1977 Blackout Coverage from the Top of Holder Tower
By Rob Forman ’78
Just past 9:00 on the evening of July 13th, 1977 (or maybe it was 10:00), the phone rang as [Edgar Winter’s] “Frankenstein” blared from the Control A speakers. It was a listener asking whether I knew about a blackout that supposedly hit New York.
I checked the UPI machine, and returned to tell the caller that the wire had nothing about a blackout. Of course I soon figured out WHY the machine said nothing. At :15 past the hour, the ABC network scrambled onto the air from Washington. Its New York operation, and who knew how much else, were in the dark. The fun at WPRB was underway. So was what may have been the greatest audience coverage in the station’s history. Without power, New York stations that neighbored us on the FM dial were off the air. Station members David Kurman in Mineola, Long Island, and Chris Fine near the Connecticut border in Harrison, New York, called to say I was booming in. I put Chris on the air with a report on his blacked-out but very peaceful neighborhood. John Shyer reported from the top of Holder Tower, “to the southwest, there is a glow in the sky. It is Philadelphia. But in the direction of New York, the sky is black…”
LISTEN: John Shyer reports on the NYC blackout from the top of Holder Tower. (Includes off-air technical strategizing between Rob and John.)
The temperature was in the 90’s that night. The station’s air conditioner was a joke. At about 2:30 am, I put “Frankenstein” back on, hoping in vain that it work in reverse. By 6:00 , when Gene Chamson discovered me still on the air in what would ordinarily have been a dark silent station, I was wearing nothing but a pair of shorts and a sweaty glow. I wish we had had a camera.
When our blackout coverage was just minutes old, the phone rang a second time. It was a listener who said the whole thing was incredible, and that he was taping my show. I thanked him, hung up, cued up the next record, and then said to myself – why didn’t you ask him for a copy of the tape? Looking back, I am sure that asking on the air would have caused no harm, but at the time I felt it would not be “professional”, so I didn’t.
Four months later, another election night. Station members Bob Ellsworth, Rick Milin and I drove to what would be the very happy headquarters of Governor Brendan Byrne. As we left, Rick asked whether a friend of his could join us and help with the coverage. If you know Bob Ellsworth, you know that his Lincoln Continental Mark Something-or-Other could always accommodate one more. On the way back to Princeton, a discussion about great moments at WPRB began. I mentioned how I had enjoyed the ’76 election, and of course I did a show on the night of the blackout… The friend said, “that was you???????,” to which I replied, “that was you????!!!!!!!???!!!!!” Days later I had the tape.