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Tiny Arizona radio station operates out of a bedroom By Chuck Woodbury, editor Really, really small town media Buck and Maude at the KBUX controls. Out West QUARTZSITE, Ariz. -- Buck and Maude Burdette are on the air in the land of lizards, cacti, mobile homes, and the grandest flea market in the American desert. Their radio station, KBUX is about as small a radio station as you'll find. At 205 watts of "effective radiated power," KBUX, 94.3 FM, beams over dry and dusty Quartzsite from a bedroom studio in the couple's modest cinderblock home on Camel Drive. The programming is a hodgepodge -- country one minute, big band the next, then soft rock followed by organ music fit for a funeral. Every once in awhile, Buck or Maude will insert a commercial. Big advertisers are The General Store, Flying J Truck Stop, Hallmart Realty, W.D. Propane and the Quartzsite Beauty Salon. An average commercial goes for $5. There are "on air" testimonials about KBUX from Pastor Lucky and Quartzsite's ninety-something "Old Timer." During the hot summer, only about 3,000 people are in range of KBUX, but during the mild winter "snowbird" season, an additional audience of perhaps 60,000 retirees in recreational vehicles could listen in. Buck is the program director and head DJ. The music and his announcements are recorded on seven 14-hour tapes, which leaves Buck free to tend to other duties. Sometimes he'll interrupt the prerecorded tapes to play a song from a donated album, occasionally delivered by the recording artist in person -- like Blythe, Calif., singer-motorhome salesman Jay Conder, who stopped by one day. "A lot of these people aren't well known, but they sing well," said Buck. Once a week, Maude hosts a two-hour program called "Women's Touch," which includes a segment titled "Grandma's Scrapbook" where she reads poems, funny sayings and other "things from the old days" from a scrapbook put together years ago by her grandmother. KBUX is on the air 24 hours a day. So while they sleep a bedroom away, previously recorded tapes beam out tunes from the '20s to the '70s and every decade in between. There's little emphasis on news. Asked if he ever had a "scoop," Buck thought awhile and said, "I don't think so." When radio matters aren't pressing, Maude prepares meals, does household chores or goes to town for supplies. The Burdettes owned a Quartzsite trailer park before starting the radio station. In fact, they're still living off income from the sale of the park; the station is losing money. There was no radio station in Quartzsite when Buck got the idea for one in 1983. Five years later, after $30,000 in licenses, legal fees and equipment purchases, KBUX went on the air. "I had only been in a radio station once in my life, he said. "It was back in the '60s in Rochester, New York. I was a locksmith and the radio station needed a lock changed." Nowadays, he and Maude are seldom away from their own radio station, working 7 days a week, 365 days a year. But the future of the station is up in the air. Buck and Maude are content as is, but if someone came along and made them a good offer, they'd be willing to give it up. Until that time -- if it ever comes -- KBUX will stay as is, which is just fine with the couple, who admit they don't know what else they'd rather do. Is it an exciting business? "It's more exciting than a trailer park," said Maude. ©2000 by Out West Newspaper Do you have any comments or update information about this story? E-mail Chuck Woodbury BACK TO FAVORITE FEATURES PAGE BACK TO OUT WEST HOME PAGE E-mail editor Chuck Woodbury Out West, 9792 Edmonds Way, #265-A, Edmonds, WA 98020. 800-274-9378. Fax: (425) 776-3398. E-mail: outwest@seanet.com. On the Web: http://www.outwestnewspaper.com