A Vision for 1260 AM
Not long after I became chief engineer for the station a new general manager took over. Lou Griest had some rather unique ideas for the station. Without much knowledge of the higher-ups, he "had a vision" of new call letters and a new identity for the station. The proposed new call letters were WCFC which would stand for "Central Fairfield County". Unfortunately, this call sign was unavailable. An alternate set of calls were selected, and that's how WCFS came to be. WCFS stood for "Central Fairfield (County) Station," a catch phrase that really never took off.
John LaBarca mentioned a fact I had previously been unaware of. Mr. Griest was a born-again Christian and the station calls letters were secretly rumored to stand for "Christ forgives sinners." Station staffers joked that the call letters meant "Can't Find the Song" or "Can't Find the Signal", the latter referring to when the station switched to its pre-dusk power of 50 watts or its newly assigned night time power of nine (9) watts.
As part the change in the station's identity new studio direct line was installed for listeners to call in for requests and contests. I happened into Gary Flamm's office while he was arranging for a new studio telephone line. Gary was having no luck with finding a phone number where the digits would spell out WCFS. After 15 minutes on the phone and with my suggestions, an acceptable phone number was decided on: 454-GOLD. Since WCFS played "Solid Gold" and it was impossible to obtain a local phone number with the new call letters, this was a solution that was settled upon.
On-air personalities for the time included John LaBarca, Al Matthews, Lenny Kerr,and Bob VanDerheyden. Weekend and fill-in jocks included Chris Cimmino, Mike Eastland, Tony Napoleon, Lee Moore and Chris "Chuck Styles" Switzer. Voices heard delivering the news included Pamela Easton, Megan O'Connell, Mark Graham, Karen Kranick, Don Ruley, Lynn Searle and Fred Trumpler.