Fillmore is Joan Fillmore and she worked and in ways ran AMI by day and on weekends Howe wanted her to do news for CJCH and C100.  Howe has become known for his open line career but for many years was a reporter for CJCH/C100 and for the last 20 years was the news director of those operations.

Howe needed part time help and so the call to Fillmore was made and that’s how I first talked to him. For years Joan Fillmore who now works at CKBW radio in Bridgewater answered the “Where’s Fillmore” call and in the 90’s did lots of news shifts for Howe.

I’ve gotten to know him a lot better since those ‘Where’s Fillmore” days. Ten years ago he took over the open line show.  It should be noted that the open line show, at the time, was struggling.  They literally had so few listeners and fewer callers.  I recall listening to Wayne Cody and Patricia almost every day.

Howe literally started at the bottom and started to build his audience. We’ll get to that audience in a few moments but a few things about Howe.

He like a few of us (Steve Murphy comes to mind) liked this industry early.  It’s hard to explain.  I knew at 12 or 13 that I was going to be in the radio industry, either as a dee jay or a sports guy.  I started off as a dee jay (would you believe Wild Child Walling) and have been through most of the positions at a radio station from all night guy (a shift or two) to owning a few.

Howe followed a different course in the sense that once he got into the news end of the business in the 70’s he stayed there and did the news gathering, news reporting, news direction and for the past decade the open line show.

I first heard of Rick Howe way back in the mid 70’s, he was on CFBC.  Next to CJCH in Halifax, CFBC in Saint John was perhaps the second biggest radio station in the Maritimes.

CFBC produced a lot of broadcasters for CJCH.  A few that come to mind include Steve Murphy and Paul Menier. I think Brian Philips did a stint there.

“This is Rick Howe, 93- C-F-B-C Contemporary News,” is something I often heard as I drove through New Brunswick in the 70’s.  Back then CFBC was located at 93 or 930 on the dial and it was a powerful station with 50,000 watts.

In 1976 I was a radio instructor at CRXL. That was a very unique broadcasting course put on by a cooperative effort of radio station, the AAB (Atlantic Association of Broadcasters) and Canada Manpower.

I had been working with CHNS since 1972 and started working part time at CRXL and then in 1976 I went full time and ended up running the place for a while before leaving to start a new radio station in Fredericton which was to become CIHI.

In my last few months at CRXL, in the spring of 1977, I received many audition tapes from people wanting to work in Fredericton.

I remember there were many tapes that came in, around 50-60.  I don’t remember more than 3 or 4 of those tapes but one of them was…Rick Howe and that CFBC Contemporary News Jingle.

He was a very good news reader at the time.  The year was 1977.  I ended up with some good news people at CIHI such as Dan Dugas who spent 20 years with Broadcast News and now is the media man for Peter McKay.  Noreen Nunn, sister of Jim worked at CIHI and so did John Lewendoski.

Ratings were a big deal to Rick Howe and he did very well.

Peter Duffy in a farewell column said that Rick had the lowest ratings at 2.6.  That is inaccurate.  The fact is CJCH especially since Brian Philips left the airwaves for health reasons hit bottom.

Now, that’s not hard to do as the AM stations in town will be and should be on the bottom.  The heyday of AM radio started to fade in the early 80’s.

First CHNS left the dial, now CJ and soon KIXX Country.

While CJCH had the low rating of 2.6 Howe’s show did not.

Ratings are hard to decipher.  Here are some examples.  That 2.6 is geared to listeners 12 years old and over.

Guess what, CJ doesn’t have many 12 year olds.  In radio advertisers went those 18+ (18-years old and over).  Howe’s numbers in this category are much higher than 2.8.

When you hit the 45+ category Howe had the best numbers in his station.  In fact since News 95.7 started with their open line shows, Howe had always led in Metro over Andrew Krystal and Tom Young.

In most of the time where these shows battled Howe had better numbers in Metro.  This last rating period News 95.7 had stronger overall numbers but still in HRM there’s reason to believe that Howe still had more.

That for a small AM station that did no promoting, no advertising, no billboard is to some a gargantuan accomplishment.

I expected News 95.7 with their FM signal, their TV budget, their billboard campaigns to lead after two books, that was not the case and Howe is/was the reason.

He’s proud of that fact and I don’t blame him.

Prior to Saint John Howe how worked in a few small Maritime station which is the best way to gain experience.

His first station was CFNB Campbellton.  I remember the station well as they turned me down in the summer of 1966.  I believe he also worked at CFAN in Newcastle and then to Saint John.

Rick Howe was a good reporter and maybe a very good one. He wasn’t afraid to go after a story and politicians.  Little did we know that running after stories and politicians would be something he would do in an expert fashion decade later for as an open line host that is what he did, chased down a story, get a guest on air and ask questions?

His open line show started slowly but it grew.

Yes, we had Wayne, and Pat and then Gene (How can we forget Gene) joined the fray, then another Pat, and then this person and that person and all of a sudden we had an army of regular callers.

And boy, were they regular.

In fact, Howe even changed my at times ‘hard to change stance’ on open line shows.

Unlike Rick I have never done an open line show for ten-straight years but have done open line shows for more than 10-years if you consider the shows in Woodstock (my version of Howe’s Campbellton), Halifax, Bathurst, Fredericton, Corner Brook, (2 different stations) and a few more.

I was not a big fan of having the same callers call in day in and day out.  In fact I went out of my way back then to not get them on air.  I wanted more diversified callers and to a degree I will always feel that way.  But what Howe did was convince me that at least I should give them some time.

“If they want to call the Hotline show every day or more than once a day maybe they need that in their lives and if I can give them that why not,” he once told me.

It’s both an interesting and a very charitable way to look at things.  Howe is a fine open line host but he just may be a finer human being.  He and his wife once plunked out over six-grand to have their dog saved.  That’s a lot of dough for a dog but CJ is a member of the family.

I don’t, despite our years of association know him personally that well, but over the past ten years I know most of his life centers around his show and his family.  He loves sports; he loves basketball and has coached it. On many occasions over the years I would see Howe, and his unique look (more on that later) in and around the high school gyms following the exploits of his son David.

Sometimes in going to a gym to do a story for my high school publication (Impact) there he would be, way up in a corner of a gym, ball cap, loud shirts and all, waiting for David and the rest of the Lockview High school team to hit the court.

Once in a while I would see him at the door, helping out, collecting money, trying to sell tickets for some sort of a draw.  One game I saw him at the scorers table.

As I said, his life is his wife (Yvonne) a very competent broadcaster in her own right, his two sons and that show.

Yes, that open line show.

One has no idea the amount of time it takes to put three hours of content on air, each day, every day, for month after month and year after year.

Three hours with no records to fill in the time.

To me doing an open line show is the ultimate challenge in this business.  You are on your own on every call.  You have no idea what a caller can bring from sheer lunacy to brilliance.  Callers have thrown curve balls, knucklers and every weird pitch imaginable and the host, is the catcher, and must catch that pitch.

Howe made the Hotline show a community on the air.  He was also very smart and realized his market. We had three different markets in Halifax with three open line shows.

While it doesn’t get much talk the CBC Noon time show with Costas is a big show and their market is all of the Maritimes. The structure is different, the audience is very large and the calls from all over the Maritimes reflect that.

News 95.7 with both Tom Young (who was Rick’s superior at CFBC) and Andrew Krystal hit a regional audience, although the Krystal has focused on HRM over the past year and may do so even more in the future.

But Howe’s Hotline was local, local and local. And that was his strength. It put him in contact with the average person, the middle class and to a large degree he became the voice or conduit for those who were not so well off.

Potholes problems, call Howe.

Cats running around bring it up with Rick.

You don’t like what the government is doing with your money, then tell Rick Howe.

And they did.

If I were driving through town or just moving into HRM and wanted to find out what was really happening then there is no doubt; simply listen to the Hotline for a week and you would have the pulse of the community. And that’s what he had.  His show was the pulse and has been for a very long time and that more than anything else will be missed.

Once in a while Howe would launch a phone attack.  This was usually done on a government person, source or cabinet minister.  They got terrific responses.

Callers are one thing but big parts of filling those three hours are guests. There are two kinds of hotline show guests; one is the telephone guest and the other is the ‘bring in the studio’ variety.

Howe usually had his studio guests come in from 11am till noon.  This gave him a chance to promote his guest(s) during the 10-11 opening hour and then if the guest(s) were interesting or controversial, then Howe had the option of keeping them on for a little bit more time in the third hour or in most cases he would use the guest(s) and their topic as fodder for the third and final hour.

But what people never saw were the times, the call, the calls, and the effort in getting those guests who came from every breath of society.

It’s called tracking people down and sometimes it is not easy.

While many think Howe only worked from 10-1 his typical day started around 6am when he hit the newsroom and started on his daily monologue.

He checks the wire, he checks the paper (I’m sure he missed the Daily News as it offered another viewpoint and ideas) and he started to write his opening script which could be over 10 minutes long.

The script was like a menu. It offered a plethora of topics to the listener.  Many didn’t understand that, saying Howe was forcing issues to talk about but that was not the case. He usually ended his spiel by saying… “These are some of the items and if you have others let me know.”

An open line show can be very consuming.  Yes, he comes in at 6am…takes three hours to prepare for a three hour show. The guest(s) and sometimes there are many (4 or 5) just don’t appear, they are called, messages are left, and are tracked down.

Here’s something that listeners never see.

A caller has been booked for the next morning for a one hour show but cannot make it. The caller calls Howe, let’s say around 7pm at home, hours after the host has left the station.
 
Guess what?  Howe spends time, from home, trying to replace the caller. It’s one thing to find someone for a five minute, on-the phone interview it’s another to get someone who can come into the studio the next day.  Most people have jobs and to leave your job isn’t that easy.

And, by the way, it’s, for the guest, not just an hour.  I filled in for Harv Stewart when Harv had down time and did so for over 10 straight Friday morning on the sports segment.  The show was between 10-11am.  Yes, it’s an hour of air time but you are giving up 3-4 hours as you can’t make plans for a 9am meeting as you have to think of getting to the studio and once the show is over at 11am and get back to the office it’s hard to get a business meeting as many are getting ready for lunch.  Getting guests late at night is not that easy.

Often, Howe has spent time getting new guest as a result of cancellations.

The Hotline Show was a very big part of his life. In a way it consumes those in this business.  Dee Jay’s can spin the hits for a few hours and leave it. How do you leave a comment or call from Pat (Patricia Pilkenton) or a conspiracy comment by Wayne Cody or Gene.  

Yes, Gene who probably was one of the most colourful characters in the history of the Howe Hotline.

In fact Howe had a cast of characters and they developed over the decade.  Yep, Patricia, Pat, Gene, Victoria, Dolores, Paul from New Glasgow, Barry from the South Shore,  Barry from Halifax, this caller, that caller and on and on and on.  They were his army and they will really miss him and the platform he gave them to air their concerns.

And then there was Bruce as in Bruce DeVenne.  I was Howe’s guest when Rick had to make a major decision and that was in giving him creditability.  No one else was or did until Howe took a chance and did it ever pay off.

Back then DeVenne was emailing Howe every day and Rick wrestled with that one.  “Do I want to give him a platform,” is what he once told me.  In the end he did, and DeVenne started his ‘anti 2014 Commonwealth Games” crusade.  It turned out to be a win-win for both.

They talk about Cal Ripken as being an iron man in baseball.  Give me a break.  Ripken worked five or six months a year and played his games for the Baltimore Orioles in the afternoon or 7pm at night.
 
Howe’s day started around 5am with a wake up call via his alarm.  He missed so few days.  I should know as I was his back up for years according to the former Program Director Terry Williams.

Year in and year out I was never rushed in but once, in Dec 2006 it did happen.

My phone rang at 4:32 in the morning. I didn’t answer it as I thought it was a wrong number.

But a moment later it rang again and a voice sounding like the Godfather said:  “Alex this is Rick.”  I could hardly make him out. He sounded sick, sore and in a sorry state.

That was the only morning I replaced him.

They talk about hockey players of being tough, playing through pain like the players in the recent Stanley Cup.  Howe was a tough as they come.

I did his show for the past two summers and I consider that an honour.  Yes, it was nice to join the so few who have done the Hotline since it started in 1960 but I think Howe understood that I knew how important the show was to him.  There was no way I was going to screw that up and I didn’t.

Filling in for him over the past two years was a great experience and I thank him for the trust.  The only negative was an immature operator that I had to deal with.  I will write about her in my book on broadcasting that I am working on.

Rick Howe once told me that a former open line host Dave Wright had ‘the common touch’.  Well the Rickster may have matched if not surpassed Wright in that regards.

And finally his ‘look’.

Yes, he looks like a refugee from the Woodstock days.  Jeans, usually a loud shirt and the ball cap over his receding hair.

But give him credit he looks that way on and off radio.  In the past year he did a few TV bits and no suit, shirt and tie for this fella.  He stayed true to himself.

As to why CJCH only allowed him one hour to tell people on his last show that’s simple. Had he mentioned it at the top of the show at 10am there would have been a demonstration outside and that’s not exactly what the suits had in mind?

From what I can recall the Hotline started in 1960 with Bill Ozard and a few after him such as John Gilbert, then Pat Blandford, Jim Nunn, Ron Phumphries, Dave Wright, Steve Murphy, Chuck Bridges (for one summer), Brian Philips, Rick Howe.

No one did it longer than Rick Howe.  Very few did it better.

I expect him to be back in radio or in the media.

Wright had it but Rick Howe was as human as they come.

Good luck and great job Rick.


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