{"id":34980,"date":"2026-09-28T07:18:22","date_gmt":"2026-09-28T13:18:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/al-ba.com\/wp2\/?page_id=34980"},"modified":"2026-09-28T07:21:08","modified_gmt":"2026-09-28T13:21:08","slug":"kerry-jackson","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/al-ba.com\/wp2\/kerry-jackson\/","title":{"rendered":"Kerry Jackson"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Kerry Jackson almost didn\u2019t have a choice when it came to his career path. That doesn\u2019t necessarily sound like a positive, but in Jackson\u2019s case, not having a choice was the best choice he could have ever made. As a kid, being at WGSV was just like being at home, and all these years later, nothing has changed. For keeping WGSV a local, tight-knit community station that Guntersville depends on, the ABA is very pleased to induct Kerry Jackson into the Hall of Fame.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs far back as I can remember, my dad was in broadcasting before me,\u201d smiles Jackson. \u201cMy mom worked at the radio station too and I kind of grew up with it at the supper table, hearing about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I was just a few years old, my dad let me go with him to the radio station to do his engineering \"\"after station signed off,\u201d he continues. \u201cIt was kind of a wonderland for me. I got to sit at the control board and play records and flip the knobs and switches and things and kind of got a fascination for it when I was real young.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI worked  63 of the 76 years that the radio station has been on the air, so I knew Kerry since he was a kid, and Kerry was a good kid,\u201d says Bill Yancy, former WGSV disc jockey and sports announcer. \u201cHe followed in the footsteps of his daddy on the technical and engineering part of broadcasting. Just give him a soldering gun, and he’ll keep that transmitter on the air.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"\u201cWhen I was about ten, my dad let me be a board operator for a network show,\u201d says Jackson.  \u201cSomeone needed to sit at the console and when they would give a cue, you would need to turn them off and turn on one of our commercials. And then go back after the commercial played. And I got to do that when I was really young and I guess that\u2019s when I got the bug.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIn high school I got my license and my dad let me be on the air. My friends thought it was a pretty neat thing because that was back about the time that the Beatles arrived on the scene and like so many others we decided to start a little band. I could get records and bring them home, and we could listen to the records and learn how to play, and I’d take them back the next day!\u201d\"\"<\/p>\n

\u201cHe started as a teenager – KJ the DJ,\u201d laughs Yancy. \u201cHe had many gold records awarded to him for being the first or one of the first DJs to promote a song as a hit. He has 31 gold records that are still on the walls out at the studio.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although Jackson is proud of those gold records, he\u2019s even more proud of being a local station.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve always been a small station in a small town. And we’ve had a real connection with the community,\u201d says Jackson. \u201cThere\u2019s a picture that hangs on the wall of when we signed on the air, and back in 1950 having a radio station in your community was an event. The picture shows that the parking lot filled with cars and all these people coming for the first day of operation of the radio station\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"\u201cThere was and is a real connection with the community and I would say that I’m most proud of being in touch with the community. To this day we have a call-in swap shop, and we have an obituary report. We have local news and we carry local sports. We\u2019ve always tried to be a hometown community station.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jackson says his son, Blake, is now following in his footsteps.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe’s very involved in the station and the local sports part of it. He loves advertising sales; helping businesses get their word out to people,\u201d says Jackson proudly. \u201cThere are no plans to quit doing what we\u2019re doing. We’re just going to keep on!\u201d\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kerry Jackson almost didn\u2019t have a choice when it came to his career path. That doesn\u2019t necessarily sound like a positive, but in Jackson\u2019s case, not having a choice was the best choice he could have ever made. As a kid, being at WGSV was just like being at home, and all these years later, … Continue reading Kerry Jackson<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-34980","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/al-ba.com\/wp2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/34980","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/al-ba.com\/wp2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/al-ba.com\/wp2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/al-ba.com\/wp2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/al-ba.com\/wp2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34980"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/al-ba.com\/wp2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/34980\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34989,"href":"https:\/\/al-ba.com\/wp2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/34980\/revisions\/34989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/al-ba.com\/wp2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}