JOHN DAY – “KJDY radio listeners familiar with that jingle know the voice that follows belongs to Ruth Harris, host of Coffee Time, “Good Morning Grant County, and welcome to Coffee Time for a Wednesday …”

Housewives, truck drivers, office workers and store browsers tune in to hear Grant County news and what she and her guest (or guests) have to say about local issues and events.

Coffee Time keeps “people informed of the things that are going on and the people who are involved,” Harris said. It also fills FCC licensing requirements for news and public opinion.

The idea for the talk show came from KUMA Pendleton; the owners of KUMA, Ted Smith and Carl “Pop” Fisher, owned KJDY from its beginning until Phil Gray bought the station.

Buss Jolley moved to John Day as the first station manager of KJDY in Dec. 1963. Before taking on this job, he was station manager of Newport’s KNTT.

He was the first host of John Day’s Coffee Time which began a year or two later.

“It’s a good local program,” said Jolley. “Usually, you have somebody on that most everybody recognizes.”

One of the earlier guests Jolley remembers was Dale Morris, then chairman of the school board, and the topic was the bond issue for the Grant Union High School gymnasium. This interview took place at the Bank of Grant County (where Century 21 is today) because the radio station had been flooded. For a short time, after the flood, the station was in Jolley’s home in Canyon City.

Since Jolley’s retirement in 1982, he has spent time wood crafting, a talent for which he is well-known. He enjoys making pictures in wood, a process called intarsia. Using western red cedar, he uses the different grains and colors of the natural wood to create the scene he has in mind.

Coffee’s OnHarris, who has been queen of Coffee Time for nearly 21 years, got her start when Dave Maxwell was station manager. He “interviewed me several times on the program for activities that I was involved in. They were familiar with me (at the radio station).”

She was hired by Ted Smith in 1984 and now works for Phil Gray, who became station owner and manager in 1987. Coffee Time “paints a portrait of what Grant County is really like,” Gray said. “It’s a familiar, comfortable program.”

The years have racked up an abundance of interviews for Harris, including politicians such as Sen. Ron Wyden, Sen. Mark Hatfield, Sen. Bob Packwood, Congressman Al Ullman, Gov. Robert Straub, Gov. Neil Goldschmidt and Gov. Ted Kulongoski.

“The political candidates always hit the radio station.” said Harris. Jolley chimed in, “It’s kind of a situation of, ‘You don’t call me, I’ll call you. I’m in town – just thought you’d like to know it! You wouldn’t want to talk to me, would ya?’ “

Harris remembers a complicated get-together with Neil Goldschmidt.

“Neil was so busy that he couldn’t stop (at the station). He made a presentation at the Senior Center and then he was in his (RV). And I believe it was when Todd Keppel was here at the Blue Mountain Eagle. He said, ‘Well, if you two want to ride over with me to Dayville, why you can interview me.’ We made arrangements to get a car down to Dayville. We agreed that I would do my taped interview to begin with so that we wouldn’t be duplicating questions … and Todd would go ahead and do the other part that he wanted apart from that and then he would have a copy of my tape and then we would have it all together. And that’s what we had to do with Mr. Goldschmidt. He was just too busy. I remember that one very well.”

Many John Day officials also have been scheduled in as Coffee Time guests. Harris remembers calling on City Manager Bill Deist.

“He could talk for an hour at the drop of a hat. He was my backup anytime that I couldn’t get a guest. I’d say, ‘Bill, I need you.’ And he would be there and we would talk about something. Superintendent “Bob Batty was the other one I could call on like that.”

Harris has had several interviews with the Grant Union High School Globetrotters (not the basketball team) to recap their sightseeing journeys. Led by now, retired economics teacher Chris Labhart, the group of students and adults have gone on trips to such far off places as Australia, Costa Rica and Pacific Islands.

“Because I collect cookbooks, Chris always brings me home a cookbook from wherever they’ve gone.”

Included with some of the tapes of the program she still has is an interview with Dr. Martha van der Vlugt.

“She and her husband had a medical clinic here where the Country Spice is now,” Harris said. “She outlived her husband. … and she practiced for a while after that and then she went back to Washington, D.C. She held some important positions (medical assignments) in government after that.”

“She was county civil defense director at the time of the flood (1964),” Buss Jolley said. “I remember interviewing her and keeping abreast of the flood situation.”

Harris recalls Babs Brainard as “very interesting and very opinionated. She is a former Justice of the Peace and she was curator of the Prairie City Museum for many years. She did some writing of the history of the area. She was always a little ‘anti’ something,” Harris said.

“But you always knew where she stood,” said Jolley with a smile.

“Yes, yes, you didn’t have to have any question about that,” Harris agreed.

Herman Oliver “liked to talk a lot. He was a rancher and he was a banker. He actually put this community through the depression without the bank closing – on his own money,” Harris said. “He was very active in the cattlemen’s group.”

Jolley enjoyed talking with him because “he had a lot of history.”

One guest Harris wishes she’d had on Coffee Time was Bertha Gebbie. A former rural school teacher from Prairie City, Gebbie had “hair that came clear down to the floor. After they put her in a nursing home, they made her cut her hair and I thought that was the cruelest thing they could have done. She lived to be past 100 years,” Harris said.

She has found, through the thousands of interviews she has conducted, that “many people are very interesting.”

Thought for the dayListeners of Coffee Time are always left with a thought for the day, bits of wisdom from Harris or other authors, a routine she started. She finds the sayings in places, such as bumper stickers and above cash registers, etc.

“Many times I get stuck with forgetting to get one and then they come off the top of my head, hopefully designed to complement whatever the guest was saying.

“I’m saving them to publish a book one of these days – not that I’m the author of all of them, but the fact that they have been thoughts for the day on Coffee Time.”

In a recent interview with players in a melodrama and their director she ended, saying, “Now our thought for the day: All the world’s a stage. We each have our part – large or small – and each of us is important to the performance of the play.”

Ruth Harris has played an important performance for Grant County with her many servings of Coffee Time throughout the years and Buss Jolley started it all for us.

(Coffee Time airs Monday, Wednesday and Friday, starting just after the10 o’clock “ABC” news. KJDY is at 93.7 FM for best reception in John Day and Canyon City, and at 94.5 FM and 1400 AM.)

Photo, Ruth Harris interviews Matthew Becker, Bree “Wildcat Katie” Meyers, (right) and Julie Reynolds (left), director of the melodrama “Wildcat Katie Brown” on Coffee Time at KJDY radio station, June 10.