It was a labor of decades.Working with Joel “JK the DJ” Kiedrowski, Ken Freck compiled an exhaustive lookat Milwaukee’s top selling records during the 1960s and early ‘70s based onweekly surveys by a local radio station. Their book, Milwaukee Radio Chart Hits: WRIT Radio Surveys 1960-1974, is drawnfrom flyers published by one of the area’s leading Top-40 AM stations, WRIT,and distributed each week to record stores and other retailers.
Why did it take so long? Thestation has gone through many hands since then and left behind no archive.Apparently, no one was collecting their flyers. “I couldn’t find the stuff,”Freck says. “One guy would have a small pile of this, another guy had a few ofthese.” Estate sales and rummage sales were combed year by year to accumulateflyers. Newspaper ads yielded a few items. Craigslist was useless.
The inspiration came fromMenomonee Falls native Joel Whitburn’s series of books that mined the Billboardcharts for analysis on the history of recorded sound. “I realized howinaccurate the Billboard charts were for this region—they didn’t mirrorMilwaukee very well,” Freck explains.
Of course, it’s hard tovalidate the accuracy of WRIT’s rankings from an age before scanners. It seemsas though they were compiled from sales reported from several local storescombined with tallying phone-in requests plus some wishful thinking. Payola? Noone can say what went on the smoke-filled backrooms of long ago.
The book is on sale atFreck’s vinyl-crammed store, Musical Memories, 833 E. Kilbourn Ave.
