Oldtime radio on the internets

Here's a story about a local AM radio station that is absolutely fabulous, and they're now streaming their signal online.

When my lovely ex-wife came to North Carolina a little over 11 years ago for a job interview, she called me from her hotel room that night, wildly excited about something. Which is like her, so I waited a bit for her to settle down and get coherent. I figured it had something to do with the interview, but no -- she was holding the phone up in front of the clock radio in the hotel room, which was turned up really really loud for a clock radio, and saying "you gotta hear this, this is amazing" over and over again as the tinny signal blasted a hole in the earpiece of my phone and drilled into my head.

I could sort of hear some kind of fiddle and banjo music, but it was pretty lo-fi, if you know what I mean. It wasn't until I came down here myself and tuned in to WPAQ on the rental car radio that I understood why she was so excited. You can't get the signal everywhere, so I'm really happy to have it online.

Be sure to check out the multimedia piece in the story [link]; the guy playing the fiddle for the inaugural webcast is Mr. Benton Flippen, sole surviving member of The Green Valley Boys, the band that played on the station's first broadcast in 1948. Cool, no?

When told that the performance was not only live on the radio, but also accessible to anyone with a computer, anywhere in the world, 86-year-old Mr. Flippen said, "Well, it's all right. Computers, they got everything else. They might as well have this."

Oh, yes indeed.