The best part about reaching the milestone of 50 years in broadcasting is that it’s not over! The excitement I feel about doing my show today is not that much different from the excitement I felt when I first began my career. The biggest difference is that I am confident instead of feeling insecure, and I celebrate that difference every day.
Talking about moments and events of the past 50 years in broadcasting does not come from a sad place of lamenting the past - my career continues. It’s rewarding to have so much attention paid to my career and I’m still alive to appreciate it!
I have seen a lot and done a lot and with very few regrets. I learned early in my career that we most regret the things in life we don’t do. But that doesn’t mean I would take back a few things I decided to do!
My first significant full-time position where I had a show of my own was in the morning on Rampart-102, WWL-FM. My first real time slot was morning drive, which at the time was a total dead zone on FM radio. First of all, not many cars had FM radios, and FM stations only got ratings at night and in the afternoons. NO ONE listened in the morning.
With no guidance I decided to do a personality-driven morning show like the shows that were popular on the AM stations. I consciously thought that the audience doesn’t care if it’s AM or FM as long as the show is good. So I set out to do a good show.
There was no blueprint for what I was doing, and I just followed my instincts as to what I thought would be entertaining and relatable. From the beginning, callers were part of what defined my show. One of the first callers I had was from Laura Misch, who was a Playboy Playmate of the Month and lived in New Orleans. She called the show, and that seemed to give me instant credibility. For several weeks Laura called in and was a topic of discussion. There were other callers, like Tammy in the Tub. A girl called me from her bathtub every morning; and with water occasionally splashing in the background, we talked about who knows what. I can assure you it was not about politics!
Making overseas phone calls live on the air was a big part of my early identity. Long distance and overseas calls are commonplace today, but in the early and mid-70s it got a lot of attention. I would call Buckingham Palace to wish the Queen Happy Birthday. When she obviously never came to the phone, I would simply say, “Would you please tell the Queen Scoot from New Orleans called to wish her Happy Birthday?” That didn’t seem like a big deal, but the idea that the Queen might actually get a message that Scoot - a local DJ from New Orleans - called to wish her Happy Birthday definitely resonated with the audience.
And, of course, I would call the President to wish him Happy Birthday and leave the message that I called. Those were the earlier years when the FCC was not as strict. When the FCC established the rule that anyone who was on the air needed to be informed that they were on the air before they even said “Hello,” that changed everything. I could long longer just cold call people and places live on the air.
Long before everything was on computers, I would literally put the vinyl album on the turntable and cue up the track. There were times that the record would skip on the air, or I would leave the studio and come back to the song being stuck in one place. Embarrassing, but that was the reality of radio.
Early in my career I was fired from WWL-FM because I went to a “Miss Wet T-shirt Contest.” It was a Sunday afternoon in Fat City, which was the most popular party area in New Orleans, and Capt. Humble from the station was the emcee. Some people in the crowd recognized me in attendance and grabbed me, hoisted me up on the stage, and I suddenly became co-emcee of the event.
At the time, WWL-FM was owned by Loyola University, which was owned by the Catholic Church. A picture of Capt. Humble and me standing next to this contestant with very large breasts wearing a T-shirt that had been doused with water appeared on the cover of the city’s weekly newspaper.
Embarrassed that the radio station’s on-air talent was caught in that situation - Capt. Humble and I were fired. I was newly married, and this was my first big full-time job and it was a very scary time for me.
What management did not want to tell the Church was that the station had run advertising for the event. They made it seem as if we went out on our own and got involved in a “Miss Wet T-shirt Contest.”
I hired a lawyer to sue the station because I knew the firing was not justified. I ended up getting a job on another station within a few weeks, and the station was forced to pay me wages that I missed after being fired. So not only did it work out - but what I thought was a devastating moment in my young career turned out to have been the best thing that could have happened because of the publicity and the fact that I was fired for going to a “Miss Wet T-shirt Contest” followed me.
One of the great things about my career is meeting and interviewing so many top celebrities: Alice Cooper, Gene Simmons, Robin Williams, Anthony Hopkins, Robert Lamm of Chicago, Tony Curtis, Joan Rivers, Billy Idol, Steve Perry and Journey, pop artist Peter Max. Those are just a few that come to mind.
My career has taken me to Portland, OR, Seattle, Philadelphia, Miami, San Diego, San Antonio, and Denver. And now back home in New Orleans on WWL, which has been a huge part of my career.
While many people remember my show in the morning on B-97 in the mid-80s, I have spent most of my career here on WWL. From starting as a young producer for The Bob Ruby Show on WWL-870 AM shortly after high school to being on the air on weekends to the morning show on Rampart-102 - WWL was responsible for giving me a start in the business.
I came back to New Orleans and WWL-FM, which was Magic-101.9 at the time, and did the morning show. But I felt the need to reinvent myself, and I set my sights on talk radio. I pushed for the opportunity to fill in for the midday host when he went on vacation in 1991. Not long after that, I was given that show; and I was now a talk radio host.
When I came back to New Orleans, 10 years ago, Diane Newman, who was the assistant program director when I first became a talk show host and is now the program director/brand manager, gave me the great opportunity to be back on WWL.
I have been doing a series on The Scoot On The Air YouTube Channel featuring some of the moments and events over the 50 years and that is available on YouTube. I hope you subscribe to the SOTA YT Channel while you are there.
And the rest of the stories I will save for the book I will continue to write.
If you are reading this blog - as a long-time listener or a more recent listener - THANK YOU! Thank you for being part of my career and my life. I owe it to you, and every day I strive to do the best show I can for you. And the incredible part of this ongoing journey is that it’s far from over. I look forward to each day, and I never know what will happen during our live show that is never very structured.
I want to take this moment to reset what I’m doing. I want to stray away from the most hateful political debates. I will never be afraid to talk about anything, but I can’t heal the divide in America am personally exhausted by the tense debate that is the right vs. the left.
I will not change who I am, but I will work toward making the show less confrontational. I will still deal with heated social issues and local politics and will certainly talk about national politics, but minds will never be changed when it comes to certain things. I think it’s best to lean in a slightly different direction - without sacrificing who I am.
A Chinese philosopher once said that a truly happy person is the person that cannot distinguish between work and play. And that’s the best way to describe my life.