10 Questions with ... Dick Purtan

BRIEF CAREER SYNOPSIS:

• 1980 - Television Emmy Award for Best Comedy Special
• 1993 - Marconi Major Market Air Personality of the Year
• 1993 - Detroit News "Michiganian" of the Year
• 2002 - Olympic Torch Bearer
• 2004 - Chicago Museum of Television and Radio Broadcasting Hall of Fame Inductee
• 2006 - National Association of Broadcasters Hall of Fame Inductee

I spent 45 years on 5 Detroit radio stations. I retired March 26, 2010 after having raised $24 million dollars for the Salvation Army Bed & Bread Club Feeding Program during my annual 16-hour Radiothon. I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving this year since I have been named Grand Marshall of Detroit's 84th annual Thanksgiving Day Parade!

1) What Got You Interested In Radio?

Listening to the radio! And I would have to thank my parents for buying a radio with an attached record player and microphone. I used to hide in the front closet and "broadcast" news stories and ads from the paper to my parents listening in the living room. They said I was great...and I believed them. I was six years old at the time.

2) Who do you consider your radio mentors?

Clint Buehlman on WBEN in Buffalo. As a kid, I would on occasion take the bus to downtown Buffalo (by myself!) to watch him do his show and then take the bus five miles back to my elementary school. And I always made it before the 9am bell rang! My parents never knew.

3) What do you view as the most important issue facing radio today?

The most important issue facing radio today? Survival...while maintaining good content.

4) Who is the most amazing talent you've worked with?

This is a hard one to answer... but Skinny Bobby Harper was the wildest and craziest. But if you're asking the most amazing talents that I've ever heard? I would list Frank Ward at WKBW in Buffalo, Klavin & Finch at WNEW-AM in New York, Richard King at WKRC in Cincinnati and Neil Rogers at WIOD/WQAM in Miami.

5) What should radio be doing now to secure a role in the future of the ever-changing media landscape?

We need to allow our on-air talent to develop and not just play more music! People crave entertainment... and not just 10 second bites between songs.

6) What's the best concert you've ever been to this year and why?

Well, it wasn't it was exactly this year. But I brought the Beatles to Cincinnati in 1964. Since the deal required (and this is hard to believe) a down-payment of only $12,500, and my wife and I only had $2,500 in our bank account, I went to four of my fellow WSAI jocks and asked them if they wanted in. They did and we came up with the necessary down payment. And just like that, we locked in the Beatles! We all got to spend time with them and my wife and I have some amazing home movies of them backstage. I also have a crisp one dollar bill signed by John, Paul, George and Ringo. All five of us "investors" made a whopping $2200 profit each!!!

7) What was the biggest gaffe you've made on air?

I guess the biggest gaffe came early, in the mid-60's, on WSAI in Cincinnati. One night the late Skinny Bobby Harper, doing 6 to 9pm, called me at my home live on the air to ask me where one of the fictional characters on my morning show was that evening. I told him I didn't know, but that if people listening were interested they should call the Hamilton County Police and Fire Emergency phone numbers saying that they would know. Over 5,000 calls were made and the entire county went on emergency stand-by alert. Bobby was arrested while on the air and taken to jail.

This made headlines the next day and a few days later the story made some of the national publications. I escaped scot free, but this began a series of negative events for Bobby which culminated in him being jailed again for a couple of weeks and finally being escorted to the Cincinnati city line by two police officers and being handed a bag containing his possessions and told to "never show his face in Cincinnati again!" And he never did! Bobby went on to success in Atlanta and ended up being the model for Dr. Johnny Fever on the TV Show "WKRP in Cincinnati".

8) What was the most successful low budget promotion idea your station ever did?

There were two actually. First, when Ernie Harwell was fired as the Detroit Tigers' play-by-play baseball announcer, I had the station print up 10,000 head-on-a-stick masks of Ernie and we passed them out at Tiger Stadium on opening day. People held them over their faces throughout the game in protest of Ernie's firing. He was re-hired a year later!

Second, because of a change in daylight saving time, a number of young children had been killed by motorists as they walked alongside roads on their way to school in the dark. In an effort to get the state of Michigan to return to standard time (which would make it lighter in the morning and safer for the kids) I showed a drive-in movie from 7a.m until 8:30a when the sun finally came up. (FYI - the movie was Woody Allen's "Take the Money and Run") Since this was in February, there was plenty of snow and we were only able to get 400 cars into the drive-in theater. The very last one we pushed in just as the final credits rolled. Over one thousand cars were turned away. The story was picked up by the Associated Press and made national news!

9) What is the biggest change that you'd like to see happen in the business?

More entertainment and original creativity allowed back into music radio. You don't "connect" with the audience and the city by just playing "more music".

10) What advice would you give people new to the business?

If you go into radio, make sure it's a passion, because that will greatly increase your chances of being successful. Remember, it's not the high paying on-air business it once was, but if you work hard enough, maybe you can help make it what it used to be. Most importantly, have fun! In my case, the more fun I had, the more money I made!

1) What do you do in your spare time?

Read, work out and I am currently writing a book about my years in radio.

2) Besides your own, what is your favorite radio format?

Talk! Mostly Political Talk these days because "Entertainment Talk" (for lack of a better description) tends to be raunchy, silly, and very often just plain stupid.

3) Where do you see the industry and yourself five years from now?

Radio will continue to cut salaries especially if the economy is still in trouble. As for me, I'll still be catching up on 45+ years of sleep deprivation!

4) As you look back over your career ... any regrets? Missed opportunities?

I was forced to turn down the morning show at WNBC in New York because I was under contract to ABC-owned WXYZ. (Imus got the gig).

5) What's the best piece of advice anyone's ever given you? The worst?

The best advice I've ever received: "Always follow your own gut feeling". The worst advice? "Always do what the Program Director tells you to do."