Forgotten Radio

I suppose that like many b4 I found it to be a greater than imagined hobby, that radio is taken for granted.

It’s not uncommon for people to take that music box in the dashboard for granted. If it works , good, if not its only a mile or so to the work 20.

But for those whose job it is to deliver America, radio can be a God send.

Providing entertainment , news, and industry news, sports, and weather and needed road reports.

But that’s getting ahead of ourselves here.

There was a time in this great nation when families would gather around the radio and after dinner sit in the living room Knit, or play board games or just visit.

Not just listen to music but radio dramas long before There was our friend, companion, and magic carpet from normal rural and sub-rural lifestyles.

Then came the construction of the Interstate Highway. I-80 went up first followed by others.

Trucking was no longer a regional enterprise, long haul over that long highway trucking became common, and the long haul blues with it.

The first to bring some relief, in the cab of those trucks on only AM, and scratchy as hell, but never the less something besides the drone of 10 wheels and tires on pavement.

The first of these trucking radio pioneers was Charley Douglas on WWL out of New Oreleenze Louisiana doing a thing called the CD Road Gang. Followed by Dave Nemo when the show got picked up for syndication in Nashville, however for those grinding gears in diesel fumed cabs here in the Mountain West, radio in the truck was near if not completely none existent.

This changed in 1975, when a 20 member 4-H club called the TeenAge Truckers Association put together put up a 50 watt radio station in western Idaho called KDSL or Kay-Diesel for short. At 89.1 FM , this was at the time of old Mom & Pop Truck Stops, Like the RoadRunner Texaco in Bliss Idaho, or even WaySide in Heyburn Idaho. Long hauls meant long nights. Truck Stops kept drivers fed and a new gig in Idaho kept them entertained. Long Haul Radio, on KDSL FM 89.1 West-Point Idaho.  KDSL lived until late 1983 when after My mom passed away, I turned our entire bottom floor of that grand house, of ours into what hails as today KTOW With the birth of KTOW we wanted to do something different, target those like ourselves who drove big rig tow trucks.

With the birth of Highway Hooker Toewing there, the name of our overnight gig, for us who tow heavy became, Highway Hooker Radio. Still runs, from 18:00 hours to midnight on the Confederate Star Network.

However the beginnings, and our soul was being lost. When the TeenAge Truckers Association after many name attempts finally arrived on taking our cue from our then parent organization that had for all attempts and purposes vanished, when the TTA, became the We picked up from where we started with KDSL. In American Falls a tiny, and I mean tiny studio was erected, and radio station KRVI (radio Voice of the Interstate) Now KJTK(Just Trucker Kountry) went on the air.

We took into doing Long Haul Radio again, but by this time , Hazzard fever had broken out amongst us and we looked for a way to bring that into the mix.

Two years later in 1989 on a run to Lost Wages Nevada, I saw the catchiest handle on an old shop in Saint George Utah, called Dixie diesel service & towing.

Upon the way back that handle kept ringing in my mind over and over and over again.

At the time there were few if any light duty port or performance diesel service shops. Although Volkswagen had brought out the Rabbit and Dasher in 78 somewhere with a diesel or as Bro would say drizzle in it. GM had light duty drizzles in Oldsmobile's , and light trucks, hell the last K5 Blazer had a diesel.

Long before BullyDog and others a tiny shop in downtown Blackfoot Idaho opened up called The Dixie Diesel Shop, diesel service Hazzard style.

We as an organization capitalized on that and in mid 1990 started carving out what would be Dixie Diesel Trucker Radio. Trucker Radio done Hazzard style. Since then Dixie Diesel went syndicated nationwide, bought the remains of what was called the Interstate Radio Network, or IRN and converted it at first to the Dixie Diesel Radio Network, that today is the Confederate Star Network.

What made Dixie Diesel so special?

That in my next report.

L8R Haulers,

Quote of the Day:
If you think nobody cares if you are alive, try missing a couple of car payments.
--Earl Wilson

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