KRLA and the Beat history
KRLA personalities
KRLA specialties
John Barrett joins KRLA
Looking back on KRLA's progress during the 1960s, the addition of Barrett must be seen as a remarkable decision. Barrett had grown up in Columbus, Nebraska, earned a broadcasting degree at the University of Nebraska, and had spent time as a a disc jockey and program director at WTIX New Orleans, news director at WHB Kansas City, and station manager at WKBW in Buffalo, working with both Perry Allen and deejay Dick Biondi.
In the photo at left you can see John Barrett ensconced comfortably with KRLA compatriots (from left) Dick Biondi talking to Penny Dennis, John Barrett, Bob Eubanks, Dave Hull, and Casey Kasem backstage at the KRLA Winter Hootenanny in January 1965, one of KRLA's entertainment outreach programs.
Barrett not only brought a sense of stability to KRLA, but began to establish a workable plan for its future -- a plan that would dovetail nicely with the requirements set forth by the FCC over the coming months. As the station's licensing woes waxed and waned, Barrett took charge by making sure that KRLA would establish itself as a resource for its community of listeners, no matter what their age or musical interests. This was, perhaps, one of the biggest distinctions between KFWB and KRLA.
Barrett began to reach out to local and national industry publications such as Billboard, Cashbox, and Broadcasting Magazine to emphasize his philosophy of listener engagement. In talks he gave at industry events throughout the nineteen-sixties Barrett revealed his whole-picture approach to Top 40 programming: accommodating listener music interests, expanding news and humor, limiting commercials, providing town-hall opportunities to debate the issues of the day, providing community resources such as job opportunities and educational expansion. For a radio station in this type of market at the time, this was revolutionary.