WABC Jingles: The Early YearsThe Jingles
WABC jingles. In the world of radio, there are none more famous. Whether you remember them from listening to the station or if you are an avid collector of radio station jingles, WABC is probably the most famous radio station ever for its tremendous number of jingles. Over the years a number of jingle companies contributed jingles to WABC. Most jingle fans know about PAMS and JAM, but there were other companies that were used to a lesser extent:
The Time Line
Prior to 1960, WABC used jingles from Ginger Johnson and Eric Siday from a package of ABC Network themes and jingles.
In 1960 when WABC became a Top 40 radio station, they used jingles created and produced by Johnny Mann for the Richard H. Ullman Company as a "trade out" for commercial time on the station.
Also produced in 1960 were jingles from Roy Ross Productions.
Some other early WABC jingles were produced by CRC, which stands for Commercial Recording Corporation.
In the Spring of 1962 PAMS Productions of Dallas became the supplier of jingles to WABC. PAMS which stands for Production, Advertising, Merchandising, Service supplied WABC with jingles from 1962 until 1974.
There was a brief chapter in WABC jingle history in 1974 when "Thunder Productions" recorded the WABC jingles.
In the Fall of 1975 JAM Creative Productions took over the WABC jingles. JAM which stands for Jon And Mary Lyn Wolfert (the creators of the company) continue to provide jingles to Talkradio WABC to this day. WABC began airing JAM jingles on October 3, 1975.
And now.... The FUN Stuff!
The Johnson/Siday, Mann/Ullman, Roy Ross and CRC jingles that WABC ran in the early sixties.
The history of the legendary WABC/PAMS relationship including stories from those who where there, a time line of what PAMS series were used when on WABC, anecdotes about some of the individual jingles and whole bunch of PAMS jingles you can download and listen to!
As noted above, Thunder Productions did the WABC jingles for only a short time in 1974. Here are a few of those jingles.
Straight from the source, JAM President Jonathan Wolfert takes you through the creation of the JAM jingle packages used by WABC. Jon also explains how it felt to go from being a kid with a fascination with WABC's jingles, to the founder and president of the company that went on to create the jingles for that very radio station. And, yes, there are plenty of WABC/JAM jingles to listen to!
This is an actual list from the WABC studios from 1967. It was used by the disc jockeys as an index for the jingles currently being used on the air.
Miscellaneous WABC PAMS Jingle Section
This section contains jingles that did not necessarily appear on WABC but are interesting for other reasons. Some STEREO jingles are included here!
The WABC News intro themes!
Acknowledgments
This section would not have been possible without the assistance of:
Bill Meeks, Founder and President of PAMS Productions from 1951 to 1976. Bill was interviewed for this page and supplied much of the information about the various PAMS Series.
Jonathan Wolfert, President of JAM Creative Productions. Jon owns the copyrights to the jingles on this page (PAMS and JAM) and gave permission for their use here. In addition, he provided invaluable assistance to me by contributing details about the jingles, PAMS, JAM and WABC itself that I would have never have known without his help. A number of former PAMS employees now work with Jon at JAM. During one of our frequent E mails, Jon wrote "The research continues 'round the clock here at Jingle Central <g>". He was, of course, making a joke. But the reality is that much of what is on this page was contributed by Jon.
Don Worsham, of "The Media Preservation Foundation" who is an authority on early radio station jingles. He is working on a book called "The Hits Between The Hits" which will chronicle the history of radio station jingles. The Media Preservation Foundation is non-profit and was established as an archive for historically important recordings and documents concerning the broadcasting industry.
Tracy E. Carmen, Executive Director of "The Media Preservation Foundation" who contributed some of the terrific stereo jingles which he mixed down from original PAMS 4 Track Master tapes.
Some notes about the jingles on this page:
These jingles have been collected from many sources from actual airchecks to CD versions. As a result, there are varying qualities to them depending on the source.
There are literally hundreds of jingles for WABC. I have tried to include a few examples from the various series. However, there are MANY more which I have yet to post. We will try to add more as time goes by.
In addition, these jingles are protected by copyright law. You should not distribute them without permission. There are many on the internet who either don't know this or have ignored it. On this page, we have not:
PAMS is a registered trademark of PAMS Productions, Inc. The PAMS jingles which are available on this page are copyrighted by PAMS Productions, Inc., Dallas, Texas. Used by permission.
JAM is a registered trademark of JAM Creative Productions, Inc. Unauthorized sale, distribution or broadcast prohibited. World rights reserved. Used by permission.
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