Van Amburg

KFRC 61, San Francisco
October 1964

Including Hap Harper
with airborne traffic

Van Amburg at KNEW (910 AM) in 1966

Fred Van Amburg — known on the air simply as Van Amburg — is perhaps best remembered as a popular newscaster, anchoring the top-rated KGO-TV (Channel 7) “News Scene” during the 1970s with Jerry Jensen. Prior to moving to Channel 7, Van Amburg had been a news anchor and sports director at KPIX-TV (Channel 5) and worked at the pre-“Big 610” KFRC. He then moved to KNEW/91 as a talk-show host after that station’s switch from Top 40 pop music as KEWB in 1966.

While at KNEW, Van Amburg also served as Bill King’s original partner on the station’s broadcasts of Oakland Raiders football.

Also heard during this broadcast are George Ruge with the news and Hap Harper with airborne traffic. An interesting commercial for Republican presidential candidate Barry Goldwater is also featured.

This aircheck of Van Amburg at RKO General’s KFRC, probably made on or about October 9, was recorded by Fred Krock as part of a representative compilation that included KSFO’s Don Sherwood, KYA’s Gene Nelson and KEWB’s Pete Bunny. (Links to these recordings are included at the bottom of this page.)

Over the years, Mr. Krock has been an announcer and engineer at several Bay Area stations, including San Mateo’s KOBY/1550 and its successor stations. His writings about Bay Area broadcasting history are included as part of “Voices Out Of The Fog” on this website.