WFHB Bloomington Community Radio
The history of Bloomington’s community radio station; a continuing series.
For the first seven years of its existence, the Community Radio Project (CRP) was populated by people who loved radio. There were technical experts, veteran broadcasters, music aficionados, radio theater producers, and more. All they’d lacked was someone who had a head for business.
When Brian Kearney came along in 1984, the CRP team was nearly complete.
“I realized we were missing other allies beyond the rag-tag, bohemian group that we were,” he says. While continuing to stage small fundraising events, Kearney knocked on the doors of important people all over town seeking support.
The legendary academic Herman B. Wells opened one door for him. It led to a woman named Cecile Waldron.
She’d been married to a successful local attorney who’d left her a lot of money when he died. She was eager to use it to enrich Bloomington culturally. Over the next few years, she’d be courted by the Bloomington Area Arts Council (BAAC) to donate money so that group could renovate the town’s old city hall. The BAAC hoped to turn the structure into an arts mecca. Kearney had become a board member of the BAAC. He and the president of the board saw the two groups’ aims dovetailing nicely. Bloomington’s old main firehouse was attached to the city hall building. If the BAAC could occupy city hall, why couldn’t the CRP’s radio station take over the firehouse?
But the buildings needed a lot of work and that’d take big money, much more than pancake breakfasts and live music benefits could provide. Cecile Waldron had that kind of money but it would take time to bring her around.
Meanwhile, Jeffrey Morris had found another frequency for which he applied. Everything looked good until a radio pirate came along.
NEXT POST: THE PIRATE
Come back for more tales from the WFHB genesis story in this space. We’ll be posting each week as WFHB celebrates its 31st year as Bloomington’s home of community radio.
