KABN--Radio Free Big Lake Alaska 830 AM

A Tribute Site to the
Fabled Radio of
KABN 830 AM
The Voice of the People
Long Island, Big Lake, Ak
by W.J. Lynus O'Brien

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BORN UNDER A BAD SIGN

THE MARLIN DISKS

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KABN RADIO

Friday, 27 January 2012

TALES FROM THE TOWER

Bear's Story
Friday, 20 February 2009 | Roger Leff

Stories about KABN radio...where does one begin? I had the priceless opportunity to spend 5 years doing the morning show at KABN...the transmitter was fired up by 5 AM when “the Golden Age of Radio would be broadcast. It was a funky series of old-time radio with the likes of “Fibber McGee and Molly” and “Abbot and Costello” gracing the early morning airwaves. After that it was 4 hours of music with Local News, Trapline Messages, the Trading Post and Ride Board...
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The Old Days

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Commune Members List

KABN RADIO -- THE KABN CHRONICLES

A TRIP DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE or how I became part of KABN

I was having a hard winter, my body still reacting even after three years to a head-on wreck (with fatalities) on Hwy 120 somewhere outside of Meeteesee, Wyoming six months before coming to Alaska. When I first heard KABN Radio I was at my trapline on Birch Creek a few miles south of the Arctic Circle far in the North-eastern Interior of Alaska in the middle of a record cold winter. My nerves pinching so bad I could hardly even walk, much less run a trapline, it was like a drug when I heard it, and took me down a path from which there was no getting off--

The KABN Chronicles are a revisiting of that trail that took me into the Rabbit Hole through the character of Tobias Stewart. [ see author note ] It's my hope these pages will be added to by the others that were there...

W.J. Lynus O'Brien
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KABN Groundbreaking (No, I wasn't there)

EVEN THE NEW YORK TIMES REMEMBERS

TELEVISION/RADIO; An Island of Idiosyncrasy on the AM Dial By SAMUEL G. FREEDMAN Published: August 12, 2001

" ...The commercial FM dial counts only a handful of free-form stations, like KPIG in Watsonville, Calif., KGSR in Austin, Tex., and WMPS in Memphis. And in the entire nation, Mr. Rodrigues of Radio and Records said, there may be no other AM station quite like WHVW. The most similar outlets over the last 20 years -- KABN in Willow, Alaska, WGKA in Atlanta and WIVS in Crystal Lake, Ill. -- all either went defunct or changed format after being sold..."
[read entire New York Times article]

Latest "My Trip Down The Rabbit Hole" Post

RADIO FREE BIG LAKE -- or what a long strange trip it's been
Monday, 01 December 2008 | W.J. Lynus O'Brien

Thinking back on it, I wonder? Would I change it if I could? Would I take it all back? Even after all these years I'm not yet able to answer that question. But what I do know, what I can tell you, giving it straight from the heart, is this, that night in 1980 during my weekly bath in the old #3 wash tub I began a journey that took me down a path from which there was no coming back. I'd...
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A Tribute to John Hale, "The Commander"

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BIG LAKE, AK WEATHER

Current Conditions at Wasilla Airport, AK:

Fair, -6.0°F (-21.0°C), wind is southwest at 3.5 mph (3 kt), barometric pressure is 0.0 mb, visibility is 10 miles (Last Updated on Jan 27 2012, 3:56 pm AKST)