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Frank Berry
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Frank’s career in radio began during the summer of 1966 between his sophomore and junior years at Winter Haven High School. His only exposure to radio up to that point in time was following chief engineer Angelo Fazzari around the transmitters of the Winter Haven stations he owned – WINT AM & FM.
One stormy summer afternoon, Angelo was out of town and someone called from the FM, telling him that lightning had struck the tower and that the station was off the air, and could do anything to get it back up. So he rode his bicycle to the station, repaired the damage, and got the station back on the air – and he didn’t even have an FCC First Class License at that time! Not long afterwards though, he got one, making it all legal and official from then on.
In the years that followed, Frank worked for numerous radio stations in Polk County, either as chief engineer or as a contract engineer. Among them were Winter Haven’s WINT-AM and WXKL-FM (1967-1970) where he also pulled an airshift, Cypress Gardens’ WGTO (1971-1973 and 1979-1982), and Lakeland’s WQPD (1972-1974), WONN/WPCV (1973-1975), and WVFM (1974-1977).
He’s also been with a number of stations in the Tampa Bay area, including WQYK (1977-1979 and 1987-1994). In between, he spent a couple years at KOB AM & FM in Albuquerque (1982-1983) and ventured into the realm of television engineering at Tampa’s WTVT Channel 13 (1983-1986). He also worked with WSUN/WYNF (1986-1987).
In 1994, Frank returned to WTVT’s engineering department. This time, he stayed with the station until he retired in May 2010.
Frank passed away Sept. 11, 2023.
Station History
1967 - 1972 Other Polk County Stations (Engineering)
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