Stories ･ﾟ✧
Climbing the WSM Radio Tower
|
Dubbed the Air Castle of the South, the WSM radio tower, when constructed in 1932, was 876 feet high and the tallest antenna in North America. Although its height was reduced in 1939, it's still 808 feet high.
Bassist Jake Tullock of the Foggy Mountain Boys took a $100 bet against his boss Lester Flatt to climb said WSM radio tower. Because that's safe.
Relaying the incident, Jake's son Gary said, "Dad was fearless of heights, having laid brick on swinging scaffolds for many years." I would love to know how high he got before the people of WSM themselves put a stop to this safety hazard and made Jake come down.
It's unknown whether Lester paid or not. From what I know of Lester, it's, um... up in the air.
Drag Racing Your Boss
This is a story transmitted informally over a Facebook post. I've seen it nowhere else.
In the late 1940s, when Earl Scruggs was working with Bill Monroe in the Blue Grass Boys, the band was working a radio program near Lexington. There was a large, new section of road being built nearby. Earl and Bill would get up at 5 AM before the radio show and drag race on the new stretch of highway. Though Bill would take the lead at the start, Earl, with his car's fluid drive transmission, would overtake his boss on the final stretch. Presumably, Earl said Bill was "hot at me the whole time I had that car."