gch wrote:

I remember that they had a big contest called Canada's First Tremendous Ripoff   with big prizes  (CFTR). 

That was their very first contest as a Top 40 station and here's a personal anecdote about it: I was the very first winner they ever had in that promotion.

I was listening to CFTR the day before they officially switched to rock. I sensed something was up. They started their Ripoff contest soon after. The afternoon the contest started, I was home sick from school, listening to the still new CFTR. When Roger Christian announced the first caller at the 870 number would win a trip to Pompano Beach, Florida, I just happened to be sitting beside the phone at the telephone table. (Remember when we had those?)

I dialed the digits, not expecting anything, and then Christian answered. He asked my name and address, and then went on the air to congratulate me for winning the trip. Outside of a few 45s from CHUM, I'd never won anything big on a radio station. But everything changed on that fateful day. 

I taped the announcement on a cassette recorder I had, and then played it for my family at dinnertime. My mother was so excited, she couldn't eat!

I was only 13 years old at the time, so I gave the tickets to my parents, who really deserved some time off. They told me they had a great time, and my teenaged brothers and sister got the bonus of being on our own for a few days. So everybody won!

Fast forward dozens of years. I was contacted by an old colleague of mine who'd worked at TR at the time and later went into TV. We worked together at the latter place and in all those years, neither of us mentioned that we'd both been at CFTR. 

He moved to PEI and later got back in touch with me. I related the story of that fateful contest win and I couldn't believe what he told me next. He was there the day I won and actually taped the winning announcement! And not only that, almost 40 years later, he still had it! An .mp3 arrived in my inbox soon after, and while that original cassette had long gone missing, I had proof once again that I'd won that contest so many decades ago.

Sorry to hijack the thread about this man's sad passing, but it was an incredible coincidence that I still have trouble believing actually happened. 

Is there an official obituary anywhere?   Sad to hear of another passing in the world of radio

RadioActive wrote:

gch wrote:

I remember that they had a big contest called Canada's First Tremendous Ripoff   with big prizes  (CFTR). 

That was their very first contest as a Top 40 station and here's a personal anecdote about it: I was the very first winner they ever had in that promotion.

I was only 13 years old at the time, so I gave the tickets to my parents, who really deserved some time off. They told me they had a great time, and my teenaged brothers and sister got the bonus of being on our own for a few days. So everybody won!

Sorry to hijack the thread about this man's sad passing, but it was an incredible coincidence that I still have trouble believing actually happened. 

 
Sorry for editing your story here RA, but that was a good one, even if you hijacked a much more somber thread!