This month began with the death of a radio legend, Bob Sievers. Mr. WOWO as he was known, due to spending some 70 years on the air at WOWO 1190 am. I, like thousands of others over those 70 years woke up to Bob when I got my first clock radio back in the 60's or 70's.
Yet, it was not Bob that inspired me to get into radio. There were others that were more influential that I heard on WOWO.
Chris Roberts who did afternoons and Ron Gregory who did nights were the ones that inspired me. There's others from out of town that I could listen to on occasion from WLS 890am in Chicago like John "Records" Landecker, Fred Winston, Larry Lujack and Tommy Edwards and CKLW 800am from Windsor/Detroit such as Dick Purtan, Ted Richards, Tom Shannon, and Pat Holiday.
Chris Roberts. I met him at his home thru my Dad who did business with Chris's wife back in the 1970's. Chris now owns radio stations in Ohio, and as I was driving to work this morning, I heard him on the air.
Ron Gregory. The last time I saw Ron in person, was in our building about a year or two ago.
Thank you Young Chris and Ron for inspiring this broadcaster to venture into this business.
Later in life, I was influenced by Don Crawford and Frank Franciosi. Don is the son of Percy Crawford and the owner of Crawford Broadcasting which owned 6 stations back in the 1980's including WMUZ 103.fm in Detroit. Frank was the General Manager 21 years ago and still is. Frank and Don's influence is what lead me into the marketing and advertising side of broadcasting. There's even a phrase that came from them that I use today, "Word of Mouth Advertising, with a BIGGER Mouth" that is how radio advertising is supposed to work.
Thank you Frank and Mr. Crawford.
Doug Burns was a co-worker for the first few years I was in Detroit and I still have some of the advertising campaigns saved that we created. Doug is now in Texas.
Robin Sullivan has been hosting the Praise Company on WMUZ for 20 years and it was Robin along with Randy, Rich N. and many others that helped create and sustain the power of radio that came from the building at the end of the alley where WMUZ is still located.Hero's, Idols, Mentors and friends one and all. Thank you.
