Round Up: ”2026 is Off and Running!”

2026 is starting off with some blustery weather and with it some of the largest King Tides in many years. It appears that flooding along the San Francisco Bay in San Rafael was responsible for inundating an ATT hub and causing the bizarre outage of all telecommunications, including 911 service, that was experienced the night of January 4. Let’s hope that they can get that infrastructure to higher ground sooner than later.

Due to that outage, we sent our first KWMR Emergency Text Alert (subscribe here!), which did reach some folks who had service from towers outside of Marin County, but got to others once service was restored. It was a great opportunity to test the system and we learned some valuable things to put into play in the future. Throughout it all, KWMR’s three transmitters (Point Reyes, Bolinas, and Lagunitas) stayed on the air. Thanks to good old FM!

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Remembering Joe Blumenthal

We learned on December 30th that Joe Blumenthal had passed away on December 28th. Joe, who hosted “Cuppa Jo” and “The Jazz Groove” on KWMR had moved to Arizona after his wife Maureen (Mo) passed away a few years ago. Joe was living near his daughter Karen and her husband. 

I remember when I first met Joe. He and Mo came to KWMR and wanted to do a long-distance bicycle tour to raise funds for KWMR. Joe and Mo (who drove the sag vehicle for Joe) did these types of things for nonprofit organizations. After that Joe got bit by the radio bug and began to host his shows on KWMR.  Joe and Mo were always a warm presence at the radio station. Mo brought her minestrone soup to Pledge Drives. I believe that soup had true healing benefits and was infused with love and caring.

Both Joe, a cardiologist by profession, and Mo were accomplished artists and they also did fundraisers for organizations by selling their works of art. We have several small pieces created by them hanging in our home. 

If you were lucky enough to know Mo and Joe Blumenthal you are a lucky human. We are planning a program to highlight Joe’s contributions to KWMR and will inform everyone via the airwaves as well as this newsletter once it is scheduled. If you have memories to share, please email them to me HERE.

 Our condolences go out to Joe’s family and friends.

Amanda Eichstaedt
KWMR Station Manager,  Executive Director & Development 

PS: Thanks for all of the end of year support. KWMR is short of our goal and all contributions are appreciated and welcome. 

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