I’ve found myself working at home a lot lately ($4 a gallon on makes that a viable option). I have to be careful not to turn on the television because that tends to be too big of a distraction, my eyes, even as bad as they are, can’t be in two places at once. So my answer for noise in the man cave is the faithful Alexa and days full of talk show radio. Yep, I’m one of those nerds, and except for a couple of hours with Kentucky Sports Radio, my dial is tuned to The Big One, 700 WLW, the Nation’s Station.

A couple of weeks ago, WLW celebrated its 100th anniversary and it was a fascinating day on the station as they played old clips and interviews, For a history buff as myself, especially local history and Cincinnati entertainment history. the day was a complete joy that brought back so many memories. (Side note: If history teachers in our local schools are not taking time out of the prescribed “curriculum” to teach about local history, they are doing their students an extreme disservice.)

My first memories of WLW naturally revolve around history and sports. My first recollection comes on a night many years ago when my dad and I were in the car sitting at a stoplight in Ripley that no longer exists and suddenly all the sirens in town started to go off, and we had no clue why. A quick turn of the radio to The Big One informed us that the whole country was doing the same thing to celebrate the end of American involvement in Vietnam. (At least that’s how I recall it.)

My second memory came in October 1972 when my family and I were at Riverfront Stadium for Game 5 of the NLCS, Reds-Pirates. I’m sure that most of you can remember that game, the dramatic Johnny Bench game-tying home run in the bottom of the ninth followed by George Foster scoring on a Bob Moose wild pitch to give the Reds the NL pennant. That in itself was plenty of excitement fora 12-year old kid but I distinctly remember the car ride home and the radio on WLW. The Music Professor, Jim LaBarbara (remember him?) kept playing the song “Everybody Plays the Fool” and dedicating it to Bob Moose.

The older I got, the more I listened to the characters on WLW, beginning of course with the hilarious antics of afternoon host Gary Burbank. Can anyone who listened forget Earl Pitts, Gilbert Gnarley, Rev. Deuteronomy Skaggs, Dan Buckles, The Big Fat Balding Guy with a Stubby Cigar in his Mouth and his Pants Half-Zipped, Synonymous Bengal, Eunice and Bernice, and the list goes on. 3-6 in the afternoon was must-hear radio.

And who can ever forget a must-hear part of the afternoon, “We don’t, we don’t, we don’t mess around!”

Of course, there was also “Willie”. Bill Cunningham, who I still listen to to this day, was a loud, sometimes obnoxious personality who made it a point to offend callers and viewers and anyone else within earshot, but it was all a carefully contrived act. Cunningham is actually a very intelligent Cincinnati lawyer, believe it or not. I still look forward every day to listening to Willie and the Seg Man and the “Stooge Report”.

Of course, sports talk radio was an important part of my listening day, starting with Cris Collinsworth and then moving to Bob Trumpy, who both were outstanding at the job. Whenever I can now, especially when I’m out driving, I tune in to WLW to listen to Lance McAlister, who may be the best of them all. Lance and I seem to have had very parallel childhoods and I’d love to sit down with him and discuss growing up with wiffle ball and baseball cards.

Of course, sports and WLW will always go together as long as there is Cincinnati Reds baseball. When I was a young pup, every single game was not televised as it is today, so you relied on the radio to follow the Reds. How many of you remember going to sleep at night listening to those baseball games from the West Coast and then scrambling to the newspapers the next day to see who won and analyze the box score? Around our house, it was my grandmother and her tattered transistor radio that went everywhere with her as she listened to Marty and Joe all over the house. My favorite player was George Foster and I would tell her, “Let George do it.” We buried that transistor radio with her and I like to think she is still listening.

Today my day begins with Mike McConnell, who took the place of Jim Scott, who was a morning staple in our home, my wife tuning him in every morning while she showered and got ready for the day. Then it’s on to Scott Sloan (“Sloanie”) before Willie shows up at noon. Then a little bit of Eddie and Rocky in the afternoon, and Lance from 6-9. It’s a pretty nice work environment to be honest.

When I made a Facebook post on the day of WLW”s 100th birthday, someone commented with just the letters “JFPO”, assuming that I was supposed to know what it meant. That was an easy one- James Francis Patrick O’Neill, ‘The Morning Mayor”. Do you remember him?

There seems to be just one proper way to end this column.

You know what makes me sick? You know what makes me so angry…” Well. I’ll just leave it there.