Ann Marie Calabrese remembered carting a record player to a Show and Tell held at her elementary school years ago.

When it was her turn, she slipped a 45 single from its sleeve, placed it on the turntable and lowered the stylus onto the grooves.

“I played the Bay City Rollers’ ‘Saturday Night’ for my class,” Calabrese recalled. “I was pretending to be a DJ. I just always wanted to be a DJ.”

Calabrese made it happen, and is celebrating her 35th year as a radio disc jockey.

She’s also celebrating 30 years as the “80s Guru” thanks to her weekly radio show, “Stuck in the ’80s” on Magic 105.5 WMGH FM.

She recently visited her alma mater, where she reflected on her career and its early beginnings.

“Here’s where I used to do the announcements,” she said of a narrow alcove at the Tamaqua Area High School’s main office.

The microphone she used to relay the daily lunch menu and school news is gone, replaced by a telephone that reaches the intercom system.

Still, the atmosphere conjured memories of her senior year, when she first leaned into a microphone to greet her audience.

By that point, her love for sharing words and music had been with her for most of her life — long before her elementary school Show and Tell.

“When I was a little kid, my idol was Dick Clark,” Calabrese said. “I would watch ‘American Bandstand’ constantly.”

She wasn’t watching for the bands or the dancers. She was watching for Clark — and listening closely to his every word.

“I had a little recorder and a microphone, and whatever he said, I would say. I would play it back and I would practice enunciating and talking from as far back as I can remember,” she said.

At her childhood home, Calabrese said, music was always playing.

“We were always listening to the radio,” she said. “A majority of my family played instruments.”

By the time high school rolled around, Calabrese was absolutely certain that radio, and being a disc jockey, was the career path she wanted.

She recalled how students were encouraged to meet with the school’s guidance counselor, the late Nick Young, to discuss their futures.

“I would just tell him that I wanted to work in radio and that I wanted to be a DJ,” Calabrese said.

Young, she said, was a longtime football game announcer for WMGH.

“He made a phone call to the radio station,” she said.

And soon thereafter, Calabrese sat down for a 90-minute interview.

“I was hired on the spot,” she said.

Learning everything

Her first day at the station was Feb. 10, 1990. She was 18 and finishing her senior year at Tamaqua.

She was put to work, recording news, weather and winning lottery numbers. On the sister station, WLSH 1410 AM, she read lunch menus for local schools.

Production and sales followed, and so too, did live broadcasts on shows like the stations’ “The Dutch Trader” and the former “Oldies for Lunch Bunch.”

“In my first year, I just wanted to learn anything and everything about radio,” Calabrese said.

In 1995, Calabrese took over as host of what was called “Magic’s ’80s Classics” on WMGH.

“Because of graduating in 1990, I knew a lot about ’80s music. It was my time,” she said.

The live show aired Thursday nights, and Calabrese took requests and relayed messages from her listeners.

“I even had people propose (marriage) on my show,” she said. “The advantage of being live is people feel that you’re right there in their living room with them.”

In 2005, she was hired by the former Penn’s Peak Radio, which aired online and on television.

“That is when the show changed to ‘Stuck in the ’80s,’ ” Calabrese said. Each week, she’d encourage listeners to “tune in and get stuck” in the 1980s.

She stayed on as host of the show when she returned to WMGH in 2010. “Stuck in the ’80s” airs Saturdays from 9 p.m. until midnight.

While her 35th anniversary show will play on Feb. 15, she’ll celebrate the milestone throughout the year with more interviews, giveaways and surprises.

Voice recognition

Being on air for multiple decades, means that many “know” Calabrese.

“I usually get recognized for my voice faster than my face,” she admitted. “I’ll be at a store or I’ll be at a restaurant and people will hear me and say, ‘Are you the 80s Guru’?”

She also takes her craft on the road as a professional DJ and owner of her business, Coolbreeze Imaging (formerly Coolbreeze Productions). Since 1999, she has worked many high-profile events, including weddings, parties and celebrations.

In 2015, Calabrese founded The Link, which is composed of volunteers who are advocates of suicide awareness and prevention in Carbon and Schuylkill counties.

She is relaunching an effort she began several years ago, called “Make a Difference — Just Because.” Through it, people or businesses donate gift cards which are then turned over to people in need.

“They had a death in a family, they had a house fire, whatever,” she said of the recipients. “I anonymously take those donations and give them to people. It’s just something I made up on my own.”

She has been involved with the American Cancer Society since 1988.

“This anniversary is bittersweet because pretty much everyone who were my influence and my cheerleaders to get me to start in radio have all passed away,” Calabrese said.

Despite that, Calabrese said she’s grateful for all the others who’ve backed her along the way.

“I thank all my listeners and all my sponsors for allowing me to do what I love for 35 years,” she said. “Because not everybody gets to do what they love — and not everybody gets to do what they said they would do when they were 5 years old.”

To contact Calabrese, call 570-290-8089 or email gurustuckradio@ptd.net.