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Struthers native reprises on-air presence
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Dennis Spisak, host of “The Slovak Program,” gets ready to spin a record after a request Saturday night. Spisak has hosted the show, which runs from 9 to 11 p.m. Saturdays, for the past four years but also played polkas on WKTL 90.7 FM as a student at Struthers High School.
By EMMALEE C. TORISK
STRUTHERS
For two hours every Saturday, from 9 to 11 p.m., Dennis Spisak feels like a teenager again.
That’s when the 54-year-old Spisak hosts “The Slovak Program” on WKTL 90.7 FM, the radio station owned by the Struthers Board of Education and housed in the Struthers High School Fieldhouse.
The show — which Spisak has hosted since early 2010 — is a lively blend of Slovak folk songs and polkas, of church announcements and reminiscences about growing up in Struthers, of stories about his family’s weekly adventures. Its purpose, Spisak said, is to “stir up a lot of happy moments” for his listeners by way of those recollections and musical selections.
“The Slovak Program” isn’t Spisak’s first foray into local radio broadcasting, however. In 1974,
Spisak joined the staff of WKTL, then a vocational radio program widely regarded as the first all-student-staffed high-school radio station in the country, because he dreamed of one day being a radio sports announcer.
For the next three years, until his graduation from SHS in 1977, Spisak was known to his listeners as the “Polka Rabbit,” or the host of WKTL’s polka program on weekday afternoons. And surprisingly, many of those same listeners, whom Spisak lovingly refers to as his “groupies,” still are tuning in and calling in 40 years later.
“They like the music, my jokes, my banter,” Spisak said. “I’m there every Saturday night with them. I just have some type of rapport with them that they enjoy.”
Spisak acknowledged that he hadn’t planned to reprise his polka-playing post. In fact, shortly after graduating from Struthers, Spisak left the area and didn’t return for almost 20 years, until he was hired as an assistant principal at his former high school. But he’s remained in Struthers ever since, serving on the board of education and living in the house he grew up in.
A wrong number to that house four years ago led him back to WKTL. The woman who had called recognized the “Polka Rabbit,” and told him that the host of “The Slovak Program” had recently retired.
“She said, ‘I used to listen to you every day,’” Spisak recalled. “She told me, ‘You ought to go back and help the Slovak people. Nobody will go back and do the show.’”
So, he did. Now, each week, from more than a dozen boxes of donated vinyl records, Spisak selects songs he remembers from his childhood — tunes that “a lot of people used to listen to or dance to,” or those that were frequently played at ethnic picnics or weddings. Others are songs his listeners have requested, along with dedications to loved ones near and far. If he’s able to find a song, he’ll play it.
Many of Spisak’s listeners have become familiar with his program, and with his family. The first song he plays each week is always dedicated to the latter — his wife, Molly; his daughter, Brittany; his sons, Michael and Patrick; and his dog, Miley.
Spisak — who said he feels like the “adopted son” of some of his listeners, along with perhaps one of the only “friendly voices that they really talk to on a weekly basis” — added that the ethnic programming on WKTL has been around practically since the station’s inception in 1965. It’s a tradition, and one of the few remaining ways for listeners to reconnect with their ethnic heritage and stay aware of going-ons in those ethnic communities.
And even though WKTL recently partnered with WAPS 91.3 FM, or “The Summit,” which is owned by the Akron Public Schools system, the station still retains “local leadership” and “local flavor,” making it a rarity in today’s conglomerate-driven media landscape.
“We’re basically the only bastion of local, small-town radio on the weekend,” he said, noting that WKTL simulcasts The Summit during the rest of the week. “It’s still a big part of the community, and I think that’s why it’s still valuable.”
Tibor Check, who has been a host of WKTL’s “Souvenirs of Hungary” program since its start on Mother’s Day 1979, agreed, explaining that WKTL’s programs offer something not readily available on mainstream radio.
“It’s memories — that’s what all the ethnic programs are doing,” Check said.
Check added that he drives more than an hour every Saturday from Geauga County to host “Souvenirs of Hungary,” and that his and others’ shows on WKTL are labors of love. But as long as one person is listening, he’ll continue.
For Spisak, too, he’s just grateful to have the chance to provide a service to his community and return once again to radio broadcasting, his first love.
“Even today, I enjoy climbing the stairs to the field house and going to the station,” Spisak said. “It’s a fun experience. I guess I’ve come home.”