Harger: CBS Newsradio signs off after 99 years. I’ve been chasing that sound since I was 4
May 22, 2026, 5:46 AM | Updated: 1:22 pm
I heard it for the first time in the back of my mom’s green 1974 Chevy Impala station wagon. Jimmy Carter was president. I was probably four years old. I was almost certainly the only preschooler in my neighborhood who knew who Jimmy Carter was.
A tone. Then this clunky, twangy electronic sequence, pulsing and repeating, like nothing else on the radio. It sounded important. It sounded like the world was about to tell you something. Then a voice came on, and it did.
That was the CBS Newsradio sounder, followed by a newscast read by someone who sounded like they knew exactly what they were talking about. It came through that Chevy’s speaker at the top of the hour, and I was hooked. Whatever that was, I wanted more of it.
That was CBS Newsradio. And today, after 99 years, it airs its final newscast.
The voices that pointed me toward the only career I ever wanted
Christopher Glenn. Dallas Townsend. Harley Carnes. Mark Knoller at the White House. Charles Osgood. These were the voices that came through that Impala speaker and, without knowing it at the time, pointed me toward the only career I ever wanted.
I’ve been chasing that sound ever since.
KIRO Newsradio and CBS: 90 years of Pacific Northwest radio
KIRO Newsradio and CBS were a power combination for 90 of those 99 years. Bill Yeend. Gregg Hersholt. Paul Brendle. Charlie Fiano out in the Highway Helper. Dave Ross middays. Ursula Reutin at the news desk. Jim French and Imagination Theater. Wayne Cody with sports. There’s a photo of Jim French on my desk right here at KIRO.
This station was a colossus. CBS was woven into its fabric. The partnership shaped Pacific Northwest radio for generations.
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I get why this is happening. I don’t have to like it
This is a business, not a charity. CBS is a big company with a television network that still makes money. Radio doesn’t fit the growth model anymore. If you have hundreds of affiliates and still can’t turn a profit, that tells you something about where the radio industry is.
I get it. I don’t have to like it.
I’ll say this for the people who made this decision. They gave CBS News Radio a clean ending. They didn’t license the name out to some third party with no interest in the standards that generations of journalists built. I’ve worked at stations that became hollowed-out shells of what they once were. New owners who gut the staff, drain the morale, and pretend it’s the same station it’s always been. That’s a slower and uglier death. CBS didn’t do that. They turned the lights off themselves. There’s a kind of dignity in that, even if it still hurts.
And it does hurt. Like losing a family member you knew wasn’t well. You knew it was coming. Doesn’t make it easier when it does.
The sound changes. The job stays the same
We are going to keep doing serious radio on KIRO. Relentlessly. That’s the commitment. But we’d be foolish to ignore the world that’s grown up around it. That’s why you’re seeing my face for radio on YouTube Live now. Why my kids complain they keep seeing me on their Instagram feed. Why I’m out doing investigative reports on video.
I’m told I’m on TikTok. The bosses assure me I don’t have to do a dance. Unless I want to.
The goal is the same as it’s always been for us. Build up, connect, inform, and celebrate families and communities. The platforms change. Being a trusted voice around here doesn’t.
The ABC newscasts begin later today. They’re good. We’re in good hands. But after 99 years, including 90 years right here at KIRO, I said it to a former head of CBS Newsradio just yesterday.
It’s a damn shame.
Charlie Harger is the host of “Seattle’s Morning News” on KIRO Newsradio. You can read more of his stories and commentaries here. Follow Charlie on X and email him here.
