Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, October 19, 1994 TAG: 9410190063
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: KATHY LOAN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG LENGTH: Medium
Lewis S. Kanode Jr., 67, was walking east on the tracks near the Cambria crossing at about 10:10 p.m. when he apparently strayed into the path of a 97-car eastbound train.
Kanode, who lived on North Franklin Street, was widely known in the New River Valley for his radio work at WJJJ-1260 AM, for a trading-post business he later operated and for his community involvement.
Police said the crossing gates were down and the train was traveling about 27 mph. The engineer saw someone walking on the tracks, applied the emergency brakes and blew a warning whistle, but Kanode did not react.
"The train whistle was blowing, but he never turned around," said Bob Auman, a Norfolk Southern Corp. spokesman.
Family members said Kanode had health problems that impaired his sight. He had been visiting friends in Cambria, about a mile away from his home, and apparently was walking home along the tracks.
"From the events described, we surmise that Mr. Kanode was disoriented and confused and may not have been aware of his surroundings at the time of the accident," Christiansburg Police Lt. Doug Marrs said.
Auman said the train weighed about 5,000 tons. After striking Kanode, it traveled 445 feet before the engineer was able to stop.
Word of his death evoked a flood of memories for friends and listeners of Kanode, affectionately known by his radio moniker, ``Rooster.''
Students tuned in his morning radio show during bad weather, eagerly awaiting word on school closings; adults listened for his trademark rooster call, the morning news and the farm report.
Kanode was born in Coal Bank Hollow near Blacksburg in 1927. His grandfather and father mined coal in a small mine nearby, and his father died of complications from black-lung disease.
In a 1988 interview, Kanode said that as a boy he dreamed about being on radio as he listened to old-time country music on Roanoke's WDBJ radio.
"I used to stutter when I was a boy," Kanode recalled. "My father said I'd never make it, but I did."
After serving in the Navy during World War II, he returned to the New River Valley and became a storekeeper.
He got his chance in radio in 1948 during the postwar boom of local broadcasting. As a grocer, he co-sponsored a bluegrass band with a live show on Pulaski's WPUV. He moved to WRAD in Radford two years later, making the transition from live-show announcer to disc jockey.
A charter member of the Country Music Association, Kanode promoted and announced a weekly jamboree at the Glen Theater in Christiansburg, which played to packed houses in the early 1950s.
He left WRAD in 1958 and joined WBCR - now known as WJJJ - where he remained on the air for nearly 30 years.
Kanode's "Rooster" moniker was born early in his career when he brought a live rooster in a bird cage to the studio to introduce his 6 a.m. show.
He took several minutes of his radio show to extend birthday greetings and anniversary wishes to listeners.
Kanode had a down-home sense of humor that led him to dedicate the Randy Travis song "Digging Up Bones" to the local undertaker. He would deplore rising taxes and wonder aloud how to pay his own. Kanode ran for Christiansburg mayor as an independent in 1967.
"Didn't win, of course. But I shook 'em up a little," Kanode recalled in 1988.
His 40-year radio career ended with his retirement in 1987. Kanode then operated Lewis Kanode's Trading Place on North Franklin Street, a barn-red wooden building where customers could buy, sell or trade almost anything.
Kanode was president of the Christiansburg Chamber of Commerce from March 1976 to February 1977. He also played Santa Claus for 38 years in the town's annual Christmas Parade.
Staff writer Robert Freis contributed information to this story.
Keywords:
FATALITY
by CNB