Thomas G. Lee & WOAS FM
As 2024 came to an end, we learned of the passing of WOAS-FM’s founder and first General Manager Thomas G. Lee (March 9, 1939 – November 26, 2024). Tom and I both began our service for the Ontonagon Area School District in the Fall of 1975 (he as the high school librarian and me as the 7th grade Geography/Earth Science teacher down the road at the ‘old’ school). I was not involved with the station when it was being constructed and at the conclusion of the 1978-79 school year, I took a one year leave of absence to return to Northern Michigan University to finish my Masters of Arts degree in Geography. I was aware of the station because I had my clock radio set on 88.5 and would wake each morning to some of my fellow faculty members doing a morning show.
To say Tom was a busy fellow would be a gross understatement. The first indication of this was his office in the H.S. library. Tom would take articles (some by him and many about the radio station being put together under his guidance), frame them, and hang them on the three bare walls. The only problem was space – he quickly ran out of wall space, attesting to the volume of activity taking place on his watch.
My favorite Tom story has to do with the first steps taken to establish WOAS-FM. After filing the exhausting string of documents to apply for a license, the first application for WOAS-FM was turned down by the Federal Communications Commission. They noted, “A radio tower can not be constructed on an airport landing field.” Tom happened to be traveling to Washington, D.C. for a conference, so he took his documents in hand and visited the FCC in person. He showed them the ‘airport’ on the USGS 15 minute topographic map of the area and noted the map had not been updated since 1954. Tom then showed them photos of the school building on that site and the 1975 cornerstone of the school building. “The old landing field,” Tom pointed out, “used to be where the front hall of the new school is now.” With that little mystery wrapped up, the application was reviewed again and the license was granted. WOAS-FM went on the air in December of 1978 and has been a continuous presence up until December 20, 2024 – an uninterrupted span of 45 years. Thank you Tom, we will miss you but your legacy will live on.
At 10 p.m. December 20, 2024, Friday night DJ Lee ‘The Nightflyer’ McCaffrey signed off as the last live DJ to be heard on WOAS-FM 88.5 – for the second time. When Lee signed off back in June of 2024, we thought we would be starting the school year on a new frequency. We were first told our application should take 2 to 4 weeks to process (it is considered a ‘minor modification’ of our license). This was then extended to 3 to 6 months (or longer). When we contacted the FCC in early November, our contact informed us that their bureau had been slammed with applications and they hoped to act on ours by late November or early December.
Without seeing movement on our license request in August, I contacted Andy Larsen, the GM of the radio group in Marquette that purchased our old frequency at an open FCC auction three years ago. They had not yet begun broadcasting and did not know exactly when they would be ready, so he gave us permission to start the school year at 88.5. In our last round of communications, Andy told us they have been ready to go for a couple of months but were holding off so they would not put us off the air while we waited for the FCC’s final decision. The construction permit (or CP) for their new translator station expires in February of 2025, so they have no more leeway to wait for our new frequency to be granted. With that said, WOAS-FM 88.5 is now officially a thing of the past. We wish to thank Andy for allowing us to stay on the air up to what turns out to be (give or take a few days) the 46th Anniversary of WOAS-FM’s first broadcast.
At this point, it would be appropriate to thank everyone who has been involved in WOAS-FM from start up to the end of our run on 88.5. We viewed the loss of 88.5 with some sadness, but in the end, it spurred a fundraising campaign (with much help from The Ontonagon Herald, The Detroit Free Press, and the NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt) that allowed us to upgrade our facility and apply for a new frequency. I had hoped to be writing a ‘Welcome to the New WOAS-FM’ article at this point, but alas, we are still in a holding pattern. It is our intention to be on the air just as soon as the FCC gives us a thumbs-up and you can be assured we will let you know ASAP. In the meantime, Happy New Year from the staff of WOAS-FM.
Photo: Original (and current) WOAS-FM engineer Jim Bradley (left) and station founder Thomas G. Lee in October of 2023. Jim and Tom were on hand when the news crew from NBC was on site doing a feature about WOAS-FM.
Top Piece Video – Radio GaGa by Queen – this is, after all, about building a radio station – right?