Bill Starkey, a resident of Terre Haute, was only a young boy when he first realized his love for the band KISS. He would stay up late watching their concerts and was lucky to have a father working in the record distribution in order to get his beloved KISS records. Starkey and his friends remained true KISS fans throughout their highschool years. They would go to Terre Haute North and pass out bootleg tapes of the band while wearing their homemade KISS t-shirts. The avid fans noticed they never heard any KISS songs on the radio. They found out the reason for this was a man named Rich Dickerson, the program director for West Terre Haute's WVTS. Although Rich played many rock songs similar to KISS ones, he refused to play any of the band's songs. He did not like them and did not feel his job was to promote them. This upset Starkey and teenage friends who decided to constantly call the station requesting KISS songs and referring to themselves as the KISS Army. They used the word army because they believed calling themselves KISS fans sounded too weak. They drew a logo on a sheet of paper and brought it to the radio station, not knowing at the time that this logo would eventually form thousands of T-shirts and patches.
The KISS Army and Dickerson would frequently joke with eachother on air and was beginning to get noticed by the Terre Haute community. Fans from all around were hearing of the KISS Army. When KISS came to Terre Haute on November 1st, 1975, at Hulman Center, Bill Starkey was called on stage to recieve a plaque from KISS, where he was allowed to hand the band his own banner. When the band began playing Starkey noticed the drummer for KISS had his banner draped across his drumset for the whole concert.
Suddenly, the KISS Army exploded into something that Bill Starkey had never imagined it would. He has since met with the band several times and the KISS Army has even been mentioned on "The Daily Show" and enlists U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice. When meeting with KISS fans who had traveled to Terre Haute to see the band, Starkey had the chance to ask the individuals why they chose to come to Terre Haute to see KISS perform when the fans replied that they had to come here because "..this is Terre Haute, where it all began.."
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