3.1.21 Hero of the Day: Jack Miller

Bee-otch of the Day honors are awarded Monday through Thursday; Bee-otch of the Week is awarded Sunday morning on Chuck69.com's socials.

A SPECIAL HERO OF THE DAY!

Name: Jack Miller
Age: was 84
Occupation: beloved radio personality
Last Seen: in the heavens
Awarded For: being the best Swap Shop host ever

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The small town of Tabor City, NC is by no means a metropolis. 

With just 4,000 or so souls, the town, which is about 40 miles north of Mytle Beach, SC, was named after a Biblical mountain. It's also the home of the yearly Yam Festival and just a stone's throw away from neighboring Loris, SC, pop. 2,700.

Tabor City and Loris mostly get their local TV and radio from Myrtle Beach and Wilmington. But, they have a few radio stations to call their own. There's 94.9 The Surf, which plays surf music, which is kind of akin to Motown. WLSC 1240 "Tiger Radio" plays classic country. And, there's WTAB. 

Since 1954, the 5,000-watt station has been the Tabor City area's home for various formats over the years, including country, southern gospel and beach music. At one point in the 1970s, they were even an affiliate of Casey Kasem's American Top 40. 

Throughout much of WTAB's history stood one man: Jack Miller. The Tennessee native started his radio career in the late 50s in Louisiana. He also worked in his home state of Tennessee and at another station in North Carolina. In 1975, Miller came to WTAB, where for over 40 years, he was the host of the program that made him a local legend: Swap Shop.

Like the Swap Shops and Tradios in other localities, Jack's version of the show was where one could buy, sell or trade items. It was like Craigslist or as Jack called it, "The Classified of the Airwaves". 

In 1995, Jack purchased WTAB. The station's staff included his son, Richard, aka "Uncle Red", gospel show hosts Bobby Pait and Rodney Inman and engineer Lloyd Gore, who also hosted the station's morning show. 

However, time has not been nice to WTAB. Richard had a stroke several years ago. Pait died in a housefire and Gore died earlier this year. In 2013, Miller decided to sell WTAB to his stepson, Eric Sellers, who took over the Swap Shop from him.

Since then, Jack had been semi-retired. Sadly on Friday, Jack Miller passed away at the age of 84. According to his obituary, he was buried on Sunday.

Granted, Tradio hosts are small fries in the radio biz. If you asked me about a host in some other small town in the south, I wouldn't come out with a concrete answer. But, Jack was different. Why was that? Three words: Richard and Sal.

Over a decade ago, the Howard Stern sidekicks were making the rounds, calling many Tradio and Swap Shop shows around the country. Bear in mind that most of them have websites that stream, making things a little easier for the two and of course, us Stern Show listeners. 

Many of Richard and Sal's calls to Jack were a thing of legend. There was the call where Richard called to God Bless... everything:

There was the time when one of the two's daughter called the show:

And the time Richard called out of breath and Sal asked Jack if he liked his salad tossed and liked being teabagged:

And yes, the exploding barbecue grill: 

The final straw came when 'ol Jack finally got caller ID. But, even that didn't help:

Well, an eagle-eared listener finally spilled the beans that Richard and Sal from the Stern Show were calling in. Oddly enough, Jack couldn't have been more surprised. I tried to find the audio, but no dice. Apparently, Jack mentioned that the WTAB website got over 10 million hits thanks to Sal and Richard's calls to the show. 

However, Richard and Sal's calls to WTAB prompted more prank calls to the station. It might be why they no longer stream online, making them strictly a 'locals only' station. Oh, well, it was nice while it lasted.

True, Richard and Sal called other Swap Shops and Tradios across the country. But, Jackie Wayne Miller was the original article. WTAB is by no means a big city station, using slap echo in their commercials and using jingles that sound like they date from the 1960s. But, in the world of iHeartMedias, Entercoms, Cumuluses and more, it's nice when a small town station - albeit on the AM band with no FM translator - still has character and personality. I'll bet that Mr. Sellers is keeping Jack's spirit alive each day hosting WTAB's Swap Shop while Jack himself is looking down, all happy that his beloved station is still entertaining the thousands of listeners it has daily. Plus, the amount of items sold each day on Swap Shop.

Thank you, Mr. Miller. Hopefully, the good lord will have caller ID.

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