Help us to solve a local history mystery: The KGY Tire Prank of 1973

For much of the 20th century, KGY was integral to community life in the South Sound region. A good, but quirky example is the alleged Olympia High School class of 1973 making the iconic KGY studio building the site of a graduation prank.

Today, 50 years later, who planned the prank and how it was carried out, is a local history mystery. On the 50th anniversary of the graduation and prank, the Olympia Historical Society-Bigelow House Museum (OHS-BHM) seeks to solve the mystery. Please read on to find out how you can help solve this local "whodunit."

The KGY Tire Prank of 1973

Graduating from high school is often seen as a milestone in a person's lifetime. Leaving home for college, travel, or the workplace, graduating from high school begins a transition from youth to adulthood. Graduation is usually marked by solemn ceremonies, long-winded speeches, and boisterous partying.

Pranks also accompany graduation time. Every year, school staff brace themselves for encountering suds in fountains, toilet-paper-strewn landscapes, and enigmatic messages painted on windows and pavements. The graduating prank attributed to the Olympia High School class of 1973 was perhaps more ambitious than most. Read on...

On the morning of June 5, 1973, radio host Dick Pust drove to work at the iconic KGY studio building located "on the waterfront" at the tip of the "port peninsula." As recorded in his book "1240 AM: Life of a Small Town Radio Station," Pust recalls: "A slight rubbery smell filled my nostrils. Whatever it was filled the entire walkway. Then I realized I was looking at tires-lots of them...Maybe my mind was playing a trick on me...But no! Those were real tires and somehow they had ended up on the KGY walkway."

Fifty years later, the whimsical mystery of "whodunit" and how this prank was carried out that June night in 1973 has not been answered.

In its mission to preserve and share the history and heritage of Olympia, the Olympia Historical Society-Bigelow House Museum seeks to find answers. Therefore, we are turning to JOLT readers and others who may have been involved in the prank, to step forward and share information and memories.

Questions we seek to answer are:

• Who was involved in planning and carrying out the prank?
• How were all 228 tires acquired and transported to KGY?
• Who made the anonymous phone call to Pust asking "Didn't you notice anything different when you got to the station this morning?"
• Lastly, were any photographs taken and still survive that documented the event?

If you can help solve the mystery by answering these questions, please contact OHS-BHM by emailing: olyhistory@gmail.com, comment on our Facebook page @olyhistory, or mail to: OHS-BHM, PO Box 1821, Olympia WA 98507.

Your submission can be made anonymously, but as an incentive, OHS-BHM will offer a prize to the person(s) who provide valid information about the prank.

Greg Griffith is president of the board of trustees of the Olympia Historical Society & Bigelow House Museum.