THE BEGINNINGS OF BLACK RADIO: MY YEARS AT WDIA MEMPHIS
In 1947, just shy of her twenty-third birthday, Christine Cooper accepted a job as copywriter at WDIA, a new radio station in Memphis, Tennessee. When the Program Director was abruptly fired, she took over.
But despite her efforts to attract an audience, the station was going under when manager and co-owner Bert Ferguson decided to hire a Black program host, Nat Williams. Williams was a hit with Black Memphis, and one year later, in 1949, WDIA was the first station in the country with “all-Negro” programming.
As Program Director, Christine Cooper insisted the station not only entertain, but also inform and serve its listeners. WDIA was called the “Goodwill Station” for its good works, “the Starmaker Station” for its influence on American music, and the “Mother Station of the Negroes” for pioneering black radio. At ninety-four, Christine Cooper Spindel has finally told her personal story — how, in segregated 1940s Memphis, a young white woman learned to see her society through a new lens and worked to change radio history.
Christine Cooper Spindel passed away peacefully on September 22, 2021, in Urbana, Illinois with her son and daughter next to her. She was 97.
The Memphis Commercial-Appeal published this article about her.