Domino in the early 1950s to supplement the big-band artists of the era such as Tommy Dorsey and Glenn Miller, the WLAC announcers presided over the development of what became "rhythm and blues" music. They did this mainly to attract advertisers who serviced the African-American community, such as hair-care products like Royal Crown Hair Pomade or chicken hatcheries, which packaged baby scrub roosters and other undesirable stock in large quantities for sale. The disc jockeys developed a reputation for colorfully pitching those products on air; some product slogans lent themselves to sexually suggestive double entendres, which only increased the announcers' popularity among teen listeners. The deejays conducted the advertising sales on a "per inquiry", or commission, basis, meaning that the station did not rely on traditional ratings to gauge the programs' successes. WLAC sales manager E.G. Blackman sought to hire the nation's first African-American news radio broadcaster employed by a major, white-owned radio station, Don Whitehead. Whitehead, a graduate of Tennessee State University, began his career shortly after the April 1968 assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. Whitehead started in the nighttime slot, announcing the news at the top of the hour. He traveled around WLAC's listening area to promote the historically black colleges and universities and played a big role in increasing enrollment of African-Americans attending college. Performers of later years, such as Johnny Winter, and the Allman brothers, Duane and Gregg, have credited the station as being a valuable source of inspiration for their artistic development. According to Levon Helm, Robbie Robertson (both members of The Band, a 1970s roots rock group) listened to WLAC at night while in Toronto. As a teenager, Robertson would stay up all night to hear blues from deejay John R. A strange irony about the phenomenon was unknown to most listeners of that time: all four disc jockeys were in fact middle-aged white men, not African-Americans, as their Southern, gravelly, drawling voices suggested. Richbourg and Allen in particular made frequent use of colloquialisms most familiar to their audience, thereby convincing many that they were "soul brothers," as a common expression of that day. Other regular sponsors of the four shows included Randy's Record Shop of Gallatin, Tennessee, Ernie's Record Mart, and Buckley's Record Shop, the latter two of Nashville, all of which conducted mail-order business selling the recordings featured on the shows, and had affiliations with record companies in Middle Tennessee. Buckley's