For long time listeners of Erie radio, if you thought about people on the air who had that “classic” deep-toned radio voice, you would think Bob Eaton.
It’s been over a week now since his obituary appeared in the Times-News, dying at the age of 82. According to the account in the paper, Bob graduated from Academy High School in 1948, and in 1949 began his career as an announcer at WERC. He went on to work for WLEU from 1950 to 1965, WICU radio and TV from 1966 to 1976, WRIE from 1977 to 1989, then finally to WQLN until 1995.
Forty-six years of continuous broadcasting: that’s something!
Lou Baxter weighed in on my Facebook about Bob:
Bob had a radio voice from God. What I’d give to have a voice like that.
He was reading news at WRIE when I joined Bob Hughes and the crew there in the 70s. Great voice… but no news sense. I was at the station the day Elvis died. Bob was anchoring the news and didn’t understand the significance of the story. He used it as a kicker at the end his newscast…”Finally, the King of Rock n Roll has died”, and then did a weather forecast. Yikes!
He eventually returned to his first love…announcing classical music at QLN.
RIP Bob Eaton.
His boss at WRIE, former owner Brady Louis shares his remembrances:
Blessed with a deep, mellifluous voice at an early age, Bob Eaton was a natural for radio.
When he did mid-days at WRIE ( “housewife time”-ouch, as opposed to “drivetime” ), he tolerated our middle-of -the-road music format until we eased into a more adult contemporary sound at which time he became WRIE’s afternoon news reporter.
Bob’s real love was classical music which made his move to WQLN-FM a natural. Finally, he was in his musical element.
He was a good guy, a loner, with a good sense of humor and a great laugh.
He will be remembered for sharing his on-air talent for decades with audiences of several stations in the Erie market.
Farewell, Bob.
Finally Jim Griffey reminded us that his love for classical music was useful in his side work as a piano tuner!
Include Bob Eaton in the pantheon of great Erie broadcasters who made an impact on our community and industry and are no longer with us.
December 20th, 2009 
joel 
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Deep Background for November 15-21, 2009
Whispers became a shout this week as executives at Citadel Broadcasting are indicating that they may have to go Chapter 11 ahead of a scheduled January debt payment that the owners of WXKC, WXTA, WQHZ, and WRIE don’t have. To hear Jerry Del Colliano of Inside Music Media talk, there could be consequences for the last remaining local morning show in the group: The Breakfast Club.
For me, I think it would be crazy for Citadel to gore their only real cash cow, Classy 100. But a note of appreciation for Chuck and Brenda to the station would be timely.
I just sounded off, how about you? What’s your take on this challenging media environment? Did you spend any funny money on last week’s ETN millionaire auction? What’s the latest scoop at your media outlet? For all this and more, this open forum is our sounding board.
You can leave a comment, e-mail me at joel@nataliemedia.com or tweet@pressandtower.
Embrace the chaos!