During 2020, I decided it was high time that I collect stories my (future, potential) grandchildren would love to hear someday. I bought an audio recorder, interviewed my mom and dad and captured their stories.
As my interest in preserving stories increased, I considered other voices in the community worth capturing for future generations. In 2021, I began volunteering at the community radio station WMSE (91.7 FM), hoping to continue my story-collecting journey. The station on the campus of the Milwaukee School of Engineering began broadcasting on March 17, 1981, and is celebrating its 44th anniversary on Monday.
It’s time to pick your Milwaukee favorites for the year!
Eventually, I embarked on a project to record the stories of the DJs from the early years of WMSE. Interviewing four DJs on the frontier of free-form radio in Milwaukee was an illuminating experience; they reminded me of the incredible power music has on our community and led me to many new explorations in sound. Ultimately, I hope to interview many more of WMSE’s foundational voices, preserving their histories for future freaks of “Frontier Radio.”
Full versions of my interviews can be found here, but four stories from WMSE’s early days stood out:
1. The first day on the air was almost WMSE’s last.
On day one, a St. Patrick’s Day interview in 1981 almost got WMSE shut down. “Wolfman Joe” Ryan was on the air for WMSE’s first afternoon show. During his drive-time show, he noticed a group of MSOE students weaving past with a ½-barrel of beer, dressed as “Patron Saints of Engineers.” He invited an overserved student into the studio who immediately drops an f-bomb into a hot mic. Luckily, Ryan steered the revelers back to the sidewalk and after a brief rebuke, station authorities decided the magic word was just a part of the growth process. Ryan went on to open Milwaukee’s legendary Bangkok Orchid restaurant, which operated for 16 years before closing in 2004.
2. A DJ once “played” more than four minutes of silence. And then the calls came…
Steve Schmidt, AKA Flux Density, was a far-out DJ explorer. In the mid ’80s, Flux was known for playing his homemade synthesizers on the air and choosing songs that inspired callers to ask “What is this?” One day he decided to play John Cage’s composition entitled “4′33″”. The song’s score instructs performers not to play their instruments throughout the three movements. Yes, more than four and a half minutes of complete silence. Calls flooded in: “Turn the sound up”, “Is the station down?” DJ Flux kept his cool and simply announced the song title and its composer as the silence concluded.
3. An engineer braved a lightning storm to keep WMSE on the air
In the early days, WMSE was kept on the air by engineering know-how from a few inspired telemetry experts known only in WMSE’s archives as “Jules” and “Hippe.” When an extraordinarily strong storm hit Milwaukee, the station got knocked off the air. The circuit breaker in need of switching was 13 stories above the street, so Hippe went to the top floor, hopped up the ladder to the roof, ran across the slippery surface in the midst of the rain and lightning, and, like Milwaukee’s own Gene Wilder, flipped the switch to return power to the mighty WMSE. It’s ALIVE, indeed! You can’t keep the big sound downtown down, not with staff willing to risk it all to keep the music blasting to the people of Milwaukee.
4. Lou Reed loved Milwaukee’s Harley-Davidson
In 1983, the godfather of punk spoke with one of WMSE’s original DJs, Paul Host, to promote his album, Legendary Hearts. Although Reed was famously mercurial and occasionally combative with the press, Paul had Lou Reed gushing about Milwaukee’s Harley-Davidsons and talking about his recent purchase of his first Hog. Paul admitted that he was reluctant to extend the motorcycle conversation because WMSE bows to no corporate overlords, but he and Lou continued before concluding an amicable chat. Parts of that interview and more of Paul Host’s interviews with rock legends can be heard here – and more of the station’s past shows are available on demand on the WMSE website.
Interview Your Loved Ones
Don’t wait to preserve the stories and the voices of your loved ones. If they’re willing, sit down together, press record and capture the stories only they can tell. It takes but an hour to save stories that will last for future generations to enjoy.
