CBS 880's Top Story: Its Demise
At the beginning of the first of the Lord of the Rings movies, the badass and beautiful Elf Queen Galadriel says, “The world has changed. I feel it in the water.” She was referring to the gathering strength of evil.
That’s how I felt upon learning that WCBS Newsradio 880, on the air in New York since 1967, is soon signing off. My world was changing. I can feel it in the water, or seltzer, since we’re talking New York here.
CBS 880 was the more in-depth twin of 1010 WINS, and they were like two binary star systems that orbit each other, casting a more powerful light. With traffic and weather every 10 minutes on the 8s. If you missed it, you could wait and hear them on the 1s at 1010.
If a Kars4Kids ad came on, you could immediately change the station and still hear the news. No one in the entire tri-state listening area changed the station faster than I did. The speed of light? My hands moved faster.
In the traffic helicopter, Chopper 880, Tom Kaminski looked down upon the city and kept a careful watch over us. Sometimes grounded by weather, but now by bean counters. We’ll never hear Tom talking about the Bruckner again.
We took you for granted, 880. 24 hours a day apart from Mets broadcasts, we could count on your knowledge and insight, rather than that of self-important podcasters or Waze. Goodbye Chief Meteorologist Craig Allen and Todd Glickman. Goodbye Deborah Rodriguez, Sophia Hall, Rich Lamb, Michael Wallace, Andre Farro, Joe Connolly, Levon Putney, Paul Murnane and Wayne Cabot. You were calm voices in the chaos of local, national and world news.
Now you number among the great past 880-ers like Charles Osgood, Ed Bradley and Charles Kuralt, radio gods with voices that were almost as beautiful as their writing. They grabbed you from the first word and didn’t let you go until they decided they’d finish with some perfect close. We won’t see any of you on the radio anymore, to paraphrase Osgood, at least on 880.
Now I am on a death watch for 1010 WINS, which is owned by the same company. Podcasts, like the New York Times’ The Daily, are siphoning news radio’s listeners. And thus, advertising revenue. But me? I just wanna hear Wayne and Paul telling me the news in the morning.
The world has changed. I can feel it in my coffee.
