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Originally Posted by NightAngel79
Growing up in the area I always had a soft spot for that show. Loved the fact that the opening shot of the city was something I could see looking out my window
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My experience was different. WKRP wasn't exactly based on, but came out right after a book called "FM" hit the shelves. I can still remember buying the FM book at the Lubbock, TX airport gift shop. (The last book I bought there was the classic "Airport", another life-changing read for me.) To me, the act of transmitting stuff through "the ether" was like shaking hands with God, and I had to try it.
Between "WKRP" and "The Dark Side of the Moon" I changed my mind and decided that an Air Force career wasn't that important after all, and threw myself into live concert engineering and production, and finally radio and TV broadcasting.
I was probably one of the few teenagers who actually aspired to one day be a character like Dr. Johnny Fever, someone with a fascinating past, if only he could remember any of it.
I remember the show's outstanding editorializing of the Who Concert Tragedy. When I went with a college buddy to see Peter Gabriel's "So" tour at the War Memorial stadium in Rochester NY, I was shocked to see that it was open admission. I taped a rerun of that episode to tell the story anew to my friends, many of whom didn't grow up in the US and knew nothing of the tragedy.
There's a lot more to WKRP than most are aware of.