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Dan
Mason at his induction in to the Hall of
Fame of Broadcasting and Cable in April, 2022
Dan
Mason began his career in radio doing overnights at WVLK in Lexington.
From there he went to KIRL in St. Louis. Then on to KBEQ in Kansas
City followed by WKLO in Louisville. In 1974 he moved to nights
at Z-93
/ WZGC-FM in Atlanta. He was later named Asst. PD and became Program
Director in 1975.
Dan
joined WPGC in May of 1977 when the Great
Strike That Struck Out occured. He continued as Program
Director after being named the National Program Director
for First
Media until he left for the General Manager position at KTSA
/ KTFM in San Antonio in 1979.
He later returned to First
Media where he was named Executive Vice President. When
First Media became Cook Inlet Radio Partners, he was named that
organization's President in 1988. In 1993, he joined Westinghouse
as President of Group W Radio.
He
was named President of CBS Radio (renamed Infinity Radio) in November
of 1995 where he was responsible for the operation of the group's
184 stations in the largest markets across the United States.
As President of Infinity Radio, he successfully integrated the
original CBS, Group W and American Radio Systems stations, among
the most venerable radio broadcasting groups in the country, by
merging operations, blending business styles and increasing profitability.
Dan has previously served on several boards including the National
Association of Broadcasters (NAB) and CBS Marketwatch.com. A native
of Louisville, Kentucky, Dan Mason graduated from Eastern Kentucky
University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Broadcasting.
He was named that university's "Outstanding Alumnus of the
Year" in 1995.
In
2002, he was named Radio Executive of the Year by Radio &
Records Magazine.
Dan
then formed a partnership with longtime radio programmer, Walt
Sabo, Sabo-Mason International Inititatives.
In
March 2007, he was once again named President and CEO of CBS Radio,
overseeing 144 properties nationwide.
Dan
retired from CBS in April, 2015 and then went to Vegas Stats Information Network. When VSIIN was sold to Draft Kings, he became a venture partner at Seventy Six Capital.
April of 2022 saw Dan being inducted into the Hall of Fame of Broadcasting and Cable in New York. Nowadays, he still does college basketball play by play when opportunities arise.
Dan
writes:
On
the Strike and its aftermath in 1977
In
the beginning it was total chaos...I got into town about midnight
just as the strike began...I did morning drive the first morning
and Bill Prettyman
was reading the news believe it or not.....He sounded pretty good
by the way...Little by little we hired new people...Dave
Foxx came from our Provo station...we hired Brandt
Miller to do afternoons...Waylon
Richards had worked with me a few years before in Kansas City
and finally Liz
Kiley came from Grand Rapids,. I believe she was a former
school teacher.
Within
4 months, the staff began to gel and within a year, WPGC had tied
WMAL for the number one position in the market....It was quite
an accomplishment...I left to take a VP/GM job at KTSA / KTFM
in San Antonio and Scott
Shannon came in and even made it a better station.
On
Becoming National PD for First Media
My
duties had increased when I was the National PD for First Media...We
had acquired KOPA in Phoenix, WZLX in Boston, WUSN in Chicago,
KFMK in Houston and KUBE in Seattle....That meant much more travel
and I wasn't physically there to do an airshift at WPGC anymore...I
still did Thanksgiving and Christmas shifts so the full timers
would have some holiday time off...And I did afternoon sports
on Brandt Miller's
show when I could...We sold that report at 5:30PM.
On
Memorable Station Promotions
Toys
for Tots - Major, major success....We had some big groups
and gathered so many toys for kids around the area...we filled
the Cap Center every year we did the show...
Unknown
Star - Overwhelming number of entries...hey..does Fox give
us any credit for this idea?....We did the record company contract
as the Grand Prize...We had a couple of really good people...One
I remember very well..Andris Plavnicks (sp?)...He was a Steven
Bishop sound alike...
Uncle
Richard - When Star Wars came out..we went out and got a 55
gallon drum and painted it blue...Smitty
and Newt
put lights all,over it and we had a triple decker cart machine
with Star Wars type respones ...We actually had someone get into
the drum to run the equipment...We took it on remotes...Last I
heard, the drum is still at the transmitter
building ...no doubt gathering a lot of dust.
On
the Format Change
Many
stations at that time were successfully coverting to AC from CHR..WNCI
in Columbus is the best modern day example of this...They have
great adult numbers...It was a gamble but with Q107
pounding us on the younger end, we thought we could migrate to
the 25-34 women demo.
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