It is a special day 65 years in the making for those of us at CFAM Radio 950, and for our dedicated listeners who have made the radio station a staple on the AM dial over the decades. Sixty-five years ago today, at 8:01 p.m. on March 13th, 1957, the switch was officially flipped on a brand new radio station, putting CFAM Radio 950 on the air!
This is a portion of the official opening ceremony of CFAM Radio 950.
Elmer Hildebrand is the C.E.O. for Golden West, and is one of the company's original employees. He joined Morning Show team Michelle, Jayme and Chris in studio during Friday's 65th anniversary Morning Show to reflect on the past six-and-a-half decades.
"A lot of people still remember what they were doing when the radio station signed on, and very quickly people said 'This will never work. This will be a flash in the pan'," said Hildebrand. "(At the time), I was writing ads and initially, we had lots of clients, but when the bills went out after the first month a lot of them cancelled, and after a few more months we didn't have anymore clients, so there were no ads to write. By that time, management had changed, and the manager of the day said, 'Well maybe you can go see if you can sell something', and that's how I started. I was selling ads during the day and writing them at night, and that's how we started to build it up one brick at a time."
Starting as a small radio station in Altona, Manitoba with a population of just 1,800 people, CFAM Radio 950 consisted of 11 staff. Now, Golden West serves many communities as the largest independent radio broadcaster in Canada, with the addition of dozens of community-based web sites that see users read more than a quarter-billion pages of information each year. As well, the company employs hundreds of professionals, and developing robust solutions to help business and communities grow which now includes Homefield, and Homefield People and Strategy.