They say you always remember your first time. And I do - the first time I set foot in a real radio station. Outside of a one-time tour of CHUM when I was 6, my first real look at a studio came at CHIN Radio on College St., where for some reason, they agreed to let an interested 15 year old kid inside for "training." 

It wasn't my favourite station, obviously, but it was a thrill for a radio-obsessed teenager. 

I'm put in mind of those days by a column in Radio World, where a guy whose first obsession was WBBF-AM Rochester, grew up listening to that amazing box that was literally music to his ears. He's since gone on to work at some big stations, including WLW and closer-to-home WGR. 

But Dave Mason says he'll never forget that first glimpse of what made it all happen. 

"I was drawn in first by the energy — the fun of hearing people laugh and play their favorite records. Then by the tools: the turntables, the tape decks, the transmitters, the towers, the blinking lights, the clicking relays. I watched in awe as engineers cued up announcers with precision, flipped switches that launched the next event.

I saw acetate discs being cut for commercials and got to witness the arrival of the Gates ST-101 tape deck. One day, WBBF unveiled a new invention: magnetic tape in a plastic cartridge, which revolutionized the way we played commercials — and later, music."

It's changed a lot since those days and you can now sit in your kitchen with a computer and some software and make all that magic happen without even leaving home. But there was nothing like that first glimpse into how the magic was made. And I'll never forget my first time. 

Why I Love Radio