CJJC 850 to 800

[jon]

Remember when CJJC hung up it's cowboy boots and got a new name, a new home and new music? Didn't Ernie Mykyte build new studios next to or below a bowling alley on Glover Road in Langley? I know they didn't stay there for long. In the CKST era they were above a bank or Credit Union on Fraser Highway before moving to Vancouver.

Here's a couple of AM 800 UP Radio jingles and an Ed Bain weather forecast.

AM 800 CJUP

This thread reminded me of a discussion here several years ago about the disaster that was the move from 850 to 800 KHz.

I don't think I mentioned it at the time but, in my youthful innocence, I wrote an Intervention Letter to the CRTC against the move. Rumour at the time was that Joe Chesney took a dislike to me in particular and DX'ers in general as a result of that letter.

Looking back on it now, 40 years later, the presence of KGMI-790 in Bellingham, would make the 800 idea sound like a disaster in the making. KGMI is and was 5000 watts day, non-directional, and 1000 watts night, with a figure 8 pattern with one end of it pushing the equivalent of several thousand watts towards Langley.

If the goal was to "hit" Vancouver, there were certainly other frequencies available that would have been a better choice than 800. With KTAC Tacoma with 10KW in the day, and 50KW KOA in Denver at night, 850 was certainly a lousy frequency. But 800 doesn't sound much better.

I know there was talk in the previous discussion of Joe feeling betrayed by the broadcast engineers who originally designed the 800 pattern and application. But were AM frequencies really that tight in the Lower Mainland back then that a better place to move was not suggested?

[Eldon-Mr.CFAY]

Hi everyone, Interesting comments Jon. I had no idea or memory of you writing to the CRTC about CJJC's move back in the good ole days of the 1970s to 800 AM from 850. Personally I agree with you that it wasn't that smart a frequency move for Langley. Not necessarily because of KGMI 790 either. Later on CFVR Abbotsford went onto 850 and boosted power to 10,000 watts there from their puny 1000 watts on graveyard frequency 1240! I think CJJC could have just increased power on 850 to 10,000 watts and saved the trouble of moving to 800 while also preventing some other station like CFVR from boosting power there!!!! I also think CJJC should have stayed focused on the Western Fraser Valley area of Langley, White Rock and Surrey rather than trying to target the Vancouver City market which has always had plenty of stations. Staying local in radio can make it or break it for you! When CJJC tried to become a big city Vancouver station thats when they blew it!!! Langley has consistently grown over the years, its not some backwater town like Pemberton or Bella Coola with a small population. Right now (too bad Rand McNallley doesn't post more accurate population figures for Langley Township and City). Langley City has close to 30,000 People and Langley Township (which more less surrounds Langley City) has about 110,000 people and is rapidly growning!!! For those who don't know it Langley Township is much bigger in land area than Langley City and also in population. Langley City is a much smaller land area with only about 30,000 population right now. Any figures you see are a bit lower because they are for estimates taken 3 or 4 years ago. With all the damn condos Langley City's current Mayor and council are promoting (I hate condos, leaky condos especially and would never ever buy one!!!) it is also growing quite quickly too.

I personally like Langley Township a whole lot better than Langley City.. The Township includes Murrayville (my favorite area of Langley), Brookswood, Walnut Grove, Fort Langlely and Aldergrove. Langley Township has a totally separate city hall or Township Civic Center (as its called) with separate Mayor and Council from Langley City. Langley City has a different Mayor and council and quite frequently the Township and City don't agree on various issues. Lately its been amalgamation of the Two Langleys!!! City doesn't want to do it because fat Kat local politicians in Langley City are reaping tons of benefits from Condo. development and the Casino tax rewards in the city area!!!!! To give you a bit of Langley History it used to be just one Langley way back before 1955!!!! Then in 1955 residents of the area known then as Langley Prairie separated over the rest of the Township of Langley over a street light dispute, they wanted street lights all over what is now Langley City and felt the rest of Langley Township was too slow in providing it! So all hell broke loose and Langley Prairie (which is now Langley City) separated and started a new town/city hall with different mayor and council. By the way CJJC 850/800 has been the only licensed radio station to ever serve Langley to date. However yours truly and my good friend Trent Karas who operated the Langley Flea Market from 1994 to July 2006 started CFLA-FM at 89.1 in summer of 1995 to summer 1996 with a Ramsey Stereo FM Transmitter (boosted to about 2 watts), automated Sony CD System and cassette equipment. We operated 24 hours a day with progressive/free form country music (old and current hits and obscure country, a few other oldies as well) and much local info... including a rare news christmas broadcast of Mrs. CFAY doing the year end news review!!! Somewhere I have that on cassette. We had the FM antenna on the Flea Market Roof building which is now long gone and is where the Cascades Casino complex is in Langley City. When I was back east in Jan. 1996 Trent's Mom Chris and him operated the station for a month from the Flea Market. They even stayed overnight a few times there. CFLA was the first FM station Langley City has ever had, licensed or not! Of course CJJC 850 is the very first radio station Langley ever got. I'm still very sad it doesn't exist anymore and got amalgamated with AM 1040 in Vancouver CKST in the early 1990s. That was one of the reasons we put CFLA FM on-air in 1995, trying to fill a void!!!

Wow went on longer than I expected to about this but that gives you a bit of history of Langley and radio here. The Langley Advance Newspaper (put out 2 or3 times a week now) does a pretty good job of Langley History in their Looking Back column which highlights Langley History back to 75 years ago and more recently each week. Anyway Jon thanks for bringing the CJJC frequency change up. I*m going to try to find some old newspaper articles about that plus CJJC's first sign-on in 1963 or so. Still searching for them. By the way Trent's Mom (who passed away in 2009) Christine knew Joe Chesney and his wife. Take care everyone, hope all is well with you!!!! Eldon...

[Dan Sys]

CJJC certainly did blow it trying to be a Vancouver station when they moved to 800. The signal was fairly decent in the daytime in Vancouver, but at nights CKOK Penticton & CHAB Moose Jaw (sometimes even XELO in Mexico) would play havoc with them. CFVR 850 was much more consistant, as I recall they were even the flagship station for the Vancouver Canadians baseball team for a season or two in the early 90's.

[cart_machine]

. I*m going to try to find some old newspaper articles about that plus CJJC's first sign-on in 1963 or so.

Vancouver Sun, May 7, 1962 (punctuation as per the original story):

New Radio Station Set
LANGLEY (Correspondent)—A new radio station for Langley municipal district will open about Sept. 1, owner Joe Chesney of North Surrey, has announced.
Approval for license for the 1,000-watt station here, also one for Abbotsford has been obtained from the Board of Broadcast Governors. Construction on the Langley station will commence in two months, Chesney said.
Towers and transmitter will be built about three miles east of Langley city with the central studio in the city itself.

cArtie