Labor Day 1974 – but how long was the ride?
September 7, 2020
Regular reader Chauncey Ross sent me a message over the weekend regarding Jackson Armstrong who worked locally at 13Q in the early-to-mid 1970s. Seems one Labor Day Armstrong did a live remote at Kennywood Park and rode The Thunderbolt a record number of times. Ross said he remembers it well… or at least he used to.
What I’m sure of is that he rode The Thunderbolt continuously to an end point on Monday afternoon (Labor Day) 1974 but the actual start time and length of ride now escapes me. It gets longer each year with fading memory:
1980: Oh yeah he rode that 24 hours!
1995: man, he set record at 36 hours!
2010: he started Saturday afternoon and hit 48 hours!
This year: He got on that thing on Fourth of July and set the record of 60 days!So yeah. Fill in the blanks.
So off I went to find those 13Q-related folk to whom I am connected on social media. Ray Zoller didn’t come to the station until after Armstrong had left, but Terry Hazlett remembered some things about that day.
Originally the afternoon jock Dennis Waters, was going to attempt the record, but he became ill after just a short time (I think it was less than an hour). So Jackson took over. Some of us went on a few trips around with him, but as I recall, he was successful in establishing the record. I do remember him saying he wasn’t a big fan of roller coasters.
That was Ross’ memory too.
…we went out to Kennywood for the conclusion of the ride on Labor Day 74. He climbed off that coaster. He wanted to be anywhere but there.
But we still don’t have the answer. How many hours did Armstrong go around on The Thunderbolt? Do you remember?
Jackson Armstrong (born John Larsh) “Your Leeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeadah!” was never in town very long no matter where he was. It was said that he was usually brought in to boost a station’s ratings and was off to the next gig. That was true in Pittsburgh as he had been hired for the new 13Q in 1973. He spent two years in Pittsburgh before moving on. His career spanned 4 1/2 decades, and after penning his biography, he died at his home in North Carolina following a medical episode in 2008.
Those roller coaster rides-and trying to break records is a tough thing to handle. If anyone could do it, it was Jackson. I met him in ’82 when we had lunch in Buffalo- (long after he helped launch 13Q) and can’t tell you how impressed I was with him. Sadly we had no openings at the time (on WGR). He’d spent time at WKBW in Buffalo (as well as other stations) and had a warm spot in his heart for both The Nickel City and Pittsburgh.
Speaking of roller coasters, we had a big celebration at King’s Island in Cincinnati in 1984 which was the beginning of an amazing weekend. I rode “The Racer” (two trains-one facing forward the other facing the other way) for an hour. (Others rode “The Beast” about 10 times more intense.) I followed that with a hot air balloon ride that evening (we crash landed after about 45 minutes) and the next morning I checked in to Christ Hospital for an unrelated operation. It was there I met the nurse who would become my wife. After we married I proudly announced to her that we were moving to Pittsburgh. It may have bugged her because we were on the way home from our Bermuda honeymoon. 11 months later our first son was born. In Pittsburgh, with play-by-play from O’Brien and Garry! I know it’s a long way around – but Jackson Armstrong was a hell of a guy!
[…] crack staff (actually Radio 9’s Jay Thurber) took the challenge yesterday after we posted about Jackson Armstrong‘s record run on the Thunderbolt at Kennywood on Labor Day 1974. Turns out, between September […]