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Produced by The Kitchen Sisters, Davia Nelson & Nikki Silva
with Valerie Velardi
Read the story of WHER.
View the WHER Photo Gallery.
WHER Reunion
A Web Exclusive
Listen to words of wisdom on life and broadcasting from the women of WHER (1999) in Real Audio - 14.4 or
28.8 flavors.
See a video documenting this historical WHER Reunion. Produced by Laura Folger
More on WHER with Jaqueline Hall and Peter Guaralnick.
Memphis, 1955
photo courtesy of Becky Phillips
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Memphis, Tennessee, Sept. 1999
They came from Florida, Alabama and the 4 corners of Memphis, Tennessee -- 14 of the
lady disc jockeys who were pioneers in broadcasting during the '50s and '60s on
the nation's first all-girl radio station, WHER. Many of the women hadn't seen
each other since they worked at the station that record producer Sam Phillips founded in the 1950s.
Sam & the women of WHER, 1999
Photo by: Sandra Wong Geroux
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Over the course of producing the radio story, one WHER gal led us to the
next. Women dug through their attics for old air-checks, and the entire WHER
record library was unearthed. The women and Sam Phillips came together in
September of 1999 at the Peabody Hotel in Memphis for the PRPD(Public
Radio Program Directors) conference,
where they were feted and photographed by the public radio system and the
press. Seventeen years of on-air broadcasting was commemorated at the conference
with a recreation of the WHER studio, complete with microphones, console,
photos of the "girls" -- and scores of records featuring the beautiful music
of WHER.
You need the free RealAudio player to listen to audio files.
Copyright © 1999 The Kitchen Sisters
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