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Walk the halls of WRQX-FM with General Manager Ernie Fears and it's like you're at Redskins Park with Joe Gibbs.
"Coach, howya doin?" says a young staffer.
"Morning, coach," nods a middle-aged executive.
To the people at WRQX (Q107) and its sister station WMAL-AM, Ernest Donald Fears, Jr. is The Coach. The title is both a legacy of his years as a high school and college coach, and a tribute to his ability to lead and to motivate people.
Fears, 54, is a native of Florida and holds B.S. and M.A. degrees in education. In 1970, he was working as athletic director and basketball coach at Norfolk State College when Virginia Governor Linwood Holton named him to head up the state's Selective Service system.
This was no figurehead position. The Virginia system was considered one of the worst in the nation when it came to local board representation and the treatment of registrants. Translated, that meant there were many predominantly black communities with predominantly white draft boards.
During his two years with Selective Service, Fears engineered an about-face for the system. Virginia's program was eventually recognized for the equity of representation on local boards.
It was through his work on Selective Service that Fears came to the attention of the Washington broadcasting community, although there seems to be some disagreement as to exactly how that happened. The Coach says The Washington Post wrote an article about the turnabout at Selective Service, which drew the attention of executives at the old...