WBAI - Alumni of The Station

Alumni of The Station

Alumni of WBAI include Margot Adler, Abraham Aig, Jan Albert, Chris Albertson, Nancy Allen, Matt Alperin, Archie Altman, Lindsay Audin, Robbie Barish, Deborah Begel, Olenka Bohachevski, Delphine Blue, Peter Bochan, Bunny Bruce, Janice K. Bryant, Doreen Canto, Pepsi Charles, Frank Coffee, Candy Cohen, Janet Coleman, Neal Conan, Pat Conte, John Corigliano, Deloris Costello, Liza Cowan, Larry Cox, Joe Cumo, Ken Davis, Barbara Day, Ife Dancy, Dick Demenus, Kathy Dobkin, Mike Edl, Barika Taheer Edwards, Matt Edwards, Dick Elman, Bob Fass, Mike Feder, Charlie Finch, Richard Fioravanti, Paul Fischer, John Fisk, Sara Fishko, Joe Frank, Gary Fried, Jim Freund, Paul Gorman, Joanne Grant, Jeff Greenfield, Edward Haber, Doug Henwood, Lex Hixon, Charles Hobson, Milton Hoffman, Mary Houston, Susan Howe, Jimmy Howes, Rob Hunter, Timothy Jerome, Reggie Johnson, Larry Josephson, Sam Julty, Citizen Kafka, Jesse Keyes, Glo Kirby, Robert Knight, Alen Pol Kobryn, Chris Koch, Robert Kuttner, Richard Lamparski, Andy Lanset, Julius Lester, Al Lewis, John Lithgow, Sari Locker, Leonard Lopate, The Mighty G-Man, Ann MacMillan, Marian McPartland, Samori Marksmen, Margaret Mercer, Frank Millspaugh, Dale Minor, Kathy O'Connell, Andrew Phillips, Betty Pilkington, Charles Pitts, Steve Post, Charles Potter, Robert Potts, David Rapkin, Chris Rhoden, Desiree K. Robinson, David Rothenberg, Jay Rothman (Zeke), Charles Ruas, Eric Salzman, Lynn Samuels, Bill Schechner, Baird Searles, Judy Sherman, John J. Simon, Miles Smith, Peter Cedric Rock Smith (aka: Rocky), Jay Smooth, Bruce Soloway, A. B. Spellman, Gordon Spencer, Dick Sudhalter, Becky Thorn, Tom Tracy, Mickey Waldman, Marjorie Waxman, Manoli Wetherell, Ira Weitzman, Bernard White, Tom Whitmore, Will K. Wilkins, Ed Woodard, David Wynyard, Peter Zanger.

In the 1960s, Dale Minor and Chris Koch reported on the Vietnam War and the Civil Rights struggle. Former Station Manager Chris Albertson returned to the music field, spent 28 years as Contributing Editor to Stereo Review and authored a biography of Bessie Smith. The Apple specialist business Tekserve was originally composed of former WBAI employees David Lerner, Dick Demenus, and Mike Edl. Through the 1970s, David Rapkin, James Irsay and Charles Potter produced some of the finest American radio drama of the post "Golden Age", some is still found in the Pacifica Archive, notable, an adaptation of Dalton Trumbo's Johnny Got His Gun. In the 1980s, new studios at 505 Eighth Avenue were built by Miles Smith who, along with WBAI alumna Jane Pipik, is now working at WGBH in Boston. About the same time Dennis Coleman, Jim Freund, Sharon Griffiths, Kathy O'Connell, Sharon Mattlin, Sidney Smith, Paul Wunder, Max Schmid and Simon Loekle formed EMRA, the "Early Morning Radio Alliance". Loekle also created the Shakespeare Liberation Front and with Stephen Erickson produced radio dramas, dramatic readings and documentaries – notably, Tale of the Monkey King and the Communist Manifesto. Loekle (As I Please – Saturday mornings at 7 a.m. and Stand-up Academy), Freund (Hour of the Wolf), Smith, and Schmid are still at the station. After retiring as a NYC High School science teacher, Paul Wunder, aka "Doctor Science", became Operations Director, a position he held until his death. Erickson, who became program director in 1984 but was battered by charges of racism (Village Voice, 1985) when he attempted to change the program schedule, moved to Germany where he produces radio documentaries.

WBAI's broadcast of the comedian George Carlin's Filthy Words became a landmark moment in the history of free speech. In a 1978 milestone in the station's contentious and unruly history, WBAI lost a 5-to-4 U.S. Supreme Court decision (FCC v. Pacifica Foundation) that to this day has defined the power of the government over broadcast material it calls indecent.

In 1998, WBAI moved to the tenth floor at 120 Wall Street in the Financial District.