WCCO-AM
Encyclopedia
WCCO is a radio station
Radio station
Radio broadcasting is a one-way wireless transmission over radio waves intended to reach a wide audience. Stations can be linked in radio networks to broadcast a common radio format, either in broadcast syndication or simulcast or both...

 located in Minneapolis, Minnesota
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Minneapolis , nicknamed "City of Lakes" and the "Mill City," is the county seat of Hennepin County, the largest city in the U.S. state of Minnesota, and the 48th largest in the United States...

, USA
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. The station broadcasts on a clear-channel frequency and is owned by CBS Radio
CBS Radio
CBS Radio, Inc., formerly known as Infinity Broadcasting Corporation, is one of the largest owners and operators of radio stations in the United States, third behind main rival Clear Channel Communications and Cumulus Media. CBS Radio owns around 130 radio stations across the country...

. The station's studios are located in downtown Minneapolis, while its transmitter is located in Coon Rapids, Minnesota
Coon Rapids, Minnesota
As of the census of 2000, there were 61,627 people, 22,578 households, and 16,572 families residing in the city. The population density was 2,718.1 people per square mile . There were 22,828 housing units at an average density of 1,007.2 per square mile...

.
With 50,000 watt
Watt
The watt is a derived unit of power in the International System of Units , named after the Scottish engineer James Watt . The unit, defined as one joule per second, measures the rate of energy conversion.-Definition:...

s of power, WCCO's signal reaches a wide area of North America at night.

From 1947 to 1996, WCCO radio and WCCO-TV
WCCO-TV
WCCO-TV, is the CBS owned and operated television station that serves the Minneapolis-St. Paul area of Minnesota. Its transmitter is at the Telefarm complex in Shoreview, Minnesota.- History :...

 (channel 4) won twelve George Foster Peabody Awards, more than any other Twin Cities broadcast outlet.

History

Early Years

WCCO began broadcasting in the region on Sept. 4, 1922 as WLAG, known as "the Call of the North", from a hotel near Loring Park
Loring Park
Loring Park is the largest park in the Central Community of Minneapolis, Minnesota on the southwest corner of downtown Minneapolis. It also lends its name to the surrounding neighborhood.- Park :...

 in Minneapolis. However, the station soon landed in financial trouble and closed down in 1924. Washburn Crosby Co., forerunner of General Mills
General Mills
General Mills, Inc. is an American Fortune 500 corporation, primarily concerned with food products, which is headquartered in Golden Valley, Minnesota, a suburb of Minneapolis. The company markets many well-known brands, such as Betty Crocker, Yoplait, Colombo, Totinos, Jeno's, Pillsbury, Green...

, took over the station and renamed it WCCO, for the company's initials. Broadcasts resumed less than two months later on Oct. 2, 1924 from its current transmitter site in Coon Rapids (then known as Anoka Township). But for that brief interruption, WCCO would be the oldest station on the air today in Minnesota. It originally broadcast at 710 AM.

In the early days of radio, WCCO was a powerful force in the development of better and more powerful transmitters. On Nov. 11, 1928, with the implementation of the Federal Radio Commission
Federal Radio Commission
The Federal Radio Commission was a government body that regulated radio use in the United States from its creation in 1926 until its replacement by the Federal Communications Commission in 1934...

's General Order 40
General Order 40
General Order 40 was an order issued on August 30, 1928 by the new Federal Radio Commission under the Radio Act of 1927 which provided for a reallocation of the commercial broadcast radio spectrum....

, WCCO changed its frequency to 810 kHz and was granted clear-channel status. It signed on with 50,000 watts for the first time in September 1932. In the 1930s, two additional 300-foot towers were added to increase the range of the station's signal, allowing it to be picked up as far away as Hawaii
Hawaii
Hawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states , and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of...

 and the Caribbean Sea
Caribbean Sea
The Caribbean Sea is a sea of the Atlantic Ocean located in the tropics of the Western hemisphere. It is bounded by Mexico and Central America to the west and southwest, to the north by the Greater Antilles, and to the east by the Lesser Antilles....

 when atmospheric
Earth's atmosphere
The atmosphere of Earth is a layer of gases surrounding the planet Earth that is retained by Earth's gravity. The atmosphere protects life on Earth by absorbing ultraviolet solar radiation, warming the surface through heat retention , and reducing temperature extremes between day and night...

 conditions were right. Later in 1932, CBS bought WCCO from General Mills, and it remains affiliated with the CBS Radio Network
CBS Radio Network
The CBS Radio Network provides news, sports and other programming to more than 1,000 radio stations throughout the United States. The network is owned by CBS Corporation, and operated by CBS Radio ....

 to this day. Some time in the late 1940s or early 1950s, CBS sold majority control of WCCO to the Murphy and McNally families, who formed Midwest Radio and Television
Midwest Radio and Television
Midwest Radio and Television was a broadcasting company based in the Upper Midwest United States.Its history dates back to August 1952, when the original owners of WTCN-AM-FM-TV decided to sell the stations. While the radio stations went to a separate owner, WTCN-TV was sold to the owners of WCCO...

 as a holding company for WCCO radio and its new television sister
WCCO-TV
WCCO-TV, is the CBS owned and operated television station that serves the Minneapolis-St. Paul area of Minnesota. Its transmitter is at the Telefarm complex in Shoreview, Minnesota.- History :...

. The WCCO stations became fully owned by CBS again in 1992 when Midwest Radio and Television merged with the network.

WCCO constructed a new 654-foot tower in Coon Rapids in 1939. This is the same tower used today, although the broadcast frequency was changed to 830 kHz as a result of the 1941 North American Radio Broadcasting Agreement
North American Radio Broadcasting Agreement
The North American Radio Broadcasting Agreement, usually referred to as NARBA, is a treaty that took effect in March 1941 and set out the bandplan and interference rules for mediumwave AM broadcasting in North America. Although mostly replaced by other agreements in the 1980s, the basic bandplan...

.

Signal

Due to the station's power, as well as Minnesota's mostly flat landscape, WCCO boasts one of the largest coverage areas in the country. During the day, it provides at least B grade coverage to almost all of Minnesota (as far north as Duluth
Duluth, Minnesota
Duluth is a port city in the U.S. state of Minnesota and is the county seat of Saint Louis County. The fourth largest city in Minnesota, Duluth had a total population of 86,265 in the 2010 census. Duluth is also the second largest city that is located on Lake Superior after Thunder Bay, Ontario,...

 and as far south as Rochester
Rochester, Minnesota
Rochester is a city in the U.S. state of Minnesota and is the county seat of Olmsted County. Located on both banks of the Zumbro River, The city has a population of 106,769 according to the 2010 United States Census, making it Minnesota's third-largest city and the largest outside of the...

), plus large portions of Iowa
Iowa
Iowa is a state located in the Midwestern United States, an area often referred to as the "American Heartland". It derives its name from the Ioway people, one of the many American Indian tribes that occupied the state at the time of European exploration. Iowa was a part of the French colony of New...

 and Wisconsin
Wisconsin
Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...

. Under the right conditions, it reaches into portions of North
North Dakota
North Dakota is a state located in the Midwestern region of the United States of America, along the Canadian border. The state is bordered by Canada to the north, Minnesota to the east, South Dakota to the south and Montana to the west. North Dakota is the 19th-largest state by area in the U.S....

 and South Dakota
South Dakota
South Dakota is a state located in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is named after the Lakota and Dakota Sioux American Indian tribes. Once a part of Dakota Territory, South Dakota became a state on November 2, 1889. The state has an area of and an estimated population of just over...

. At night, the station's signal typically reaches across 28 U.S. states and three Canadian
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

 provinces. Certain conditions can make the signal stretch much farther. Legendary station personality Howard Viken says that he once picked up the station while he was stationed at Guadalcanal
Guadalcanal
Guadalcanal is a tropical island in the South-Western Pacific. The largest island in the Solomons, it was discovered by the Spanish expedition of Alvaro de Mendaña in 1568...

 in 1943. In 2005, WCCO began broadcasting its signal with HD Radio
HD Radio
HD Radio, which originally stood for "Hybrid Digital", is the trademark for iBiquity's in-band on-channel digital radio technology used by AM and FM radio stations to transmit audio and data via a digital signal in conjunction with their analog signals...

.

Programming and Personalities

WCCO broadcasters were substantial celebrities across the Midwest
Midwestern United States
The Midwestern United States is one of the four U.S. geographic regions defined by the United States Census Bureau, providing an official definition of the American Midwest....

. Perhaps the greatest of them all was Cedric Adams
Cedric Adams
Cedric Adams was an American broadcaster, well known in the Midwestern United States from the 1930s until his death He was inducted into the Pavek Museum of Broadcasting's Hall of Fame in 2002...

 who first appeared on WCCO in 1931, and broadcast on the station until his death in 1961. Pilots flying over the Upper Midwest reported watching the lights go out all over the region each night when Adams finished his 10 p.m. newscast. Howard Viken, Maynard Speece, Charlie Boone and Roger Erickson, Jergen Nash, Joyce Lamont, Randy Merriman and others were so well known and loved that when distinguished broadcaster Steve Cannon
Steve Cannon
Steve Cannon may refer to:*Steve Staley, voice actor whose stage name is Steve Cannon*Steve Cannon , Minnesota radio personality on WCCO-AM...

 "the Iron Ranger" and his cast of characters, including Backlash LaRue and Ma Linger arrived at WCCO from KSTP in 1971, he was still thought of by many as the "new guy" nearly until his retirement 26 years later.

WCCO Radio is known in its home market by its call letters, the phrase "Radio 8-3-0" or "Minnesota's 8-3-0" or the nicknames "' CCO" or "The Good Neighbor", and plays a news and talk-oriented format, with a strong news element, opinion and a number of shows throughout the day, with occasional short stories
Short Stories
Short Stories may refer to:*A plural for Short story*Short Stories , an American pulp magazine published from 1890-1959*Short Stories, a 1954 collection by O. E...

 like the station's former "Point of Law" program which served to both entertain and educate the station's listeners about finer points of the American legal system. The format also included a broad mix of music, which leaned toward traditional MOR and easy-listening fare until the 1980s, when the playlist shifted more toward adult contemporary. The music was gradually phased out by the early 1990s, when the format was changed to all news/talk.

Severe Weather Coverage

WCCO also had a longtime reputation of being the station to tune to for emergency information, especially severe weather. Listeners would call in during severe weather events and describe what they were seeing at their locations, supplementing information from the National Weather Service. For many years, it was famous for its "klaxon" alert tone for tornado warnings, which was a purposely irritating, attention-grabbing sound designed to alert even the drowsiest listeners, of impending danger. This sound was created by putting a two-part metal ashtray on a bulk tape eraser and pushing the erase button, creating a foghorn-like tone, which was then recorded for subsequent use.

For a series of public service, live, emergency broadcasts in 1965 - the St. Patrick's Day Blizzard, the record April floods on the Minnesota and Mississippi Rivers, and the May 6 onslaught of 24 tornado touchdowns in the Twin Cities area - the station earned a 'trifecta' of the George Foster Peabody, the DuPont, and the Sigma Delta Chi, awards, all in one year.

FM Sister: W9XHW to WCCO-FM to Lite FM

WCCO engineers were experimenting with frequency modulation
Frequency modulation
In telecommunications and signal processing, frequency modulation conveys information over a carrier wave by varying its instantaneous frequency. This contrasts with amplitude modulation, in which the amplitude of the carrier is varied while its frequency remains constant...

 by 1939, operating W9XHW at 42.3 MHz, but at just 50 watts. The station continued to only consider the medium tepidly. In 1969, WCCO-FM was broadcasting at 2700 watt, atop the 450-foot Foshay Tower
Foshay Tower
The Foshay Tower, now the W Minneapolis – The Foshay hotel, is a skyscraper in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Modeled after the Washington Monument, the building was completed in 1929, months before the stock market crash in October of that year. It has 32 floors and stands high, plus an antenna mast...

 in downtown Minneapolis, and only for the minimum number of hours required to keep a license to the frequency. The FM station moved its antenna to 1250 feet near the top of the Shoreview, Minnesota, Twin Cities antenna farm, with a power of 100,000 watts, in 1973. A full day's programming of music and a large news operation could be heard clearly for 150 miles in all directions. By the late 1970s, "WCCO-FM 103" had come into its own and established its own identity with a very popular adult-contemporary/soft rock format. In 1983 it became WLTE
WLTE
WLTE is a radio station in Minneapolis-St. Paul that carries a "Lite rock" adult contemporary format and has done so for more than two decades. WLTE is owned by CBS Corporation, which also owns WCCO radio today...

 102.9 FM. Like its AM sister, "102.9 Lite FM" broadcasts in HD Radio, and rebroadcasts WCCO programming on its HD-2 side channel.

WCCO Today

WCCO was the top-rated station in the Twin Cities for decades until shifting demographics and interests finally brought KQRS-FM to the top spot. One sign of the changing times: the well-known farm
Farm
A farm is an area of land, or, for aquaculture, lake, river or sea, including various structures, devoted primarily to the practice of producing and managing food , fibres and, increasingly, fuel. It is the basic production facility in food production. Farms may be owned and operated by a single...

 report was dropped in early 2004, reflecting the fact that many farmers began to rely more on the Internet
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...

 for such information and that the number of farmers in Minnesota has drastically shrunk since the station first began broadcasting (though agriculture remains vital to the region).

For several years, WCCO has hosted a weekly radio show with the governor of Minnesota
Governor of Minnesota
The Governor of Minnesota is the chief executive of the U.S. state of Minnesota, leading the state's executive branch. Forty different people have been governors of the state, though historically there were also three governors of Minnesota Territory. Alexander Ramsey, the first territorial...

. Former governor Jesse Ventura
Jesse Ventura
James George Janos , better known as Jesse Ventura, is an American politician, the 38th Governor of Minnesota from 1999 to 2003, Navy UDT veteran, former SEAL reservist, actor, and former radio and television talk show host...

 had a show while in office, and successor Tim Pawlenty
Tim Pawlenty
Timothy James "Tim" Pawlenty , also known affectionately among supporters as T-Paw, is an American politician who served as the 39th Governor of Minnesota . He was a Republican candidate for President of the United States in the 2012 election from May to August 2011...

 has followed suit.

More recent WCCO personalities have included longtime Star Tribune
Star Tribune
The Star Tribune is the largest newspaper in the U.S. state of Minnesota and is published seven days each week in an edition for the Minneapolis-Saint Paul metropolitan area. A statewide version is also available across Minnesota and parts of Wisconsin, Iowa, South Dakota, and North Dakota. The...

 columnist Sid Hartman
Sid Hartman
Sid Hartman is an American sports journalist for the Minneapolis Star Tribune and the WCCO 830 AM radio station.-Background and early career:A high-school dropout, Hartman received no formal writing training...

, "Whole-Lotta Woman" Ruth Koscielak, Tim Russell
Tim Russell
Tim Russell is an American radio announcer and voice actor in Minneapolis – Saint Paul. He is most widely known as one of the actors on the long-running radio show, A Prairie Home Companion...

, also a cast member on Garrison Keillor's A Prairie Home Companion
A Prairie Home Companion
A Prairie Home Companion is a live radio variety show created and hosted by Garrison Keillor. The show runs on Saturdays from 5 to 7 p.m. Central Time, and usually originates from the Fitzgerald Theater in Saint Paul, Minnesota, although it is frequently taken on the road...

. Some notable sports broadcasters have included Baseball Hall of Fame member Herb Carneal
Herb Carneal
Herb Carneal was an American Major League Baseball sportscaster. From 1962 through 2006, he was a play-by-play voice of Minnesota Twins radio broadcasts, becoming the lead announcer in 1967 after Ray Scott left to work exclusively with CBS...

 the longtime voice of the Minnesota Twins
Minnesota Twins
The Minnesota Twins are a professional baseball team based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. They play in the Central Division of Major League Baseball's American League. The team is named after the Twin Cities area of Minneapolis and St. Paul. They played in Metropolitan Stadium from 1961 to 1981 and the...

, Halsey Hall, Ray Scott and Ray Christensen, longtime voice of University of Minnesota
University of Minnesota
The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university located in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, United States. It is the oldest and largest part of the University of Minnesota system and has the fourth-largest main campus student body in the United States, with 52,557...

's Gopher Football and Gopher Men's Basketball. Some of WCCO's current programming includes the morning show with Dave Lee during the week days from 5 to 9. The afternoon drive with Michele Tafoya from 3 to 6, and Hine Sight from 8 to 10 p.m. followed by variety / comedy host T.D. Mischke until midnight when the station broadcasts syndicated programming.

WCCO will be the radio home of Minnesota Timberwolves
Minnesota Timberwolves
The Minnesota Timberwolves are an American professional basketball team based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. They play in the Northwest Division of the Western Conference in the National Basketball Association . Founded in 1989, the team is currently owned by Glen Taylor...

 basketball
Basketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules...

 starting with the 2011-2012 season, having recently acquired the broadcast rights from rival KFAN
KFAN (AM)
* See also KFXN-FMKTCN —branded News/Talk 1130—is a commercial radio station licensed to Minneapolis, Minnesota, broadcasting a conservative news/talk format. The station is owned by Clear Channel Communications, and serves the Twin Cities market. KTCN's main studios are in St...

. WCCO has also recently signed a contract to broadcast University of St. Thomas
University of St. Thomas
University of St. Thomas can refer to:*University of St. Thomas *University of St. Thomas *University of Santo Tomas, Manila, Philippines*Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas , Rome, Italy...

 football beginning in the 2011-2012 season. Games will be hosted on air by David Lee. WCCO was the former home of University of Minnesota
University of Minnesota
The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university located in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, United States. It is the oldest and largest part of the University of Minnesota system and has the fourth-largest main campus student body in the United States, with 52,557...

 Golden Gophers
Minnesota Golden Gophers
The Minnesota Golden Gophers are the college sports team for the University of Minnesota. The university fields both men's and women's teams in basketball, cross country, gymnastics, golf, ice hockey, swimming, tennis, and track and field. Men's-specific sports include baseball, football, and...

 athletics, Minnesota Wild
Minnesota Wild
The Minnesota Wild are a professional ice hockey team based in St. Paul, Minnesota, United States. They are members of the Northwest Division of the Western Conference of the National Hockey League ....

 hockey
Hockey
Hockey is a family of sports in which two teams play against each other by trying to maneuver a ball or a puck into the opponent's goal using a hockey stick.-Etymology:...

 and Minnesota Twins
Minnesota Twins
The Minnesota Twins are a professional baseball team based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. They play in the Central Division of Major League Baseball's American League. The team is named after the Twin Cities area of Minneapolis and St. Paul. They played in Metropolitan Stadium from 1961 to 1981 and the...

 baseball
Baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...

. The Twins had been on WCCO since arriving in Minnesota in 1961, but because of a dispute between WCCO parent CBS and XM Satellite Radio
XM Satellite Radio
XM Satellite Radio is one of two satellite radio services in the United States and Canada, operated by Sirius XM Radio. It provides pay-for-service radio, analogous to cable television. Its service includes 73 different music channels, 39 news, sports, talk and entertainment channels, 21 regional...

 over compensation for its Major League Baseball broadcasts, CBS did not renew many of its MLB contracts. WCCO was the radio home of the Minnesota Vikings
Minnesota Vikings
The Minnesota Vikings are a professional American football team based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Vikings joined the National Football League as an expansion team in 1960...

 from 1961-69, 1976-84, 1988-90 and 1996-2000.

Eleanor Mondale
Eleanor Mondale
Eleanor Jane Mondale Poling was an American radio personality television host, and actress.-Biography:...

, the daughter of former Senator and Vice President Walter Mondale
Walter Mondale
Walter Frederick "Fritz" Mondale is an American Democratic Party politician, who served as the 42nd Vice President of the United States , under President Jimmy Carter, and as a United States Senator for Minnesota...

, started her career in radio at the station in 1989 as the entertainment reporter, but left after eight months. She returned to Minnesota in 2006 to co-host a weekday morning show on WCCO-AM with Susie Jones. Eleanor had been off the air at WCCO-AM since March 19, 2009, when she announced that her brain cancer had returned a second time. She had surgery to remove the tumor Aug. 12, 2009, at the Mayo Clinic
Mayo Clinic
Mayo Clinic is a not-for-profit medical practice and medical research group specializing in treating difficult patients . Patients are referred to Mayo Clinic from across the U.S. and the world, and it is known for innovative and effective treatments. Mayo Clinic is known for being at the top of...

 in Rochester, Minnesota., and a posting on her CaringBridge
CaringBridge
CaringBridge is a charitable 501 nonprofit organization offering free personalized websites to people facing a serious medical condition or hospitalization, undergoing medical treatment and/or recovering from a significant accident, illness, injury or procedure. Its functionality is similar to a blog...

 website declared the surgery a success. She underwent surgery that time and was able to return to WCCO but eventually had to take disability leave to treat the recurrence.
Eleanor died of brain cancer at her home in Minnesota on Saturday September 17, 2011. She was 51.

In August 2008, as a cosmetic change to make WCCO in the norm with CBS' other talk radio stations, the station changed from "News/Talk 830 WCCO" to "News Radio 830 WCCO".

On September 15th, 2011, WCCO was awarded the Marconi Award for Large Market Station of the Year.

The Morning News with Dave Lee

  • Dave Lee – host
  • Steve Murphy – news updates
  • Mike Lynch – weather updates
  • Sid Hartman – sports talk
  • Josie Smith – traffic reporter
  • Jerry Peterson (J.P.) – traffic reporter


Key features of the show: Traffic and weather together on the 8s, birthdays, "Market Watch" with Ann Cates, John Rash with "The Rash Report"

The John Williams Show (9 to Noon)

  • John Williams – host
  • Steve Murphy – news updates
  • Mark Napoleon or Deb Snyder – traffic reporter

The Chad Hartman Show Noon to 3

  • Chad Hartman – host
  • Adam Carter – news updates
  • Mike Lynch – weather updates
  • Mark Napolean – traffic reporter

Michele Tafoya Show

  • Michele Tafoya – host
  • Adam Carter or Susie Jones – news updates
  • Chris Shaffer – WCCO weather updates
  • Jerry Peterson or Josie Smith – traffic reports

Sports To the Max with Mike Max (6-8 p.m.)

  • Mike Max – host
  • Susie Jones or Edgar Linares - news updates
  • Ron Schara – Monday night outdoors
  • Jerry Peterson - traffic updates

The Nite Show (10 p.m.-midnight)

Live Monday to Thursdays, Fridays its highlights of the week.
  • T.D. Mischke – host
  • Edgar Linares – news updates

Weekend hosts and news staff

  • Denny Long – Saturday and Sunday mornings
  • Bruce Hagevik – weekend morning news reporter
  • Steve Thomson – afternoons
  • Eric Nelson – afternoons
  • Susie Jones - weekend afternoon news reporter
  • Esme Murphy – Saturday nights
  • Dave Mona – Sunday Sports Huddle
  • Sid Hartman – Sunday Sports Huddle
  • Jearlyn Steele – Sunday evenings
  • Samantha Smith - weekend evening news reporter
  • Jordan Rich – weekend overnights

On-air staff

  • Dave Lee - mornings
  • Mike Max – evenings
  • John Hines 8 to 10
  • Mischke 10 to 12
  • Jon Grayson - overnights
  • Mike Lynch – weather
  • Steve Murphy – news editor/reporter
  • Bruce Hagevik – weekend news reporter, also works a few days during the week
  • Adam Carter – news reporter weekday 9 a.m., noon and early afternoons
  • Jerry Peterson – traffic mornings/afternoons
  • Josie Smith – traffic mornings/afternoons
  • Ann Cates – Market Watch
  • Denny Long – weekend mornings host, also rotates on WCCO Midday Live.
  • Esme Murphy – weekend host, Saturday evenings
  • Eric Nelson – weekend host/sports
  • Steve Thomson – weekend host/sports
  • Dave Mona – weekend host Sunday mornings
  • Jearlyn Steele – Sunday evenings
  • Ron Schara – WCCO outdoors
  • John Rash – The Rash Report during the Dave Lee Morning news
  • Sue Zelickson – food reporter
  • Sid Hartman – WCCO radio sports,
  • Roger Strom - Farm and Business report
  • Susie Jones - reporter weekday midday and afternoons


Former on-air staff

  • Cedric Adams - deceased
  • Charlie Boone – retired 12/18/2010
  • Steve Cannon
    Steve Cannon
    Steve Cannon may refer to:*Steve Staley, voice actor whose stage name is Steve Cannon*Steve Cannon , Minnesota radio personality on WCCO-AM...

     - retired 10/3/1997 (deceased)
  • Clellan Card - deceased
  • Roger Erickson - retired 1/10/1998
  • Halsey Hall - deceased
  • Franklin Hobbs - deceased, host of the overnight show "Hobbs House" from 1959 to 1981
  • Ruth Koscielak
  • Joe McFarlin - deceased
  • Al Malmberg - laid off.
  • Jergen Nash - deceased
  • Jack Rice - left on 1/30/2009 to move on and do other things
  • Dan Terhaar – sports; laid off
  • Howard Viken
  • Brad Walton - laid off from WCCO, deceased 8/26/2011
  • Patty Peterson - jazz singer
  • Don Shelby - retired from radio 2009, retired from WCCO-TV in December 2010
  • Glen Olson
  • Dark Star - contract buyout
  • Tim Russell - contract buyout
  • Jeff McKinny - left station
  • Eric Eskola - contract buyout
  • Phil Hendrie - left for nationally syndicated show
  • Wes Minter - left for another station
  • Sandy Buttweiler - left for KFGO
  • Paul Stagg - now with KWLM
  • Curt Lundgren - news: retired
  • Karen Filloon - weather: left meteorology
  • Mike (moose) Miller- location unknown
  • Dean Spratt
    Dean Spratt
    Dean Spratt was one of 7 children born to Mary and Ray Spratt in Minneapolis, MN. Blind from birth Spratt attended St. Cloud State University where he studied communications. In November of 1981, Spratt became the first traffic reporter at WCCO-AM radio, as well as the first blind traffic reporter...

    - traffic (deceased)
  • Wendy Wilde- politics
  • Rita Maloney- news and weekend host- VP at Mpls Grain Exchange
  • Kim Jeffries- morning host
  • Herb Carneal-Twins baseball broadcast
  • John Gordon-Twins baseball broadcast
  • Dan Gladden-Twins baseball broadcast
  • Dick Chapman-host
  • Jim Rogers- night time host
  • Joyce Lamont- variety host
  • Bill Diehl- weekends on location
  • Don Wick-farm broadcaster, now partner in farm network in ND

External links

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