My Radio Heroes

All of my professional radio career was up and down IH-35. I grew up in San Antonio, graduating from Alamo Heights High School in 1962. I began my radio career at a small 250-watt daytime only station in San Marcos in 1963 while I was in school at what was then Southwest Texas State College. I moved up the highway to Austin in 1965; moved back to San Antonio briefly during the summer of 1968, then to Fort Worth. I returned to Austin in 1971 and have been here ever since. I retired from radio in the year 2000.

My radio heroes were the likes of Herb Carl, Skinny Don Green, Charlie Van, Howard Edwards, Ricci Ware, Bruce Hathaway, Doug China, Gary Allyn, Don Couser, Woody Roberts, Ben Laurie, Jerry Miller, Lee 'Baby' Sims, Howard Faulkenberg, Tom Ellis, Bob Sinclair, Pat Tallman and so many others. I fell in love with radio thanks to these folks and borrowed liberally from them. So liberally, in fact, that one night while I was working a weekend shift at KNOW in Austin in 1965 a listener called and said, "You're really not Dave Jarrott; you're really Woody Roberts. You sound just like him!"

It was my pleasure in 2006 to be able to shake Herb Carl's hand and thank him for getting me started. Oh, he didn't hire me, but he did encourage me and without his encouragement I never would have pursued my dream of being a disc-jockey. You see I was in the 8th grade in 1958, and I think it was Pat Tallman on KTSA who was being advertised as the "world's first high school age dee-jay." So I made an audition tape with my friend's reel-to-reel Ampex recorder, ad libbing commercials from the San Antonio Yellow Pages, and holding the microphone to the record player to pick up the tunes. I took it down to KONO and asked to see the program director, who at that time was Herb Carl. Herb and two others on his staff graciously invited me in and listened to my tape! And offered constructive criticism! And encouraged my dream! And gave me a tour of the studios!

Herb said I should get continue my speech and drama classes and try to get a job in a smaller market to get experience. I did continue the classes, and when I moved to San Marcos to major in theatre at SWTSC I applied at KCNY, the local radio station. I was hired in January 1963 and spent the next 37 years in radio, with a little time out occasionally for television (news) and working as a copywriter and producer for advertising agencies.

I have never forgotten Herb's kindness to a junior high kid with a dream, and I did my best over the years to mentor other young people with similar dreams.

Dave Jarrott

Herb Carl and Dave Jarrott – 2006

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