I applied for and was auditioned to present the late evening programme in August 1980. Although the audition was a nightmare (I had to ‘interview’ Programme Controller, Jeff Winston, about Russian dissidents a subject he knew a lot and I knew nothing), I got the job and the 2200-midnight weekday shift on the basis that there would be no stringy violins or silly smoking jackets (like our friends down the A38)!
Just before closedown each night we had a small feature called ‘DXers Corner’ (invented by the Chief Engineer, Nick Johnson) where I would read a DXer’s QSL report from far outside our normal transmission area. I remember we had a response from Melbourne, Australia where a DXer had recorded the DevonAir closedown sequence as evidence. We were getting reception reports from all over the world, though mainly from continental Europe.
I loved presenting ‘NightWatch’ and, according to the audience results, so did the listener – the 2200hrs figures compared well with 1000hrs. The format was simple and it worked well as a result.
When the new programme controller started in 1983, he decided I was wasted in the evenings and duly shifted me to daytimes. The exact opposite of where my voice and talents lay. I spent my remaining four years, unhappily at DevonAir, shunted around the schedule, with a daft (unpaid) Head of Presentation title, sadly never to return to ‘NightWatch’. About two years before I walked, a weekday magazine programme was invented for me. It was called ‘Waugh’s World’ (a title I (and certain family members) hated with a passion). It was a hard programme to produce as the order had gone out to talk less and play more music – so it stood no chance. Predictably my relationship with this post 1983 controller guy and the station ended in tears and in 1987 I jumped ship.
Ian Waugh (DevonAir Radio, 1980-1987)
