell out of the other guys who were with me), so why couldn’t they hire me? I didn’t have a driver’s license and couldn’t drive at night. Case closed for now. My radio career had started in 1960 with a visit to the NUMBER ONE STATION in town, and continued with my basement station equipped by parts and bits and pieces of other stuff-along with my first tape recorder (an Emerson) bought with S and H Green Stamps. It wouldn’t just end like that.