An Honor For WOKQ

WOKQ has received a nomination for the prestigious Marconi Award from the National Association of Broadcasters. When I'm not doing the Morning Waking Crew broadcast, most folks know my other job around here is being one of the bosses. My official title is "Operations Manager" and it's one of those all-encompassing job titles that means when the toilet in the Men's Room blows up it somehow winds up being my job.

But it's times like these that make the gig very cool. WOKQ has been nominated for the a "Marconi" award. You've heard the term before. The Morning Waking Crew has a few nominations for this award. As usual, we've never actually won anything, but I digress.

This nomination is for "Country Station of the Year". The nomination isn't segmented by market size, which means that OKQ is one of five nominees up against some fine country stations around the country, all in much bigger markets than us. If you pay attention to the market rankings from the Nielsen folks, OKQ's home market is number 123 and the other nominees in the category are all in market numbers 40 or higher. Some very stiff competition indeed.

This nomination recognizes not only WOKQ's service to the communities we serve, but also our long-standing passion for country music. Forty-plus years in the same format, with the same call letters and even the same street address. Since I know you're expecting me to say it, I'll oblige. WOKQ was country before country was cool. Several times over in fact.

This nomination encompasses everyone that works here. The folks you know on the air and the folks you don't. Our programming is led by Mark Jennings who is not only lovable, but wicked smart too. We're blessed with a sales and support staff that's top notch, a commercial production department that keeps needing new walls to hold all of the awards they've won, a digital whiz-kid (who's probably editing this post even as we speak), all backed up by a technical crew that makes Studio Big one of the coolest facilities in New England.

All of this is headed up by our General Manager Marty Lessard. He's been with the station in one capacity or another for 40 years and that is nothing short of amazing in a notoriously transient industry like radio.

The five "Country Station of the Year" nominees find out who wins in early September. All the stations in the category are nothing short of incredible and win or lose, it's nice to be in their company.