While we were all collecting CHUM, CKEY, CKFH and CKOC charts growing up here, our counterparts in other cities and other lands were doing the same thing. The days of the free handouts lasted a couple of decades, before it became too expensive, stations changed formats or it just wasn’t popular enough anymore.
 
I was always fascinated to see how other stations handled these handouts. Some were incredibly well designed, with cover art, pictures inside and more. Others were barely more than reproduced mimeographs. But all were used to showcase the personality of the place they represented.
 
Here’s a look at how the other half lived, including some rare listings for some rare stations.
 
2SM Sydney, Australia
 
Although it’s a talk station now, 2SM once ruled the Top 40 roost in Sydney.
 
What I love about these charts is just how different the music scene was Down Under than it was here. Take this list of the singles from March 1975. The number one song that week was “Horror Movie” by the Skyhooks. Who? It obviously never traveled into this hemisphere.
 
Neither did “My Little Angel” (#7) by William Shakespeare (although likely not THAT William Shakespeare!) But perhaps the oddest of the Top 10 is the song called “Santa Never Made It Into Darwin” by the no doubt legendary Bill & Boyd. My question: What was an apparent Christmas song doing in the Top 10 at the end of March? (Actually, it's a touching song about the aftermath of a terrible cyclone hitting that Australian city on Christmas Day 1974, leaving massive destruction in its wake.)
 
 
WABC Top 100 Of 1969
 
The most successful Top 40 station of all time regularly put out a chart that wasn’t always strictly a weekly 40. In fact most of them consisted of the same 14 songs that made up their shortened playlist, a key to WABC’s successful strategy. (“Just play the hits over and over.”) They also put out a special Top 100 in 1969. It not only shows the biggest songs of that year, it also gives you a glimpse of that powerhouse line-up that mixed with that powerhouse signal to make ABC not only #1 in New York, but reportedly in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, too. No other station has ever managed to do that.

 
 
CFCF Montreal
 
Considering they weren’t really even a full rock station back in 1967, this “Dave Boxer” chart from August 25 is pretty impressive. There’s still some debate as to whether the place once known as XWA when it signed on in 1919 deserves the designation of the very first radio station in history, but one thing is sure – it wouldn’t make it to its hundredth anniversary. The station went broke and signed off in 2010, some 90 years after it first came to life.
 

 
 
CFRA Ottawa
 
Now a major talk station in the nation’s capital, it was a rockin’ presence back in the 60s and 70s. This chart is from 1970, just before Can Con rules went into effect, and you’ll notice the only two Canadian artists in the top 30 are The Guess Who and The Original Caste. A year later, things would be very different.
 
 

CKCY & CJIC Sault Ste. Marie
 
Billed as the station that’s been “your hit authority for the past two decades,” this small station brought the music to the true Great White North. But it didn’t do it forever. The 920 frequency went silent in the summer of 1992. This chart is from better times - Aug. 10, 1973. Although their morning man pictured on the cover looks like he had a rough night.


 
 
Meanwhile, CHUM wasn’t the only 1050 that was playing the hits in Ontario. Here’s a look at CJIC, CKCY’s competition in the Sault. In a deal involving different owners, both stations went silent in 1992.


 
 
RPM 100
 
Not from a radio station at all, this weekly handout was designed to promote and get you to support Canadian talent - and subscribe to RPM Weekly. This one is from Dec. 1966, and was an early booster of Canadian content, long before we knew the term. 



  
KDIA Oakland, Ca.
 
It wasn’t all Top 40. Here’s a sample of a soul station from Oakland, California, whose biggest claim to fame is that Sylvester Stewart was once a DJ there. He became much better known as Sly of “Sly & The Family Stone” in the 60s and 70s. See how many – if any – of the tunes you recognize from 1979. KDIA’s calls are now at 1640, where it’s a Christian station.


 
KFRC San Francisco
 
The legendary 610 was in its waning days when this chart came out in 1979. It had been the home to so many legendary jocks, it could fill its own Hall of Fame. The most famous: morning man Dr. Don Rose, who used more jokes in each stopset than most announcers did in an entire show. KFRC’s spot on the AM dial is now occupied by KEAR, a Christian station.  

 
 
KHJ Los Angeles
 
One of the greatest radio stations on the planet in the 60s had to be 93/KHJ. The Boss Jocks were amazing, the sound was incredible and the station itself ruled the second biggest media market in the world until FM took over. KHJ is now an all religious station in L.A., presumably meaning it has a new kind of “boss” jock.



 
 
KRLA Los Angeles
 
KRLA put out a two sheet newspaper-like chart in the 70s, a takeoff on the look of Rolling Stone, called “Gathers No Moss.” On the back was a chart, this one from September 1970. Note the anti-drug/mental health PSA on the inside. These days KRLA is an uber-Conservative talk station in Glendale, known as “The Answer 870.”




 
 
KMGQ Honolulu
 
If there’s anywhere better to be listening to great tunes in 1973 than on a lush Hawaiian Island, I can’t think of one. It’s somewhat of an oddity, because the chart lists the hit albums first. But check out the elaborate artwork on this chart, which shows someone went to a lot of trouble every week.


 
KINY/KSUP Juneau, Alaska
 
From one side of the U.S. to the other. Here’s a look at what Alaskans were listening to on June 7, 1986. KINY is now an all talk station, while KSUP is Hot AC.
 
 
KOL Seattle
 
While KJR became legendary in Seattle, the CKFH to its CHUM was KOL. Here’s a Christmas one sheet chart from 1965, featuring disc jockey Dex Allen. Allen also worked in Pittsburgh and passed away just a few months ago, in May 2018.
 
 
WBOS Boston
 
This station proves, if nothing else, that an all disco format was typically unlistenable, although it apparently did O.K. in the early days of its dance music incarnation. Today it operates as an alternative rock outlet.
 
 

WXKS Boston
 
What’s worse than a disco station? Two disco stations. And Boston was home to both of them. Fortunately, WXKS is now Kiss 108, one of the biggest in the city and one of the most successful hit music stations in the U.S. 
  
WBUS Miami
 
Remember when Quadraphonic was the new stereo? This station bought into the myth in 1976. Today, they’re rhythmic AC. Note how this is one of the few charts without any numeric rankings.
 
 

WLCY Tampa/St.Petersburg, Florida
 
It would be fair to say that in the 60s and early 70s, listeners in Tampa-St. Pete’s loved “LCY.” It was once the number one Top 40 station in the city and while its chart wasn’t all that impressive looking, it helped to cement that dominance in the market. These days, the former LCY’s got some ’splainin to do- and it does, to people who work in the financial industry with an all business format and the call letters WWMI.
 
By the way, those calls don’t mean anything now, but a few years ago it was a Radio Disney operation and it stood for “We Want MIckey.”

 
 

WDGY & KDWB Minneapolis
 
One of the great powerhouses of the northern U.S., WDGY’s direct competitor was the equally great KDWB and the legendary KSTP. In a massive crazy series of events, when AM radio ran into trouble, WDGY disappeared and the call letters were eventually transferred to the station at 630 – which had been competitor KDWB. There’s currently an oldies station called WDGY at 740 AM, but it’s daytime only because of Moses Znaimer’s Zoomer Radio clear channel in Toronto. 

 
 

 

Next week, Part 2 – including the station that influenced Allan Waters to turn CHUM into Canada’s first Top 40 station, an unlikely competitor to CKLW, the only Top 40 station to have an ad in the original Woodstock Music Festival program, and a rare chart from – Cheektowaga?