West Hazel Dell — Gerald Gaule has gone back in time — and taken his micro radio station, AM 1700, with him. Recently we featured Gaule’s hyperlocal venue, which broadcasts no farther than the neighborhood around his Teal Pointe apartment complex, north of Bortolami’s Pizza restaurant on Northeast 99th Street. Now, Gaule has switched his format from “oldies,” from the 1950s through the 1970s, to “nostalgia,” reaching even farther back into the golden age of radio. It’s not just big band hits and easy listening from the swing era — it’s also great oratory, comedy, drama and news, from The Shadow to Bob Hope to World War II broadcasts and President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s speeches. Gaule continues to be affiliated with nonprofit Omni Media Networks, providing public affairs programming for the blind. Theoretically you should be able to stream the signal via Omnimedianetworks.org — click on “listen” and scroll down to stream no. 7 — but Gaule conceded that the stream is inconsistent at best.
