ED
SALAMON
Ed
Salamon was Program Director of New York City¹s
WHN from 1975 to 1981, which is recognized as the most
listened to Country radio station of all time. He was
pivotal in the “crossover” phenomena of
the 70s, because at that time many Country singles
sold well enough from their WHN airplay to be picked
up by influential top forty station WABC and thus "crossover" to
pop. His Country radio career began in 1973 as Program
Director of WEEP AM/FM, in his hometown of Pittsburgh,
PA.. There, he was the first in Country radio to use
consumer research such as call-out research and focus
groups. In 1981 he left WHN to form The United Stations
Radio Network with Dick Clark and others, where he
created programming carried at one time or another
by nearly every County station in America. When the
United Stations was acquired by the Westwood One Radio
Network, at the time the world’s largest radio
network, he was named Westwood One’s President/Programming.
In 2002, after more than twenty consecutive years as
programming head of a radio network, he became Executive
Director of the Country Radio Broadcasters, Inc. where
in 1976 he first served as an Agenda Committee member.
His influence on Country radio will continue through
the many network programs he created that are still
on the air and the many programmers and consultants
whom he mentored. Ed Salamon was inducted into the
Country Radio Hall of Fame in 2006.
