Confessions of a Rock and Roll DJ - Girls, Gifts and Payola - Stories for my Grandchildren

I'm documenting my illustrious career in broadcasting. You know, sort of rehearsing for the official biography. The first part is here. The second part is here. 

In an era when girls fainted at the mere prospect of catching a glimpse of the Beatles, or Elvis, or other major celebrity, one would expect that being an awesome DJ at the biggest station in town would bring about a similar response at one's own public appearances, right? Let me tell you a story.

One of my sponsors was a local record store named Breezy's Melody Mart. I would go by the store once a week and get Breezy's list of top selling songs in Abilene for the week and use that list to program records. On one occasion, as I was leaving, a teenage girl rushed up to Breezy and asked, "Is that Bob Anderson?" Naturally, I lingered so as to hear the rest of this. "THE Bob Anderson?" she asked. Assured that it was really THE Bob Anderson, the girl turned to her friend and said, "Oh, I'm SO disappointed!"

Even the girl I later married confessed to me that the first time I ever came to her attention - I was doing a remote at a downtown movie theater for the opening of  an Elvis Presley film - she thought I was a real dork. So much for attracting girls.

Gifts fell in about the same category. Some DJ's were getting them, but not me. Well, I did get free bounce time at a trampoline center for plugging their enterprise, and the folks that sold the souvenirs next door to the broadcast trailer at the West Texas Fair would bring me some toy on a stick every year, so that I could dangle it in the window and promote their business. I actually scored a couple of very nice sweaters from a men and boys clothing store - another one of my sponsors - but it was about this time that the Payola scandals hit, and that was the end of freebies of any kind.

Alan Freed, the DJ that actually coined the term 'Rock and Roll,' was indicted for receiving illegal payments to promote certain records. Dick Clark had a brush with the law as well and because of all the bad publicity all of the sudden radio stations across the country were scrambling to cover their collective behinds. I got called in, along with all of the other announcers at the station, and got grilled about payments and gifts that I might have received. I confessed the trampoline time and the sweaters (but I don't think I mentioned the Fair toys). The manager finally decided that since I had never been asked to play any specific records that if I signed a bunch of legal documents that I would never accept anything but good wishes from anyone ever again they wouldn't fire me. Seriously.

And part of the Payola fall-out was that DJs no longer got to pick and choose the music they played. After the great crack-down, when I would come in for my shift there would be a stack of 45rpm records in a box at the console. I could play those records, no more, no less. So I quit going to Breezy's for the weekly list, thus severely limiting my chances of running into girls who - upon learning who I was - would be SO disappointed.