| Monday | Tuesday |
|
|
| Wednesday | Thursday |
|
|
| Friday | |
|
The special started off with an intro where the announcer, Jim Forbes, talks about what this special was going to be about with many clips of Howard and the other guys on the show talking about some of the stuff that's gone on over the years.
After the intro they went back to January 12, 1954 when Howard was born. Then Howard's mother Ray Stern came on and talked about the day Howard was born and explained how she wasn't allowed to have Ben in the hospital room with her. She talked about how he was told they had a boy. Ben also had a few words to say about that and how he was the one who came up with the name Howard. He said he liked that name and told her that's what they were naming him.
Up next was Howard's sister Ellen who talked about how thrilled she was to have a brother. She was 4 years old at the time. Howard talked about how great his relationship was with his sister over the years. He said that she never looked for the spotlight while he was always looking for it. He would take any attention he could get while she stayed quiet.
Ray talked about living in Jackson Heights and how they knew they had to move from the small home there. She said that they wondered where to go and friends told them to move to Roosevelt because that's where they were all going. They bought a split level house there for $14,500. Ben said that those were the days. Ben said that they moved there when Howard was just a few months old, in June of 1954.
Howard talked about some of the stuff he remembered from living in Roosevelt. He remembered crapping his pants and running home to take them off and burying them in the back yard.
Jim had some of Howard's friends, Jerry Dickowitz, Milton Little and Margie Sickles, talking about growing up with Howard. Each of them talked a little bit about Roosevelt and what they remember of it. They described the town, how big it was, how much traffic there was there and things like that.
The friends talked about Howard's house being red and what it was like to hang out with Howard. Howard talked about those friends and how they were all good friends and a lot of fun to hang out with. Margie talked about how great Howard's parents were. Milton also said that they were great people and they always made them feel good when they were hanging out with Howard. He said they were just ''honest, decent folks.''
Margie said that there were a few families there that would hang out and do things together in that neighborhood. Ray was also saying that they were always involved with the things going on in the world and in the neighborhood.
Margie was talking about the families hanging out and how she used to watch the adults at night just hanging out and they were always having fun and laughing. She said that Ben was always very funny and Ray was always laughing at his jokes.
Howard said that his father really was the life of the party from what he remembers. He said that he was always very well read and up on the news. He said that his mother was always laughing at what he said too. Margie said that Ben telling all of those jokes were probably a big influence on Howard and his career. Howard said that his father was always no nonsense and very opinionated. He said that there was a certain dynamic there that reminds him of his radio show.
Ray talked about how she would volunteer Ben's services to do things at their church and he'd be dressed up as a woman quite often. She said that Howard saw that and that probably made it easy for him to see stuff like that. Ben said that he used to play many female roles in those plays they'd put on at church.
Ben said he used to record himself singing at work and he'd bring home the records for the kids to listen to. He said that he had Shirley Jones come up and record in the studio one time and he sang for her. She told him that it was an awful performance though.
We heard an interview clip where Howard was asked about his father and what it was like growing up with him. In the clip we heard Howard talking about how his mother let him have a Playboy magazine when he was a young boy. He said that sex wasn't that big of a deal in his house. Ben and Ray came on and talked about how they weren't uptight about those things back then.
We heard a clip from Howard's show where he talked about his mother and how she always told him that he should be fearless but then she'd put fear into him when she'd tell him about how people died back when she was a little kid. Howard talked about the things that shaped him into the person he is and how she put all of this fear into him. He was doing an impression of his mother while talking about the crazy stuff she told him. He said he lives in a world of fear because of that.
Howard said that his sister had some friends who were really hot and she'd bring them back to the house. He said he had a crush on one of them, Sharon Landis or something like that, and he always liked when she'd come over.
Howard said that some of her male friends weren't so great and they used to try and scare him all the time. He said that he and Ellen did get along though and things went pretty well for them over the years. He said that there were times when he was a little overwhelming for her though.
Ellen said that she didn't see Howard a lot when they were growing up because they were off doing their own thing most of the time. She said that they didn't really fight that much though. Ray said that Howard was good to her as a kid and he's kept that up. Ellen said that he's still wonderful to her and her kids. She said that he's also there for his own kids and she's very lucky to have him.
Ben said that he could see Howard had fun with the marionettes. Ellen said that he would put on shows for his friends and he really kept people entertained. Margie was on again talking about Howard's comic book collection and things like that as well. She said that she would go over and read his comic books with him and watch his marionette shows that he put on. His other friends also talked about the stuff that they used to see over at his house when they were there. One of the guys said that he saw a nude magazine for the first time at Howard's house.
One of Howard's friends said that they actually got out of class to go do puppet shows and write them for class. Ben said that he used to help him out with that stuff and they did the Fiddler on the Roof puppet show at one point.
We heard another clip from Howard's show where he was talking about those years when he was doing his puppet shows. He said he did a lot of dirty puppet shows when he was around the age of 7. He said that he'd have pirates raping women and things like that. He said that it all got very perverted.
They also played a clip from ''Private Parts'' where Howard is doing a puppet show and having the characters having sex and then having them taken away from him.
Howard's friends said that they think that Howard was exaggerating about the puppet sex shows. They didn't remember that happening and it was much more innocent than he made it out to be.
Ben said that he brought Howard to temple to see one of these radio guys because he knew that he was kind of interested in radio stuff. Ben remembered talking to Howard about radio and what they thought was good and not so good about it back then.
We heard another clip from ''Private Parts'' where Howard's father was bringing him to his studio to watch him work.
Ben said that he used to bring Howard in to work to watch him work and they would see guys like Don Adams, Larry Storch and Wally Cox doing their thing for cartoons. Then we heard another clip from Howard's show where he was talking about the recording sessions and how some of them ended up on a Tennessee Tuxedo DVD that was released not too long ago. He played some of the clips where Ben was instructing the people in the studio on what they were doing. Howard said that Ben was very official sounding in those clips.
Ben talked about how he would record the family at these sessions and Howard would get out of hand sometimes. He said he kept all of these tapes locked up for years. He said that if he knew that they'd turn into what they did, he never would have given them to Howard to play on his show.
We heard a clip from Howard's show where he first revealed the family tapes where he had his father yelling at him. Howard talked about how they all had to perform when they'd go there. He said his father would perform songs and stuff so he played some of that. That's when we heard Ben's ''Shut up, sit down!'' for the first time. In the clip Howard said that he could never yell at his kids like that.
Howard said those were some confusing things going on back then. He said that it was like his parents were asking him ''isn't this exciting?'' and then saying ''Don't get excited!'' Howard's mother asks ''what's wrong with you?'' during that clip so Howard explains that he was just a kid back then. He was just being a kid.
In that bit Howard said that his parents humiliated him on a daily basis. He went on to play some of his father singing and Jackie started laughing his ass off. Howard talked about how his father was laughing in that bit but he wasn't always laughing, he was miserable most of the time. Howard played the ''Shut up, sit down!'' clip a few times and then forwarded through the tapes and tried to find some other stuff. He heard himself playing the piano and screwing that up. He said he wishes he could still play that song that he was playing. He said he wouldn't give his kids piano lessons, he wouldn't want to have to sit and listen to that crap.
In another clip Ray was singing a song and Ben was yelling at her that she wasn't on the microphone. Then Howard forwards the tape and finds an interview that Ben did with him, when he was about 7. Ben asked him about why kids should go to religious services. Howard didn't know what to say and fumbled over his words and didn't say much of anything. Ben then asks Ellen what she thinks about the local football team. She talks about that for a minute and then Ben asks what they think about the United States remaining in the United Nations. Howard gives a goofy answer and Ben tells him ''I told you not to be stupid you moron...'' Howard laughed and said that he was just doing some funny stuff and his father freaked out on him. Jackie said that this was like a sitcom.
Howard continued to play the clips of his father asking all of these goofy questions. Ben asks some political questions and has Howard rambling about nonsense. He also talks to Ellen about the same stuff and neither of them gave good enough answers so he straightens them out on that.
Jim Forbes said that Ellen didn't think that Ben was like that all the time. She then comes on and said that he wasn't always yelling at Howard that way. Ben also had some things to say about that as well. He said that if he had tape of what Howard was doing before he yelled at him, then he'd have something to prove that he should be able to yell at him.
After that we heard more of the Tennessee Tuxedo recording sessions when Howard played them on the show. Howard talked about the way his father was so official and would tell him not to do anything stupid when they'd go into those recording sessions. He and Artie also talked about Ben's job and how he never made a huge amount of money. He did okay but he didn't get rich off of what he was doing.
We heard one of Howard's friends talking about how Howard wanted to get into radio. Ray said that he was talking about that stuff all the time. One of the friends said he didn't remember Howard talking about it all that much at all but he did think that Howard was going to get into show business because he was so funny.
They played another clip from Howard's show where Artie was talking to Howard about his father being in the radio business and how Howard had said that he really wasn't in the business. Howard said that his father doesn't get upset about that stuff and doesn't question him about things he says on the air. He said that they don't get that personal. He said that his father used to call him an idiot if he said that he was going to get into the radio business and make millions. Howard talked about how his father invested wisely in stocks and that's how they live the way they do now.
In another clip we heard from one of Howard's friends, Seth, who said that Howard's father freaked out on them when they were playing around with the reel to reel recorder that Howard's father had. That led to Jim introducing some clips that had never been played before. They had Howard singing some songs from the 1960s. He was singing a bunch of songs that were hits at the time. He was going on and on during the recording. They had to slow down the recordings because Howard had recorded them to make it sound like Alvin and the Chipmunks.
We heard Howard talking about what a big deal those tape recorders were to him back then. They went into some more of those personal recordings where Howard was doing a Batman show all by himself. He was doing the voices, making the sound effects and playing the Batman theme song. He even had some audio from the real Batman show that he threw into the mix.
Howard said that he would make up shows on his own when he was young. He was a fan of Soupy Sales at the time and he would have some of his characters on these shows he did. That led to another clip where Howard was a kid doing these recordings and doing an interview with a friend. It was very short though. They went to commercial break after that.
Ray talked about how she never went to camp and Ben only went for about a week when he was a kid. Ben talked about going to camp himself. Ray said that Howard was always a little shy about his first time going but he made friends with his friend Lou so that helped. His sister was there as well and that helped. She said that he did enjoy it once he started going.
We heard from Howard talking about going to camp and how he had some nice friends there. They were people who accepted him and he fit in there at camp. Dr. Lou had some stuff to say about Howard and how he was a lot of fun to hang out with at camp. He said that they weren't all that great at sports but they still had fun playing. He talked about how they used to play softball and they'd try to knock Howard down by throwing the ball at him instead of letting him get a hit.
They played another clip from Howard's show where he was talking about going to camp and what they'd do there. He said that they didn't have all that many activities there other than sleeping out in the woods. He said he hated doing that because of the bugs and stuff. He said the camp was crappy and you'd have to make doody in the woods. He explained what it was like to lash two logs to a tree and dig a hole to crap in. He explained to Robin about how he would have to hold in his doody for 2 days and how uncomfortable that was. He also talked about making a lean-to and using a tarp to do that.
Howard said that they had one kid fall into a fire and then roll out. They had to pour milk on him to put the fire out. Howard said that the camps they have today are more like going to a hotel than when he was going. Howard said that camping to him these days is going to a second rate hotel like a Ramada Inn and staying for a night.
Howard's friends from camp talked about how Howard would fart a lot when he was a kid and he always found it amusing. One of the guys explained the farting thing and how much he'd do it. Howard said that he loved farting and it always came naturally to him.
Ray talked about Howard and all of the positive things that his camp counselors would write about him. She said that they told her that Howard was a leader but he didn't use his skills there at camp.
Howard's friends talked about Dr. Lou and how he was on his way to being a doctor even when he was a kid. They also talked about Howard using that Wallensack recorder that he had to do interviews and stuff so it was almost obvious as to where he was going.
The friends talked about the band that they created as a goof. Howard had a drum set and they used to play songs but they were really horrible. One of the guys also talked about how Howard had this girlfriend by the name of Irene that was very pretty. One of the guys wasn't sure how Howard got her because she was so good looking. He said he's not sure how far he got with her back then. Things were much different back then.
Ray said that she remembers Irene and how sweet she was. She wasn't sure but she thought that she lived in Queens or Brooklyn so they weren't able to visit each other after camp. Ray said that Howard always respected girls and would defend them if his friends were in the car making fun. Ray said that one of Howard's friends in college told her that Howard was ''one of the girls'' when they were hanging out.
They went into another clip from Howard's show where he was talking about Irene and how she was his first love. He said that she was only 13 but she had big boobs and she was hot. He said his friend Dr. Lou told him he should play the field and that led to him breaking up with Irene. Lou told him that there would be tons of chicks after that so he broke things off with her. The next day she had a boyfriend and every guy wanted to date her. He didn't have any chicks to go to after that. He said he's always thought ''what if...'' ever since then. He said he'd like to get her on the show but she doesn't want anything to do with him now. He said he thinks that she's still pissed at him over the break up.
Then we heard Howard's friends talking about what happened to Roosevelt and how they were in school in the integrated school that was in town. Some of the families thought that it would be best to get out of town before their kids moved into junior high. The town changed and most of the white people in the community moved out.
Howard's family stuck around Roosevelt long after most of their friends had moved out. Ben said that Howard used to write and draw to keep himself busy back then. Ray said that Howard liked chess, reading MAD magazine and things like that. She said that whatever he was interested in he'd put his time into.
Howard's childhood friends talked about how Howard would go to camp and come back and tell them what they should be doing. They learned a lot from him about stuff that they didn't know about when he'd come back from camp.
Howard's friends talked about the band that they created and how one of their friends ended up moving out of town first.
Ben said that Howard got interested in music so he got him an electric keyboard and a clarinet. He said that Howard didn't last too long with that and he was the worst clarinet player ever. He said that he sold the clarinet for him and had him take piano lessons.
One of Howard's friends talked about the keyboard that Howard had and how it sounded like a crow walking when he'd play it. That led into a clip of Howard playing some of the tape he had of his band playing when they were kids. They were originally called The Plumber's Union and eventually became Electric Comic Book.
In the clip we heard Howard talking to Robin about the people who were in the band and how they had a couple of go-go girls come out and dance for them while they played. Howard was going to play Psychedelic Bee for Robin during that discussion. She was afraid that it was going to be one of the world's worst songs and it would be stuck in her head all day long.
Howard played the song and Robin picked it apart. Howard tried to explain it to Robin but she was laughing and just going along with whatever he said. Howard said for a 6th grader it wasn't so bad. Robin continued to laugh at him and goofed on the song.
After that we heard more from Howard's friends who said that they didn't really play many gigs. They only played about 2 or 3 songs at a bar mitzvah. They went back into another clip from Howard's show where Howard talked about another song that he wrote as a child. That song was ''Silver Nickels Golden Dimes.'' Robin was already picking it apart before Howard even played it. He played the song and goofed on it himself when he heard the intro.
Robert Carger, one of the guys in the band, called into the show that day and said that he wasn't sure that he should be taking credit for the music because he helped out with that. Howard and Robert talked about the old days in the neighborhood for a few minutes after that. Howard said Robert kind of abandoned him and never called him after he left. Robert said he was afraid.
Ray talked about how Howard used to show her his muscles on his arm as he was getting older. Ben said that Howard used to show off his strength by lifting him up. He'd have bruises on his arms from that and he'd tell people at work that he was getting abused at home.
Jim mentioned that Howard got bar mitzvahed in 1967. Ray talked about how Howard got kicked out of his class for the bar mitzvah. She said that he eventually did it and he did just fine. She said that it was very low key and they did it in the neighborhood and it went just fine. Some of his friends were there and so was Irene.
Howard talked about how horrible Hebrew school was for him. He said he wasn't into it. He said that it was a guy who got up and sang in a foreign language that made no sense to him. He just wasn't into it. One of his friends said that Howard is actually 100 percent ''Hebe'' contrary to what some people think.
Howard said that he only did well because of performance pressure. He said he didn't give a crap about the bar mitzvah back then and he still doesn't feel much for the religion. While all of this was playing we heard clips of Howard singing his Hebrew songs and doing a thank you to a family member.
Margie and Dr. Lou also talked about the changes that happened in Roosevelt and how tough it must have been for him. Dr. Lou said that Howard had a really tough time growing up there. He wasn't sure why Howard's parents hung on as long as they did in that neighborhood.
We heard an old news report about the ''white flight'' that was going on at the time in Roosevelt. That story came from Newsday in 1968. That led to more discussions about the way the families were bailing out of that neighborhood and moving. It was like a domino effect with one family after the next just leaving.
Jerry Dickowitz talked about how he remembered that Ben and Ray were like the only family that didn't move out of that neighborhood at the time. Everyone else left at the same time.
We heard a clip from ''60 Minutes'' where Ed Bradley was talking about Howard's move away from Roosevelt and how his parents kept him there even though he wanted to leave. In the interview Howard said that it was horrible living there. He said that he had to fend for himself in school and his mother had no idea what was really going on. He claimed that sometimes a kid would just turn around in class and punch him in the face, just because he was white.
We then heard a news report about Martin Luther King Jr. being shot and killed. Then we heard from Ray about how she was told to go get Howard from school the day that King was killed. She didn't do it and she said that may have been a mistake. She said that he did some home unharmed though. Ben said that he got calls too and he let Ray handle it that day. One of Howard's friends said that it was a very awkward time for Howard because of what was going on in school.
We then heard an old clip from Howard's show where he talked to this guy Dennis who was the only other while kid who stayed in Roosevelt back then. Howard and Dennis talked about how it was very dangerous to go between their homes. Howard said they didn't hang out that much. He went on to talk about how the real estate agents were the ones who decided who was going to move into which neighborhoods and that's how Roosevelt went from white to black just about over night. Howard said that the problem was that they'd move in like 5 families into one house instead of just one family.
Dennis said that he got beat up the day after the Martin Luther King Jr. Shooting. He didn't get beat up as much as Howard did in school though. Dennis said that's because he played football and the kids would leave him alone. Howard said that he wanted to stay home after that shooting but his mother said she wasn't afraid to send him to school. Howard said he didn't get beat up the day of the shooting but the next day he did. He said that a math teacher also got stabbed.
After that we heard more from Howard's friends talking about what went on after the Martin Luther King's death. One of the guys talked about how there were riots there in Roosevelt and businesses were burned down. He said that it was a very tough time for them there in town.
In another clip we heard from Howard's friends about what happened when they moved out of the neighborhood. They talked about how there were a few families that tried to stop what was going on. It didn't work and the families had to move out of the area. Some of Howard's friends would get reports about what he was up to even after they moved.
Ray said that they didn't want to move but it was tough for Howard to stay in school getting accosted for money all the time. She said that she only knew of getting hit one time, by a garbage pail. She said that Howard had befriended a black boy back then and he was told that he couldn't be friends with him. Howard got hit in the face over that and that's when they figured they had to move out.
We heard a clip from Howard's show where he was talking about what was going on with the old high school that day. He also talked about some of the stuff that went on shortly before they moved out of Roosevelt. He said his mother wondered why they were beating up the one white kid who actually wanted to stay in the same neighborhood with them. Howard said that they weren't that well thought out. Robin said it sounds like his mother wasn't that well thought out either. Howard and Robin spent some time talking about that situation and how they really didn't think it out ahead of time.
One of Howard's friends from Rockville Center talked about how Howard was devoid of many basic skills and he was very awkward. He said that he wasn't able to run or jump in gym class and they used to call him ''Gunkard Stern'' because he was so awkward.
Ray talked about her son and how different he was when he came home compared to what he was like at school. She said he was relaxed at home but not in school.
They went into another clip from Howard's show where he talked about high school and being in Key Club. He said that they took him in shortly after he moved there from Roosevelt. He talked about how miserable he was in Key club and doing stuff for them. He said within a few days he was standing outside collecting money dressed up like Santa.
They played another Howard clip where he was telling Robin about the move his family made out of Roosevelt and into Rockville Center. He called it a despicable little town that was a hot bed for anti-Semitism. He said that the first guy he laid eyes on was this guy Dave Lucy who had the whitest skin and the bluest eyes he had ever seen. He said that's what he should have looked like. He said the guy talked to him a couple of times but not all that much. He said that the only people who would talk to him were the 5 biggest nerds there. He looked awkward because he had long hair but was wearing slacks and loafers because his mother wouldn't let him wear jeans. He said that she was a very sick woman and she had no idea she was.
Howard said that the 5 guys he made friends with were the biggest douche bags in school. He said they were losers but he was uncomfortable going to any other tables in the lunch room. He and the guys spent a few minutes talking about that time in school and how Howard had nothing going on for himself at the time.
We heard a clip from Howard's show where he talked about his mother cleaning his dirty underpants that were stained with doody. He said that she'd do it in front of him and make him watch as she was cleaning them. He said she'd leave them in the sink soaking so they could see the accident. Gary asked how old he was at the time. Howard said he could have been 12 or 13 but it went on his whole childhood. Howard's mother called in during that segment and said that it never happened, she never cleaned his underpants in front of him. Howard went on to tell her about what he remembered her doing and how she scrubbed the underpants. She said that he had to be dreaming this.
Howard also claimed that his mother used to hit him with a wooden hanger when he did something wrong. She claimed she didn't do that either and she'd be willing to take a lie detector test to prove it. Howard said he'd take one as well. They went back and forth about that stuff for a few minutes.
Howard eventually told his mother that he made all of that up and he was actually a happy son. Robin asked Ray if she thought he was actually a happy person. Howard said it really doesn't matter what she thinks. Robin said that she thinks that Howard is miserable.
After that bit they went to another commercial break.
They went into another clip from Howard's show where he talked about those six weeks of the year where he had fun at camp. He said he was surprised that his parents didn't send him to a black camp or maybe a prison for those six weeks.
In another interview clip we heard from one of Howard's friends who talked about not going on a Western trip with Howard. Ben and Ray also talked about that trip. Ben said he wanted Howard to go up to Boston and do some stuff up there so he could get in some acting work. He decided to go on that trip instead.
After those quick interviews they went back into Howard's show clip where he was talking about that Western trip and how he didn't try to pick up any of the campers even though one of them wanted him. He was 19 at the time and this 16 year old was coming on to him. He didn't go there with the girl though. He said that he could have gotten into some trouble if he had.
Howard talked about going out to Kansas and sleeping in a corn bin out there. He said that it was a lot of fun. He said that all of the kids were getting it on back then and he had a counselor who just wanted to be his friend. He said that he asked her to get it on with him but she told him no. He said he whined and nagged her to zip her sleeping bag into his and she eventually did it. Then he begged her for hours to kiss him. He said he thinks that she French kissed him and that was it. Gary asked if the girl ever told him to get lost. Howard said that's what she did all night.
A couple of Howard's friends talked about working in the kitchen at camp and how that went for them. They shared some stories about that before they went into a tape from Howard's show where he talked to one of the guys he was in camp with. Howard and Kenny talked about the old days and how much fun they had at camp. They had more clips of Kenny talking about what went on back then and how he had pulled a prank on ''Howie'' one day and dumped a bucket of water on his head when he came out of the kitchen.
One of Howard's buddies said that Howard loved lighting his farts on fire. Then we heard Howard talking about how much he loves farting and how his father got him interested in that stuff when he was younger. One of the guys talked about blowing up a toilet at camp with a firecracker.
One of the guys talked about how they missed out on Woodstock which wasn't too far from where their camp was. They could have gone if they had known about it. They found out about Woodstock after some of the other camp counselors had gone up there but it was too late by then. One of the guys said that they once broke into the canteen there at camp and stole some food so that was the start of Howard's life of crime.
Howard's parents still think that Howard didn't do drugs as much as he said he did. Howard said that he was an unhappy kid and he may not have ever recovered from that whole experience. That's why he was self medicating. He said he was doing pot, hash, mescaline and qualudes and stuff like that in high school. Kenny said that Howard introduced him to qualudes and that was the first drug he ever tried, thanks to Howard.
Kenny said that he told a friend of his about how the first time he ever smoked pot was with Howard Stern and that got him into some trouble with Howard. That led to them playing a clip from Howard's show where he calls Kenny on the air and goes off on him for spreading stories about him.
In the clip Howard calls Kenny and asks him not to spread these stories about him. Kenny gets on the phone and Howard asks him why he's going around telling these stories. Kenny said that he didn't tell more than one person the story. The two of them spent a few minutes talking about the old days in camp and talking about the good ol' days.
Howard's friends talked about the girls that Howard did get and that led into another Stern Show clip where Howard spoke to one of the girls he went to camp with, Karen. She brought her husband with her so Howard spoke to the two of them for a few minutes. Howard said that he likes to humiliate women on the show because of the way he was treated when he was young. He said that Karen wasn't into him at all and she didn't want him. She said that Howard waited for all of Lou's rejects instead of getting his own girls. Howard figured that Karen regrets not having sex with him back then because she could have had quite a story to tell. She said she did.
Howard talked to Karen about some of the wild things he gets to do today and how she could have been part of that if she was his wife. He told her she blew it. He said that he would have jumped on her bones in 2 minutes and would have worshiped her. Howard said he hopes that she gets a terminal yeast infection along with all of the other women who rejected him in his life.
Kenny talked about Howard coming to him one day and told him to smell his finger because he had gotten there with some chick. Ray said that Howard was always very open and thought he had syphilis at one point and told her about it. They took him to the doctor but he was fine, he didn't have anything. Howard said that the relationships he had were very spotty. Sometimes he'd get a really hot chick, then he'd have nothing for a while. He said that he thought that 16 was late to get laid but some other guys have told him that they didn't get any until they were like 18 or 19. He said he did have some women but it wasn't all that many.
Howard had sex with a woman by the name of Robin back when he was 16. Jim said that Howard recounted that moment in his book ''Private Parts'' and then we hear Crackhead Bob reading the excerpt from the book. It was unintelligible so Jim said that the interpretation was that Howard finally got laid.
One of Howard's camp friends, Howie B, talked about this Succah that they built in the back yard of his parents house and how they had customized it to be a club house. They set it up so they could go play cards, drink beers and smoke cigarettes. He said they did that for a few years and then they'd eventually have some people back to the club house to drink and smoke. He said that Howard exaggerates the story about that clubhouse though. That led into another Stern Show clip where Howard talked about it.
In the clip Howard talks about the Succah and how he and Howie built it. He said that they used to get laid in there and they used to smoke weed and get loaded in there. He claimed that they'd tell Howie's parents that they wanted to get into the religious part of the whole thing when they were really trying to get high and laid.
Howie said that Howard wasn't doing much kissing in those days. He said he has embellished that story quite a bit in his opinion.
Jim talked about Howard's love for Rock and Roll after that. Howard was talking about how much he loved the Beatles back then and how the kids in school would make fun of him for liking that stuff. He said that he was also into Mountain back then. He talked about how phenomenal their music was to him. That led to a quick interview with Leslie West where he talked about what he knew about Howard and his love of the band. They also played a clip from ''Private Parts'' where Howard is listening to Mountain and getting high.
They were about to go to break but they had a quick favorite moment from the show from Dee Snider. He talked about the Baba Booey mistake that Gary made on the show. They went to another commercial break a short time later.
Howard also talked about going to college and feeling a responsibility to do well for his parents because they were paying for him to go. He said he ended up graduating the second highest in his class. He said he did very well there.
Howard's mother Ray said that Dr. Lou and Howard shared living quarters in college. She said that Howard's friendship with Lou meant a lot to him. Howard met his first wife there and he was very happy as far as she could tell. She wasn't sure if it was because his father was paying so much money for him to go or not. She talked about how much writing Howard did and how that's when he really opened up at that point.
Dr. Lou talked about going up there and getting a call from Howard who had a really weird roommate. Lou had one too. He said that Howard came to visit him and loved the dorm he was in so they made a switch and he moved in with him for that first year.
Ray said that Howard came out of his shell at that point and he really opened up. Dr. Lou said that Howard fit in very easily there and he was able to relate to some of the other guys at school.
They played a Stern Show clip where Howard was telling Robin and Gary about going to school and what it was like in the dorms and going out to clubs and stuff. He said that it was tough for him being so tall because he stood out in a crowd. He said he tried smoking cigarettes to look cool but that really didn't help. Corey Feldman was in the studio at the time so he was talking to Howard about that stuff. Howard said he'd go to the clubs with his friend but he was always the one who wanted to leave the party early.
Howard told a story about this beautiful woman hitting on his friend Dr. Lou at a part and Dr. Lou ended up leaving the party early with the girl. He was kind of upset that Lou left him behind there. He also wondered why none of the girls came up to him at all. He said that even the ugly girls weren't approaching him.
We heard another clip of Dr. Lou talking about Howard getting some blotter acid and how he really didn't want to do it but Howard ended up taking too much of the stuff. He said Howard ended up flipping out when he took it because he was so freaked out by what he was seeing. Dr. Lou said he put on some Grateful Dead song and that made Howard freak out even more. He put his hands over his ears and screamed at him to stop it. He said Howard ended up being awake for the whole night and he had to stay up with him. Howard never did acid again and stopped the experimentation at that point.
Howard's mother talked about the Transcendental meditation that she's done for many years and how she got Howard into that. She said that Howard has told her that he gets a lot out of that and he's able to come up with great ideas while he's meditating. She said that the whole family believes in it and they all benefit from it. She said they start their day off with it and end their day with it.
Howard said that his mother had become very depressed when her sister died and that's when she started doing the TM thing. He said it was like overnight she got rid of her depression. He said that led to him going to a TM meeting with his mother and he started to get into it himself. He said he's always liked it. After the show is over he goes into his office for at least 20 minutes and he feels totally refreshed. He said it's not a religious thing, it's just a technique like brushing your teeth.
Jim talked about Howard working at Boston University's radio station WTBU. Then we heard a couple of clips from those days when Howard was doing his thing and introducing some songs. Dr. Lou talked about how it was a big break for Howard to get into that station and do some stuff on air. He wasn't trying to be outrageous at the time, he was just doing a regular DJ thing.
Howard said that he met this guy Bob Petrick while he was working at WTBU. He said that he was very key in his career. We also heard Bob talking about meeting Howard back then and what had gone on back then. They talked about what they could do with the free time on the air that they had and started talking. Howard said that Bob knew two guys Bruce Katz and Joel Cohen who had a show that they did together. Bob asked him to work with those guys. Howard said that's when the King Schmaltz Bagel Hour came about.
Howard said that he and the guys tried to create a show that turned out to be very similar to what he does today. That led to them playing a commercial that Howard had done for the King Schmaltz Bagel Hour. Then we heard a clip of Howard talking about the history of the King Schmaltz Bagel Hour and how he was hired by Bob Petrick to do the show. The clip was very old and Howard didn't sound much like Howard.
We heard more of the King Schmaltz Bagel Hour show where Howard was speaking in some kind of bizarre accent. Then he gets on as himself and talks to Bob Petrick and then to their co-stars Joel Cohen and Bruce Katz. They talked about what show used to be on and how they shortened it from 4 hours to 1. The guys said that they were out to offend someone that night and if they didn't, they were going to jump off a building. They tried to get some people to call in but the phone wasn't ringing.
Howard asked the guys to explain what King Schmaltz was. One of the guys explained it as being a ''sticky substance'' but then said that it was radio for the viewer and they were going to be doing giveaways every week. They had a vinyl disk to give away that day.
Howard took a phone call from a guy who was just trying to find the station on the radio. Howard told him that they were on 640 AM.
Lou said that Howard's first show was probably his most nervous show and that was the one that he remembered most. That show was almost the last show. Bob Petrick said that they were just horrible radio people and they couldn't get their act together that night. He said that they were cutting in and out, they had problems with the phone and stuff like that. Bob said that the guy who ran the station heard what was going on and called in to let them know what he thought.
They played the audio where Howard takes the phone call from the guy telling them to guess who he was and they had 3 tries. Then he tells them ''you're fired!'' when they can't guess who it was. Bob said that he can remember that call and how he felt that night. He said that he knew that they were going to be banned from radio for life after that night.
Howard said that he remembers that night too and how he and Bob ran out of the studio scared for their lives. They wondered if they were really fired. Bob said that they were afraid they were going to be turned into the FCC and they were going to be banned forever. They wanted to convince people that they were really trying to do a good show.
Howard said that Bob was able to talk to that guy Hank and let him know that they were really trying to do something new. Howard said that he thinks that Hank really hated that show and what they were doing because he was afraid that they were going to get in trouble. He doesn't know how they convinced the guy to let them back on the air but they were back on the next week.
They played some audio of the second King Schmaltz Bagel Hour show where they talked about getting into trouble with the FCC after that first show and had two citations from them. Howard said that he should have asked those guys to go out and do radio together right then. He said it's probably best that he didn't because he was still working on his delivery and stuff.
Jim said that the King Schmaltz show ran for 9 weeks and set up Howard for doing many things such as Godzilla Goes to Harlem. That led to Bob Petrick talking about that bit and how it came about. He explained some of the stuff that was in the bit and then they went into that bit from 1975. The bit is Howard doing his WABC announcer voice and introducing a song. Then they break in with a news report from New York City where they talk about the strange monster that was in the city. They go to a couple of reporters who are doing reports from Harlem. They have one guy talking to Godzilla and trying to mug him, asking for his wallet.
Bob said that these guys were in their late teens, early 20s and they were basically talking to a tape recorder. He said they still had their wits about them and they were able to come up with this stuff. There was another bit that they did where he was trying to be a serious news man but he ended up being the one who couldn't stay serious and would laugh when he'd read this name ''Ellie Tubs.'' He said that they had to do about 17 takes to get it down.
After that description we heard some of the outtakes from that recording session. In the clip we could hear Howard talking to the guys about where they were sitting. Then they start the session and Bob tries to get through his script but breaks up laughing when he reads the ''Ellie Tubs'' name. Then they do another take and he cracks up again. Howard tried to get him under control but Bob kept laughing.
Dr. Lou said he thinks that there were about 3 listeners back then and they included him, Howard and the guy next door who had to listen because he had the radio turned up so loud. He said that not that many people were listening because they were in Boston and had so many other stations to listen to.
They went into another clip of Howard doing a bit on The King Schmaltz Bagel Hour. He took a call from a guy who said that he wanted to know how he could beat off some guy who was ravishing him. Howard told the guy that he had a potty mouth and couldn't call in again. He told the guy to be more original and not just curse on the air trying to get a laugh.
We heard more from Bob Petrick who said that he's pretty sure that not many people heard the show and no one would remember it, but he and Howard kept tapes of the show and they thought it was something special. We also heard from Ben and Ray Stern who were talking about the stuff he was doing back then and how they told him that he had to cater to the outside audience and not just goof around with the guys in the studio.
We heard another Stern Show segment where Howard talked about those days at WTBU doing the King Schmaltz Bagel Hour thing that got his father all pissed off at him. He said he just sat there belching for hours and his father got all upset with him over that. He had some tape of that and said that he sent it to his father when he was in school and his father didn't like it at all.
Howard was talking about how that was revolutionary stuff because they were doing that in 1975. He said that his father told him it was horrible and if he had any brains he would have told him that it was great and he should keep going with it. He said that he was crushed when his father told him what he thought of it.
Ben and Ray talked about how they think that they straightened Howard out by telling him that stuff. Ben said that everything that Howard did after that was good.
We heard Howard and the guys from the King Schmaltz Bagel Hour show saying goodbye in their last show. They were pretending to cry and humming ''Auld Lang Syne'' as they were saying their goodbyes. They went to commercial break after that.
Jim said that Howard had put Alison in his movie for his cinematography class. Bob Petrick said that the movie had a bunch of Howard's friends and Alison's roommates in it. Bob played Jesus Christ in the movie. He explained the movie as they were playing the audio in the background. Bob explained where they shot the movie and how he was supposed to have been chopped up into pieces and thrown over the roof of a building. He said that it was actually kind of frightening and if people had seen it, they might not think of Howard the same way. He said he hopes that Howard eventually airs it so people can see it.
Up next was another Stern Show clip where Bob Petrick was sitting in the studio while they were doing the show. He joked that Bob was going to be giving them the gay point of view but he was just kidding about that. Howard also talked about how Bob was the guy who was a sperm donor who was making donations at a sperm bank to make money while they were at school. That led to Howard talking to him about how many kids he must have out there now.
Jim explained how Howard graduated from college in 1976 and went out to find a real job. That led into another clip from the Stern Show where Howard was talking about leaving college and going to find a real job. He said he panicked when he got out of school because he was filled with insecurity. He said he knew that he was going to be on the radio but he never did anything other than college radio. He said that no teacher ever wanted to offer him a job. He never even had an internship. He said he went home to his parents house and told them he was going to find a job. He got a suit and put it on and went out with a briefcase filled with resumes trying to find a job.
Howard said that he went out and got his hair cut because that's what his professor told him to do. He eventually went out and found a job in Newton, Massachusetts and they hired him up there.
We heard from Ben and Ray again in the middle of that bit. Ray said that she didn't remember much about that story, she just remembers that they had to buy him a car.
They got back to the Stern Show clip and Howard said he got the job up there and they refused to pay him because he was so bad on the air. He went on to talk about some of the stuff that he was doing up there and how he was the laughing stock of the station. He said that he was trying to do a voice when he was on up there and he sounded a lot like Kermit the Frog. He met a bunch of people in the business while he was going out and doing interviews.
Howard said he was going out trying to find jobs all over the place and found a couple of guys who wouldn't even return his calls after he contacted them. He said that his life was a mess for a few years there. He was driving all over the place trying to find a job and thought that he could get something in Altoona, Pennsylvania. He talked about a guy that got a job that he wanted and he figured that he was screwed at that point. He started going into the city on the train and went around giving out his resume to everyone he could. He said that everyone had something to do, but not him.
Howard said he put the pressure on himself to find a job because he had just gone through 4 years of college. He said he was afraid that his father was going to yell at him about what he should have done. He thought he was going to have a nervous breakdown.
Howard came home with a lottery ticket one day and his father gave him a hard time about that telling him that only unemployed people buy lottery tickets. Howard said that he found a job with Bloomingdale's and figured that would work. He didn't think that it could be that big of a deal to take that job. He said he got really depressed and couldn't find a job so he'd go home and tell his parents that he was out interviewing and stuff.
Howard said that at one point a guy drove up to him and asked him if he wanted to come to a meeting and hear ''the plan.'' He said that he must have stuck out like some kind of loser target. He took the address and found out they were Amway guys. He said that it was really depressing that he was getting stuck with that kind of stuff. He eventually got a job as a media buyer at a real business.
Howard said that his boss was telling him what to do that day and he kind of freaked out and was in tears not knowing what to do. He said he was in way over his head and didn't know what to do. He said that one of the guys there told him he'd help. He said he was asked to do a bunch of things and he really didn't know what to do. He did try though. He said that there were a lot of really talented people working there and he was there busting his balls trying to figure out what to do.
Ben Stern came on and said that Howard hated that job and they told him to leave the job. His mother said they told him to get out of there if he didn't like what he was doing.
They got back into the Stern Show clip where Howard was talking about his job history. Howard said that his father ended up finding a job for him so he went in for an interview for that. He was told he could be a salesman but Howard didn't want to do that either. He gave him a tape and that guy told him he'd give it to Larry Miller who was running WKTU at the time. He wasn't hearing from him but eventually got a call from the guy telling him he was horrible.
Howard said he went in and quit his advertising job and didn't even give them notice. He said that very day he got a call from Benton Bowles to work in their film division. He said that was a big break for him but the advertising job screwed things up for him. He said that they heard about him quitting the advertising job at Benton and Bowles and fired him on the spot. He said that he looked so bad to them that they canned him that day.
Howard losing his job there was good fortune for his friend Ken Fried who got hired there after they fired Howard. He was told that Howard ''left'' after a day.
Howard said he went in for another job interview at a place where he saw a guy putting perfume under his arm pits. It was another advertising job and he was told he should go out and sell advertising but trade for it, not even sell. He said he went in and quit that job and the place was being raided. He wasn't sure what that was about but he had to go back and explain to this one Chinese guy that he had spoken to about advertising. He went back and told the guy not to advertise on radio because it won't work. He said he felt so alone after that he wanted to crawl back into his mother's womb.
Howard said that Alison told him that he should call back the guy at the radio station that wanted to hire him. He got some fill in work and asked him for that job. He got the job.
Jim said that tomorrow they'll be talking about Howard getting into radio and meeting people like Fred and Robin along the way. Today's show was over by about 12:35pm.
Host Jim Forbes tells us about Howard going to work at WRNW in 1977. They had an interview with DJ Meg Griffin who worked with Howard at WRNW. She described this house that they worked out of back then. The Program Director from the station also said a few words about Howard working there for a few seconds. We heard from a couple of other people who worked there at the time as well. They talked about the conditions of their work place and how everything was set up. They all mentioned the bathroom in the building and how the roof was slanted. They also said that it was a very low rent type of job but it was also their first time in radio.
Each of the employees talked about all of the stuff they had set up in the house and how it was very old fashioned stuff back then. Howard came on and talked about how he wasn't a good broadcaster at the time. Meg Griffin said that they all knew about this newcomer and they were afraid that he may take their job or something. She said that he seemed to be as much of a loner then as she was. She said that he was an unmistakable presence though because he is so tall. She said that he may have been kind of insecure and that's why he was so quiet at the time.
One of the guys said that Howard really was into his job and it was nice to have him around. He said he was hard working and committed to doing radio. He was only making $96 a week and working ridiculous hours. Howard said that his father told him that he was lucky to be getting paid at that point in his career.
Howard's father came on and said that he knew a guy who could help Howard out with his voice. He sent him to this voice teacher and took it from there. Ben said that he told Howard that he has to have diarrhea of the mouth to be in radio.
Howard said he thought that he was going to have to be an announcer in radio to make it. He was awful at it though so he had to do something about it. Jim says that Howard's first shift there was a disaster. That led into a clip from the Stern Show where he talked about what happened that first day. Then they broke into a clip from ''Private Parts'' where he dropped stuff on his turntable and the record skips. Then they got back to Howard talking to Robin about the record player locking up and how he wasn't able to fix it. He had an engineer come in and fix it while he was still on the air. He said he was the laughing stock of the station at the time.
We heard from Meg again who said that it probably wasn't even Howard's fault that the equipment froze up. She said she had the same problem and the equipment there was really old and not taken care of. Some of the other guys there talked about Howard's voice on the air back then and how strained he seemed to be.
Meg said that she thought that Howard was really conservative at the time. The other guys talked about how insecure Howard was and how he was just looking to fit in at the time. It wasn't easy for him.
They went into an old clip where Howard was coming out of a song and giving the weather. He was talking about the cold weather and talking about how he likes the word ''blustery'' instead. He was putting on some kind of voice that sounded odd.
After that we heard more from the other employees from WRNW who spent a few more minutes talking about what Howard was up to when he was there. They went into another Stern Show clip where Howard was continuing his story about working there at WRNW. He was telling Robin about how he selected the music there and he didn't take much care in that. He said he'd just throw a dart at the wall and pick songs. The other jocks were much more prepared.
Meg Griffin said that she would ask for copies of albums for each of the jocks there so they could all take them home and listen to them. She mentioned Elvis Costello's ''Allison'' and how Howard was seeing a woman by the name of Alison. She said that she gave Howard a copy and he told her that he just couldn't play it. She said that Howard hadn't figured out who he was yet and he was endearingly shy.
We heard more of the Stern Show where Howard was talking to Robin about WRNW and how bad he was on the air. He told her that he was on the air doing his thing and sounding a lot like Kermit the Frog. He told Robin he started to work with this guy Mark Drucker back then and there was this thing called News Blimp and he wanted to start doing bits with Mark to get them into this News Blimp thing. He said they had to do a really cool announcer voice and it wasn't working for him. He was doing a bad impression of those guys. He said he'd get these scripts and he and Mark would have to produce them. He had nothing else to do at the time and couldn't even afford to buy a comedy album.
Howard said that he was only making $96 at the time and he had to make money somehow. He had a copy of one of the News Blimps that he produced back then. He played that old tape and he had old clips of Stella and Mira in the bit along with him doing some announcing. Howard didn't even know what he was doing at the time. He just had to read the scripts along with the clips that were in there. Robin said she didn't even know what he was saying in this bit. Howard didn't either.
Howard said he thinks that he slowed the tape down to make his voice deeper. He said he sent the bit into the people he produced it for and they rejected it.
We heard from Ben Stern again who said that the most amazing thing that happened was seeing Howard in the New York Times when he was working there at WRNW. Howard said that he was the last man on the totem pole at WRNW but they still gave him coverage. Ben said that he thought that was a signal that this was meant to be. He said it was an amazing feat for him to be picked out like that. Ray said that Howard's career moved very quickly, right from the beginning.
In another Stern Show clip Howard said he was living at a monastery at the time because it was a cheap place to live. He lived there with the monks for about a year. He said that he was doing the meditation thing at the time. He said that he was living in silence at the time because that's the way things work there. He said that the silence can actually hurt your ears. It's so quiet that it starts to hurt. He said you have to adjust to it. Howard was able to live there, with meals included, for $100 a month and that was a great deal. He said that his father helped him out with a car. He said that he didn't have a lot of money though.
We heard from one of the guys that worked with Howard at the time and he thought that Howard was living in his car or something back then. He was always at work on time though. One of the guys siad that Howard would go out to his car to meditate and his girlfirend would alwyas be there so he figured he was living in there. One of the other jocks said that she was meditating at the time so she and Howard would do that together.
Meg was talking about how Howard was always a mix of strange things. She said that he was conservative and doing meditation at the time but then he turns into a lot of people's nightmare which was kind of strange.
We heard another clip of Howard doing one of his bits for WRNW. It was pretty lame with Howard doing the announcing and a voice of a goofy listener.
Jim said that Howard didn't get a lot of support from anyone back then. That led into another Stern Show clip where Howard was talking about this guy Yubi who used to run WRNW and gave him his first job there. Howard talked to Yubi about the old days and how well the guy played him in the movie ''Private Parts.'' Howard claimed that he used to wear a jump suit but Yubi claimed that wasn't true, he never wore one. Yubi is working with the company IDT and he's trying to get him to sponsor the show. Yubi's kids were with him so Howard spoke to them as well.
Meg Griffin said that Yubi was a creep. She said that he wore lots of gold jewelry, lots of cologne and used to come on to the women there. She said he was kind of like the character Borat. We heard from some of the other employees who said that Yubi was kind of like the guy in the movie. One of the guys said that they used to do the Steve Martin ''two wild and crazy guys'' impression to Yubi thinking that he was doing that impression. He didn't know that he spoke like that normally.
We heard another clip of Howard doing a commercial for WRNW. Then they went into some more clips from the people that worked with Howard at the station. Ben Stern also got on and said he helped Howard out by getting him to stop saying ''Uh'' while he was talking. That was a big deal to get rid of that. The guys also talked about how they renamed Howard ''Howeird'' and wanted him to use it on the air. The guys told him that he was weird but he thought they were just joking around.
Howard said that the other jocks there were much better than he was and he knew that he would never be as good as them. That led into another ''Private Parts'' clip where Howard is asked if he wants to be Program Director there at WRNW and offered $250 a week instead of $96.
Ray Stern said that Howard was a very responsible guy and they always wanted him to be in management. Ben thought that was a bad idea because that's where they put you when they don't want you on the air. Ben said that he didn't want him to give up his shift and told him to keep both jobs. He said Howard listened to him and stuck with it.
In another Stern Show clip we heard Howard talking about Meg Griffin working at WRNW and how he was made the production director there. He said he was hired to do that but then he was told that he had to fire this guy Joe from Chicago that he really liked. He said that Joe was really talented and he knew that he could get a job somewhere. He decided to take the job but he made this woman Donna the music director and had her picking out the songs.
We heard from Joe about how he was fired from the station and how Howard was put into that job. Meg said she thinks that they saw that Howard could be molded into something they wanted. The new owners didn't like what they were playing on the air and they wanted Howard to control that. Meg said that she listens to Howard every day now but back then he was pretty tight assed and a much different person. She said that he was very conservative back then. She thinks that something happened to him in Washington DC that changed him.
The other people from the station were talking about how conservative Howard was back then and how much he seems to have changed. Howard said that he was always very serious about his jobs and he didn't want any bullshit. He said that he took his job very seriously and this whole thing was the real deal for him to be in radio. He said that fun things happen around him but he's not the life of the party by any means.
Meg Griffin said that she thinks that Howard picked up some stuff from other people like her husband over the years. She said that all of the jocks and people at the station would do stuff together but Howard was never there. She didn't remember him doing any of that stuff with the rest of them. We heard some more clips of Howard working there at WRNW. He was doing a commercial where they promoted all of the stuff they were playing there at the time.
Up next we heard one of the women from the station talking about how she was in charge of these ''god tapes'' that they were running there. She said that she did that for a few weeks and then heard that Meg had been fired from the station and she got her job. She said that Howard gave her her first job. She said that Howard didn't seem to be interested in the music at all back then. She said that he really didn't care and it was odd that he was in a job like that if he didn't care about the music.
Jim said that Howard was working on his live commercial reads back then. We heard from one of the jocks who said that they used to get food and stuff from the sponsors if they mentioned them on the air. They used to get all kinds of ads for $6 a minute and they'd do some weird commercials for sponsors who were thrilled to get on the air. That led into a Stern Show clip where Howard was telling Robin about the sponsors he had like The Cheese Wheel. He said that was the big one he had up there and they're probably still there in Westchester.
We heard from Howard again who said that he had all kinds of awful jobs over the years. He worked up at a Holiday Inn as a DJ and he ended up getting fired because he had no idea what to play. That led into more of the Stern Show audio where Howard was telling Robin about that stuff. He was talking about how he'd play The Beatles instead of dance music for people to dance to. He said he just wanted people to tell him what to play. Howard said that it was like 1976 or 77 when he was doing that. Jackie said that he worked at the Elmsford Holiday Inn himself.
Howard said that they got rid of him within a week and hired some kid to take over for him. He said that it was a nightmare working there and he was very disorganized the whole time he was there. He said that every record would start off slow and every segue sucked. He said it was very unprofessional sounding. He said that they were desperate to get people into that place and they were paying him good money. He said it was $200 for just one day and it was unheard of at the time. He didn't know what to wear either. He didn't go to clubs so he didn't know what people were wearing.
Howard figured that the job would have lasted for a couple of months or maybe a year. He lasted a week. He said that Meg Griffin worked up there too but she didn't last any longer than he did. He said that the kid who took over for him lasted a long time.
Jim said that things weren't going very well for Howard at the station either. One of the jocks said that she was a real novice in radio and Howard called in and made it sound like things were fun and exciting at this remote he was doing. She said that Howard can be like a steam roller and he just goes on and on. That led into another Stern Show clip.
In the clip we hear Howard talking to Robin about this movie premiere he went to so he could do this remote to promote the Sergeant Peppers album. He said that he was talking to just a couple of people and had to pretend that there were a bunch of people there. There were only two people in the theater. He played a clip from that broadcast where he was hyping the whole thing up to make it sound interesting. He said the theater owner was all pissed off and he was just having a hard time.
In the clip Howard was playing it sounded like there were a lot of people there at the theater but he said he rehearsed them a long time to make sure that they sounded like a big crowd. He asked the audience to sing some of the Sergeant Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band and one woman yells out to him ''Go blow...'' so he knew he was in trouble then.
Howard didn't want to keep playing that stuff but Robin told him to keep going. He listened to a little more of that clip but had to bail out saying that he hates hearing it. Robin wanted more so he did play a little bit. Howard said that he was there with two kids who didn't want to talk to him and it was an impossible assignment. Howard thinks that Donna didn't like him that she didn't jump in and say anything while he was choking. They went on with that for a couple of minutes before they had to break for The History of Howard Stern.
Jim said that Howard was laying the groundwork for his future shows back then. We heard from Howard again who was saying that he knew that he had to do training somewhere and that's what stations like WRNW were for. He said that they didn't pay much but it was a good way to start out. He said he was in the business and he was able to tell people that he was in the business.
Meg Griffin said that Howard has followed his dream since that time. She talked about how Howard used to goof on her about losing her jobs and following her music to do what her heart told her to do. She said she's just doing what Howard did but their financials worked out differently. She said that they really do deserve what they have now. She said that she learned a lot at WRNW and they're both still doing what they want to and what they believe in.
Some of the guys from WRNW talked about the way things worked out for Howard since that time. They talked about how happy they are for Howard now that he's made his career into what it is. Howard also said that his lessons from WRNW meant a lot to his career. It was an education working there. He said that led to him getting a job at WCCC in Hartford.
We heard another Stern Show clip where Howard was talking to Robert Kline and told him that one of his records helped him get a job at WCCC. He said that he went in and did a morning show for the Program Director and ended up playing one of his albums during this test show he was doing. He said that Robert was funny and they hired him because of him, not because he was funny himself. He said he owes his radio career to Kline.
Jim said that Howard met Fred Norris there at WCCC. That led to a clip of Fred talking about working up there and how he wasn't allowed to watch TV back then because his mother didn't have one. Fred's brother sucked in school so neither of them were allowed to watch TV. He said he read a lot of books instead and that's why he's got so much useless knowledge in his head. Fred talked about some of the jobs he had before getting into radio and said that he worked in a machine shop for a few years.
Fred was doing overnights there at WCCC and playing records and just doing what the program director wanted him to. Then Howard met him one morning when they were changing shifts at the station. That led to a clip from ''Private Parts'' where Fred and Howard first met. Howard was all out of breath because he was late and nervous. He ended up getting right on the air and doing some impressions as he was going into a Cheap Trick song.
We heard from Fred about how it wasn't a big deal when they first met. He said that Howard did seem to be very talented and he was more than just the average radio guy. He said that most guys come in and just punch the clock and run out. He said that Howard put his heart and soul into that job.
Howard said that Fred was a great talent and he was a college student at the time and he's still not sure how he functioned doing that overnight shift and going to school during the day. Howard said that he had a voice guy once he met Fred and he was very quick on his feet. Fred said he was doing voices and Howard asked him to stick around during the show once in a while and that's how he'd go from doing his shift to doing voices on Howard's show.
Howard said that he didn't have much social grace and he can't really talk to people off the air. He said that he and Fred didn't really talk during the show and they never talked much about what they were going to do, they'd just do it. He said they didn't have any ''real discussions'' at all. They he said that once he was done with Fred he'd just say goodbye to him and Fred would run off.
Fred said that Howard would call him with about 30 seconds left before he was going on the air and he'd ask him to do a voice. Fred said that he'd try to come up with something and it would only last a few seconds on the air.
We heard another Stern Show clip where Howard was asking to talk to Bruce Nozzle who hired him up at WCCC back then. He gave him his first job there at WCCC. He talked to Bill and thanked him for giving him that job. If Bill hadn't hired Fred too, he never would have met him. He begged Bill to take Fred back as he was letting him go.
Howard talked about some of the old days and how they were made to wear white gloves to make sure they didn't scratch the records that they used.
Joe from Chicago heard that Howard had gone to Hartford and he knew that they changed formats just about every other day so he figured that it was just another one when Howard started there. That led into a clip of Howard up at WCCC doing his thing. Then they went into another Stern Show clip where he and Fred were talking about some of the stuff they used to do up there at WCCC. They used to play ''Devil Went Down to Georgia'' a lot up there so Fred was doing his impression of that song. Gary was getting in on that and goofing on the song with Fred.
Howard said that Hartford was a weird place. He and Fred talked about some of the other weird music they played on the station at the time. They threw out all of the different names of the bands that they were playing and goofing on them all. They'd sing a couple of lyrics and make fun of them all. Fred was really getting into it. Howard said that it was the worst station and they never had good ratings. They'd get blamed for it if they didn't get any ratings too.
Fred talked about the days up at WCCC and what Howard was doing. He was working Monday to Saturday. He had to do six hours on Saturday after doing 4 hour shifts 5 days a week. He said that Howard didn't have a support staff either. He said that he'd go over once in a while to help him out. The room would always be a mess after Howard was done though. He had to do everything himself and it was tough to keep it clean. Fred said that there would be records all over the place and he could tell that Howard was having a hard time so he'd help him straighten up. He felt like Howard was drowning in records so he was helping to clean up.
Ben Stern said that he went up to visit Howard and he'd play tapes for them. He said that one of the interviews sounded terrific to him so he told him to keep it up. He liked what he was doing and the interview was wonderful so he gave him the advice to keep it going.
We heard from Howard's childhood friend Seth Darvic who said that he remembered seeing Howard doing his thing and closing his eyes while he was working. Fred said that you could see Howard's mind at work while he was doing his thing. That led into another old clip from WCCC where Howard was talking about picking up women at a grocery store by bumping into her cart.
One of the guys said that Howard's neighbors didn't like him and people would write obscenities on his door. That led to another Stern Show clip where he said that the neighbors he had were real scumbags but he'd always say hi to them. Then when he started to get famous he'd get signs hung on his door saying that they wanted free speech like he had free speech. He said that it was a townhouse community that he was living in and talked about how awful they were as neighbors. He said they'd play loud music and tell him that they had free speech like him. He started playing loud music too so it was like a war. He mentioned that he ended up going to Detroit after that.
Jim said that Howard and Fred were working very hard back then. We heard from Fred again and he was talking about the public affair shows that they had to run on the weekends. He said that they had him doing everything up there. That led to another Stern Show clip where Howard was talking about how they had him doing all kinds of jobs up there at WCCC.
Fred was on again and talked about what they were doing back then and how it's nothing like what they're doing now. He said that they had him doing everything. They went into another Stern Show clip where Fred and Howard were talking about the program director up there and all of the stuff they had to do. Howard brought up the white glove thing and how they had to wear them to handle these certain records they got up there because they were supposed to be returned without scratches.
We heard another Stern show clip where Howard was talking to this guy Sy about working up there at WCCC. They talked about some fun stuff that went on up there. Howard said that they had a guy up there who thought that Lynrd Skynrd was a man and he'd call them ''Mr. Lynrd Skynrd.'' Howard spent a few minutes talking about that stuff.
Ben and Ray Stern were on and talking about how Howard would make a big deal out of everything in his life and that's how he made his career into what it became. Ben said that Howard had ideas that were kind of different and the station owners would fight him every step of the way. He had to overcome management whenever he'd go to a new station.
In another Stern Show clip Howard was doing his impression of what it was like to do his thing up there at WCCC. He had to do it a specific way without saying anything wrong or he'd get yelled at.
Fred talked about the equipment they had up at WCCC and how some of it looked like stuff they'd picked up at a garage sale. We heard from a guy who talked about how great Fred is at playing his sound effects. That led into another old clip from WCCC where Howard was doing the pick up thing in a grocery store.
We heard more Stern Show clips where Howard was talking to this guy Brian about working with him up at WCCC. The guy was on the air one time and whipped out his penis and flopped it on the table. He said that he took a record and tried to swat it but the guy pulled it away just in time so it didn't get hit. Howard said they had some fun back then doing stuff with him. He told a story about Brian doing something with a Paul Harvey tape where he says ''Good day'' and ends his show. He said that Brian edited a tape and had him pause for about 2 minutes before he finished his show end.
Howard said they make it sound like fun up there but it was actually a nightmare to work there. He said that Brian was one of those guys who made it kind of fun once in a while. He said that he worked at a place that was a real toilet bowl before WCCC so that wasn't nearly as bad.
After that we heard a guy talking about something Howard did up there at WCCC when he'd have listeners call in with their girlfriends number so he could call them on the air and try to get them to dump their boyfriends. They went back into that Stern Show segment with Howard and Brian talking about that stuff.
Howard and Brian were talking about the goofs they did with the women on the phone back then. Brian said that no one was doing anything like that on radio at the time.
We heard from a guy who was saying that there wasn't much joking around on the air back then. There were some funny people on the air but most of the radio guys were just doing straight news reports. That led to a news report about Paul McCartney getting arrested for pot possession in Japan. Howard said that he called Japan back then and tried to get them to release Paul from jail. He said that no one was doing stuff like that at the time and people loved it. He said that he realized how powerful radio could be at that point. Fred said that really inspired him to do some stuff back then and the program director gave him a hard time about a song parody he wanted to play on the air. He wasn't sure why he gave him such a hard time about it. He said that they should have just played it.
Back into the Stern Show segment Howard and Brian were talking about that Paul McCartney bit that they did at WCCC. Howard got into trouble for calling Japan even though people loved that call.
Howard talked about the Shell oil boycott he wanted to do back then. He said he saw that he could start these mass movements then and it turned out that radio was a really strong medium. He said that he didn't have Fred to help him out all the time and he was doing a lot of this stuff on his own. He said that people were really starting to notice him at the time.
Fred said that Howard was doing this ''To Hell with Shell'' thing back then and it really made an impact in the market. He said it was pretty ballsy for Howard to do something like that. The station let him do it too and that was a big deal. They could have been a potential advertiser and you just don't do stuff like that if they could be an advertiser. He said that they could get fired for something like that easily.
Fred said that the station backed Howard up on the Shell thing and it made the news. He said that the local papers picked up on it and they must have been thrilled. Howard said that he was hoping that he'd be able to get out of Hartford because he was miserable there. He wasn't able to get a $25 a week raise from the owner after being there for a year.
In a Stern Show segment we heard Howard talking about how he had to get out of Hartford when he couldn't get that raise. He said he asked God to help him get out of there and he thinks he actually listened to him. He said he was just about carried from Hartford to Detroit. He said he had a really deep discussion with the lord and he just had to get out of there. He said that he felt like killing himself at that point but he didn't threaten God or anything. He said that he was contacted and told that there was a job opening in Ohio.
We heard from this guy Dwight who said that he had heard Howard's tapes and thought he had something going on. Howard said that he was offered a job out in Columbus, Ohio and a deal was worked out. Then he saw that there was a job available in Detroit and he wanted to go there because it was a bigger city than Columbus. He was told that he didn't want to work there but they ended up giving him the job. Howard said he went out and met with these people and they were going to give him $28,000 a year to work there. They told him that they were working on a new facility for the station. Howard said that he asked them for $30,000 and they actually gave it to him. They went to break after that.
We heard a clip from ''Private Parts'' where Howard went to Detroit and was introduced as looking like Big Bird by the Duke of Rock. They had the real Duke of Rock on the phone and talking about Howard's New York accent and his whole ''new York Jew'' thing going on and he wasn't sure if it was going to work.
We heard from a few other guys who worked out there in Detroit at the time. They talked about Howard's start out there and how that went. They also talked about the awful place Howard was living in at the time. Ben and Ray Stern also talked about some of the stuff that was going on back then and how dedicated he was to his work. Ray said that they went out there to visit Howard and he told them that he had the best Chinese food out there and they soon found out that it was the worst they'd ever had. Ray said that Detroit wasn't a big impact for Howard.
In a Stern Show clip we heard Artie Lange asking Howard how things went out there in Detroit when he was working there. Howard said he was only there for 2 months or so. He said that he was a short drive from work when he was out there. He said he'd just sit in his room and wait for the next show, do the show and they go home, get something to eat, and then go home and wait for his next show. He said that he'd go out to get food but that was it. He'd get biscuits and chicken for every meal and that was it. Artie said that it was sad so he's glad that he has a happy ending.
Howard said he was insane back then and just concentrated on doing the radio show. He wouldn't go out and talk to people unless he had to work at the radio station on the weekends or something. He didn't talk to anyone or do anything but watch TV. He said he probably got some ideas for the show from doing that. He said that he was there alone for 2 months before Alison came out there. He said they were there for another 9 months after that.
Howard said that he was trying to prove to his family that he was going to be able to make a living doing this stuff. He felt he had to succeed. He said that it's a weird way to live.
In another old clip we heard Howard on WWWW making a phone call to the Iraqi embassy in New York to try and end a conflict that was going on. He was dialing on a rotary phone in the clip. Howard got a hold of someone there at the embassy and tried to talk to them about fighting with Iran. He spoke to the guy for a minute and thought he had the war ended by the end of the call.
Jim said that W-4 was just like every other station, they were understaffed, over worked and under paid. That led to more discussions from the guys who worked there and what they did. Ben Stern also said that Howard was working very hard. Howard said that he was producing all of his stuff on his own but he did have a news woman and a producer who helped him out a little bit. He said that the sound of the show was kind of shitty because he had to tape the calls off the air and things like that.
The one person that Howard missed was Fred Norris. That led to Fred talking about how Howard had told him that they'd work together again some day. He said he figured Howard meant well but that would never happen. He figured that no program director would ever hire him to work with Howard. He figured it was nice to know Howard and they'd just go their separate ways.
Howard said he tried to get Fred out to Detroit but there was no money. Fred would call in and do voices for him though. Fred said that Howard kept calling and things must have been going okay if he kept him on the show. He said he never got paid extra to do those calls though. He said they liked it but it was just a fun thing to do. He said he thought Howard was funny and he liked having fun with him.
We heard another Stern Show clip where Howard was talking to some people during a birthday show. Robin had gotten this guy Dick Hungate to call in. Dick was his boss at WWWW and Howard figured that he had gone on to bigger and better things after telling him how to run his show. Dick was out in Richmond, Virginia. Howard laughed at him for not going anywhere with his career. Howard and Dick talked about the old days and some of the stuff they did out there. Dick worked at WYSP for a time so he said hello to the people there.
Howard said that he feels very good that he's surpassed Dick in his career. He said that the guy was a good guy and he thanked him for calling in. He told him he hopes that he gets back into a high position in the industry soon. He told him to come by and visit him so he can show him his 7 member staff and take a ride in his limo.
After that we heard some more clips of the guys that worked with Howard out there. They talked about how Dick had gotten fired and they brought in a new guy. They talked about some of the changes they made there at the station and how they made Howard play his bits in weird places during his show.
We heard a classic bit that Howard did as Jimmy Carter talking to a woman on the phone. Jim Forbes said that there were a lot of bands going through the city at the time so Howard got to see the Rock and Roll lifestyle. They had some of the WWWW guys talking about the Van Halen tour and how they stopped by the station back then. That led into a Stern Show clip where Howard was talking about staying in the same hotel that Van Halen was staying in. He had people banging on his door asking where Eddie Van Halen was.
They had one of the guys from WWWW talking about what it was like when Van Halen stopped by the station. He went into details about the whole Van Halen experience.
We heard another Stern Show clip where Robin brought up Steven Perry from the band Journey. That led to Howard talking about what a dick that guy was. He ran into him in 1980 at WWWW and what a cocksucker he was. He said he was very arrogant and he hopes that he's miserable now. He said that he was a fish out of water back then and doing his morning show. He said the guy walked in with the whole band and said ''look at Big Bird over there'' in front of everyone. He let that go and said that he went to their concert and had to bring them up on stage. He was back stage making out with chicks and stuff. He figures that he'd be all nice to him now though. Howard said that Journey played to about 80,000 people that night. Howard said that Billy Squire was really cool to him back then though.
Jim said that Howard started with his Wack Pack back then when this woman by the name of Irene came on as the Leather Weather Lady. They had a DJ talking about the stuff she would do on the show doing the leather in her leather dominatrix outfit. Howard said that he was interested in reality so he wanted to know more about this real dominatrix. He said that it was pretty out there for 1980 when they were on back then.
Irene said that back then in 1980 there wasn't much being said on the radio so she had to be careful about what she said. She said Howard wasn't even allowed to say ''sex'' on the radio. That led to them playing a clip of her calling Howard's show in 1980 and saying ''dirty sex'' and getting lectured by Howard that she can't say that on the air.
The guys talked about Irene and her leather outfits and how she was always in that stuff. She was Goth before there was Goth according to Howard. That led into another old clip where Howard talked to Irene about her leather fetish. She told him that he asks her stupid questions all the time. Howard said he didn't know much about it so he had to ask her those stupid questions. Irene was supposed to just do the weather but she was going on and on about her leather stuff.
We heard more old clips from Howard's show where he was talking to this guy Wally that he used to work with at WWWW.
In July of 1980 Howard arranged a bra burning bit. Jim introduced that and then we heard an audio clip from that show.
We heard another Stern Show clip where Howard talked about the appearances he used to have to do at WWWW and how much he hated doing those. He said that he had to do a race one time against one of the other DJs in a race car. He didn't care if he got beat but the other guy did. He said he was told how to drive but he didn't want to push it and end up crashing. He didn't care if he lost or not.
We heard more clips from WWWW where he was talking about all of the appearances he was supposed to be making that weekend.
There was more Stern Show audio where Howard was talking about going to do host a Rocky Horror Picture Show one time and having people throwing toast at him. He said he was in a Dracula outfit and feeling like he'd rather be out drag racing or something.
We heard from some of the guys from WWWW about how Detroit may not have been a good fit for Howard. They didn't like that Howard wasn't into the rock and roll stuff that they were playing on the station. They were talking about some of the stuff that worked and didn't work for him. They talked about how the show wasn't quite what it is today.
In another clip we heard Howard talking to a woman about her nice figure and asking her about her measurements. He almost got them right when he guessed. He was doing a dial-a-date for her and got some guys on the phone to go out with her.
In another interview clip we heard Howard talking about the stuff he was doing back in those days like drinking and passing out on the air. He said that things were really wild back then for him. That led to some interviews about this belly dancer that used to do Howard's show back then. She talked about what she used to do for Howard's show and how they had people drinking beer at 8 in the morning back then. She talked about Howard's look and how geeky he was at the time. She talked about having her bra pop off during an appearance she was making.
Dr. Lou remembered calling Howard into the show back then and Howard telling him that he knew what his listeners wanted. That led to another classic WWWW clip where Howard was calling London to try and get someone to talk to him. He got a woman in Scotland Yard on the phone and asked for someone to talk to him about the John Bonham case. She put someone on the phone and Howard told him who he was and why he was calling. He brought up the John Bonham death and wanted to find out more information. The cop over there didn't know anything about it so Howard actually knew more. Howard gave the cop the information he knew since the guy was clueless.
Howard was talking about how good radio was back then in 1980 and how he knew that he wasn't quite up to par. He said he knew that it was his attitude. He said he could have whipped all of their asses but he needed to change his attitude.
We heard from Jimmy Kimmel about how he heard about Howard when his uncle Vinnie would send him tapes of the show. He said that he would listen to the tapes that he sent over and over and over again. Then 10 years later Howard came on out there and he was able to barely pick it up on his crappy 1981 RX-7 car radio as he was driving to work. He said those 12 minutes were the greatest. They went to break after that.
We heard a clip of Howard on W-4 taking a phone call from a guy in Milwaukee that he'd placed a bet with. He and the caller talked about the bet they had and how Howard was going to send them some Stroh's beer. He said that his leather weather lady was going to bring the beer to him and she was going to make them drink each one of the empty cans of beer they were going to send to them. Howard goofed on the guy's accent for a few minutes before hanging up on him.
Jim introduced this woman Velma that was Howard's wrestling partner back in those days. She talked about how innocent Howard was back in those days and how much he's changed. She also talked about the morning that Howard called the Russian embassy in Moscow one morning. That led into a clip of that call from WWWW. In the clip Howard got on the phone and called the international operator to get through to Russia. He tried to get through but the operator said they'd have to call him back in a half hour or so. They said that Russia was a manual phone company and they had to call there and give them a message and get back to him.
In another clip we heard Howard calling a guy as Jimmy Carter and thanking him for voting for him. He said he was calling every person that voted for him. He would then ask them for some cash since he wasn't re-elected. He said he needed the money to buy braces for his daughter. Then he broke the news that he had just won a contest that he had entered to win the day off from work.
We heard a story about how W-4 had lost ratings and they got their Arbitron ratings book. They were awful and just a few days later Howard was doing a show where he was drinking on the air and trying to let people know that they shouldn't drink. One of the guys from the station told a woman to call in and goof on Howard about the ratings. The woman got through and goofed on him about the ratings and Howard went nuts and flipped out on her.
Howard said that the whole station fell apart and they ended up doing a format change to country from rock and roll. They all knew that something was going on when they turned on the radio that morning. They ended up flipping formats on a Saturday night at midnight. Howard stayed another couple of weeks and then he bailed out.
Howard said that he became Hop Along Howie after they did the format change. They went into a clip where Howard was introducing a song and giving the weather after the format change. He didn't sound happy.
In another Stern Show clip we hear Howard telling Robin about those days and how awful they were. He said that he only stayed on the air for about 3 days after they changed formats. He was getting paid pretty well at the time though so he didn't mind that. He said he needed that money because he was flat broke. He said he had to get out of there though. He said he started goofing on the music they were playing and they told him to get out.
We heard more from the jocks that worked with Howard over there at WWWW and they knew that Howard wasn't going to last there for long. We heard a couple more clips of Howard doing his thing at WWWW and talking about the weather and going into more awful songs.
They flipped between that stuff and the Stern Show clips where Howard was talking about how much it sucked when they flipped formats. Howard said that they were owned by Shamrock which was owned by Roy Disney. He said that they didn't know much about him at the time though. Howard said he got a call from someone on Sunday morning telling him that they had switched formats overnight. He had just worked the day before.
Howard talked about how they go about doing a format change like that. He said that Doug Podell had to be dragged out of there when this big moving van showed up to take everything out. They ended up handing out a bunch of cowboy hats and stuff like that before they did the change. Then Doug had to do the change from rock to country in the middle of the night. Howard said that everyone there didn't know what to do when they made the change. The Doc of Rock didn't know what to do. He said he stayed there himself for about 2 weeks with that new format. He was called Hop Along Howie for those two weeks. He said they told him that he could make a great country DJ though.
Howard said that he ended up goofing on the people who were listening to that awful music and they ended up kicking him out. He said he hated the music and he'd goof on the people who called in. He didn't even know how to pronounce the name Reba McIntyre's name at the time.
In another interview clip we heard one of the guys talking about Howard going on the air and talking about the people listening liking to fuck sheep. He had his microphone down at the time though, he just made the other DJs think that's what he was saying over the air. They played a clip from ''Private Parts'' where Howard learned of the new format there at WWWW.
Up next we heard some people talking about Howard's time at WWWW and how it just wasn't the right place for him. The demise of W-4 was the end of his time there in Detroit. There were people who said that they really liked Howard working there. They're happy for him that things worked out in the long run. Howard said that he didn't just sit there and flounder around too long. He said that he had people watching him that wanted to see him do his thing for a few more years before they brought him to New York. Howard said that DC-101 was one of a few stations that wanted him. They cut his salary a little bit from what he was making in Detroit though.
We heard some of the people who made that DC-101 deal happen talking about how that all worked out. The woman who worked with Howard was Denise Oliver and she said a few things about how she had offered him a job just weeks before the station changed formats. He turned it down at first but then the format change happened and he accepted the job. Howard said that he decided that he was going to put everything he could into this new job and make things happen.
They played another clip from ''Private Parts'' where Howard was telling his wife that he was going to be making some changes and doing things differently in Washington DC. After that we heard Jim promoting what they had coming up tomorrow on the show. Howard moves to Washington DC and meets Robin. They wrapped up today's Howard Stern History around 10:50am.
We heard from Robin about how she thought she wanted to be a nurse for a living. She did that for six years and then stumbled around for a few years and fell into this radio thing by accident. She said she looked in the yellow pages and tried to figure out what she could do. She went to a few different schools and ended up going got the broadcasting school and knew that's where she should be. She said that she knew that she had to do the news because the regular DJ job wouldn't allow her to talk enough.
Robin said that she was told that she could go places in the industry before she even finished school. She went to Carlisle, Pennsylvania for a job and did some work there for a short time. She said she was only at the station for one day. The guy who hired her ended up leaving the station the day she started and he asked her to go there with him. She did that and moved to Harrisburg, PA. She said she was having fun doing radio and every day was different for her. She worked there for 6 months and then figured she got all she could out of that place and called some people in Baltimore. She got a call from someone in Baltimore and got hired to do an afternoon show with some other people.
Robin said she didn't stay in Baltimore very long because Denise Oliver heard her. Denise said she heard Robin and knew who she was so she called Robin and told her she wanted her to send her tapes and courted her to work at the station in Washington. Robin said that she had to coerce her into working in Washington because she didn't think she was ready. She said she knew she had to move there after Denise played her a tape of this new morning man, Howard Stern.
Robin said that Denise popped this tape into the tape machine and she heard Howard interviewing a prostitute as if she was a molecular scientist. She said that he was asking her all of these questions like she was a normal person and no one had ever done that. She said she had to meet Howard after that and took the job just so she could do that.
Howard said that when he was on in Detroit he knew that he wanted a good partner that could mix it up with him. Denise Oliver told him that she had played this tape of him for Robin and he had some tape of Robin to play for him.
Denise said that when she introduced Howard and Robin, she was the only other person there. She said that she talked to Robin about being in the military and why she did that. Robin said that she didn't think that things could be that bad in there. Denise said that Howard and Robin hit it off right from the start and she knew that they'd make a great team. That led to a reading of some of Howard's book ''Private Parts'' by Crackhead Bob. It was unintelligible.
After that we heard a clip from DC-101 where Howard was talking to a guy on the phone about his ideas for picking up women. Howard introduced him to Robin and had him try and pick her up. He said something about her breasts so Howard had to cut him off.
Robin said that Howard would never say what she looked like when people would ask about her on the air. He used to let them believe that she was tall and blonde. Denise said that she thought that Robin was going to kill Howard when he held a contest to let people guess what size her breasts were. Robin just laughed it off though and things went just fine.
Howard said that Robin fills out the show and people underestimate what she brings to the show. He said that his father was always a fan of hers and he told him that she fills in the show like that. She has a good voice and she's got a lot of information.
Ben and Ray Stern had some things to say about Robin too. Ray said that they hit it off right away and she's amazed that they're still together after all this time. Ben said that Robin really was more important as a sidekick than as a news person and Howard had to convince management about that.
Howard said that Robin was always laughing on the show but she was just having fun and not putting on a phony laugh. She would know the right stories to get him going and they never really worked things out off the air. He said that they've had very few off air discussions about radio over the years. She said they never really planned anything. She knew what to do and he relied on that.
Robin said that she figured that being on Howard's show was a great way to get her name out there in a big market. Denise said that she's glad that she was able to bring those two together back then. She thinks that it would be a different show without her. She said she always liked Howard and Robin as people too.
We heard another clip of Howard and Robin talking back at DC-101. Howard ended up asking Robin about what she did over the weekend and she let him know it was none of his business. He guessed that she was in a leather mask or something. She laughed the whole time.
Jim Forbes said that Howard and Robin weren't in the same studio together for very long. Management separated them because Howard was spending too much time talking to her. That led to them playing a clip from ''Private Parts'' the movie where they separated them and told her not to let Howard intimidate her.
Denise said that there was an FCC regulation that said they had to do the news so she'd have to go in and talk to them about that. She said that she had to encourage them to do some news on the show. Robin said that Howard's interactions were welcome but she had a tough time doing her reports with him interrupting so much. She was never prepared to answer all of the questions that he had for her. She said it was good because she got more air time though.
Howard said that he knew that he was going to be number 1 in Washington with Robin working with him. He said he never thought he was going to be super successful, he just wanted to make a living in radio.
We heard another clip from DC-101 where Howard was making a phone call to a elementary school and claimed to have Prince Charles on the show. He told the guy who answered the phone that Prince Charles liked young girls and he was looking for a date. The guy on the phone knew it was a joke but Howard kept it going and had a guy doing a Prince Charles impression, very poorly.
Howard pointed out that Prince Charles was 32 and he was dating a 19 year old. The guy who answered the phone was a custodian at the school and said that he's actually an engineer there. Howard thought that was kind of funny and goofed on him about that. Howard asked if he could set up a date with one of the 11 year olds at the school. The guy told them to try high school instead.
Howard's Lesbian Dial-A-Date took place in May of 1981 and caused a stir in Washington DC. Denise Oliver talked about how they were planning this dating thing and they were going to do a gay man dating thing but she thought that might not fly with management. Howard changed it to lesbian and she thought that might work. Robin said that she thought that it was pretty innovative at the time.
We heard a clip from that show where Howard did his first Lesbian Dial-A-Date. He spoke to the woman who was playing the game who hadn't come out to her parents yet. She talked about the way she picks up women and finds other lesbians. Howard went through the stereotypes that she has to put up with and then moved into the game. He said they had a few women from around her age who wanted to play. Howard said that he was going to be chaperoning the date and nothing crazy was going to go on.
Howard went to the phones and picked a few women to play the game. He went through each woman he had on the line and asked them a couple of questions about their lesbian experiences. He was calling the contestant Ms. X during the segment. He asked her what kind of women she likes. She said she's into women who are into sports. She had no preference on hair color. Howard asked the women on the line what they looked like and went through all of that with them.
Howard picked out the women to play the game and went through details of each of the women's lives. He wondered if they buy magazines like Penthouse and Playboy like he does. The women said they didn't which surprised Howard. Ms. X said that it's a different thing for them than it is for men. One of the contestants was 5'9'' tall so Howard was into her. He told her that if she ever goes straight, she should give him a call. After going through all three women Ms. X went with number 1. She said she went with her because she agreed with a lot of her concepts and the way things had gone for her in her life. Howard let the other women know that they had lost.
Howard told the girls that they were going to go to a basketball game or something together and he would be there to chaperone them.
After that we heard from Andrew Dice Clay about one of his favorite moments from the show. He said he thought that they were going to come to blows one time on the show when they were fighting. He said that Gary came in at one point and said that people were pulling to the side of the freeway to listen to the show. He said that a show has to be great for people to do stuff like that. Dice said that he really wanted to kill Howard at the time because he said that the mother of his kids wasn't a good mother.
We heard from Robin about how Howard used to call her mother on the show when they were in Washington DC and they stopped doing that when they moved away to New York. Robin said that she stopped talking to her mother fore about 10 years so that was another reason they stopped calling her.
They got back into the DC-101 clip where Howard called Robin's mother and got a guy on the phone. It turned out it was her father but Howard just wanted to talk to her mother. He went on to tell her that her daughter is very nice but she's always trying to hug and kiss him. Robin's mother said she thought she taught her better than that.
Howard took some phone calls and asked the people if they wanted to ask some questions. One guy asked how she raised Robin to be such a prim and proper girl. Mrs. Quivers didn't know. Howard wished Mrs. Quivers a happy mother's day and let her go. He said that his mother would never come on the air with him.
We heard from Ben and Ray again and Ray was saying that they started hearing stories from people about hearing their son on the radio and he was really making a name for himself. She said that he really took off down there in Washington DC.
Jim Forbes said that one of the guys who picked up on what Howard was doing was this guy Petey Greene who had a public affairs show on Sunday morning. Howard talked about Petey and what he'd do on his show. He said he loved Petey's show and he was surprised that he was stuck to doing those Sunday morning shows. Robin said that he was very entertaining and Howard really did love him.
We heard a clip of Howard and Robin talking about Petey Greene's show because Howard was going to be appearing on it. He joked that he was going to show up with a white sheet over his head but he said he was just kidding about that.
Howard talked about how he actually showed up in black face and not in a white sheet. He said he now knows that he was nuts to do that and it wasn't even that funny. Robin said that she wasn't sure if Howard was going to get out of that place alive that day. She was in the audience and saw it all happening. The audience loved it and laughed when Petey called Howard a cracker.
We heard a clip from that Petey Greene show where he introduced Howard and brought him out to do the interview. Howard was doing his impression of a black man when he did the show and it was such a bad impression that it was funny to Petey. Howard came out and did some weird stuff where he was yelling about the plight of the black man. The two of them went back and forth goofing around with each other. Howard stayed in that goofy character through some of the interview but then went into his own voice eventually.
Howard talked to Petey about his radio show. He talked about the type of guests he gets. Petey told him that he would never put on white face and appear on a show like Howard did. Petey kept calling Howard a cracker throughout the interview. Howard said he'd like to see Petey on in prime time and not stuck in the mornings on a Sunday. Petey asked Howard why he doesn't give Robin's job to a white woman. Howard said that he was working on it.
Howard wrote a song to perform on Petey Greene's show. They ran out of time though so they couldn't play guitar. Howard ended up having the audience clap for him instead and went into the song. He sang a song about the white man being a honky. The clapping fell apart in the middle of the song, just like the lyrics did.
After that interview Jim Forbes was talking about how some people had a problem with Howard's racial humor, even if Petey Greene didn't. Robin was one of them. She said that she did have a problem with Howard in the beginning but she eventually got over it and realized that it was her own problem.
We heard another clip from DC-101 where a caller asked when they were going to play the ''Metro Bus'' song parody. Howard ended up goofing on the guy because of the way he was speaking to him. He said he sounded like an old black guy with no teeth like Muddy Waters or BB King or something. The caller thought that Robin sounded white to him and wondered why that was. Howard went off on the guy for sounding racist.
We heard from Howard about how he never knew that Robin was black before he met her and it wasn't a factor for him when she did start there. He said he didn't go out and hire a black woman just so he could justify the racial humor he was doing on the show. He said that wasn't even in his head. He said that a guy like Imus might think like that and hire a black woman so he can get away with that kind of stuff but that's not the way he thinks himself.
Robin said that Howard was a great observer of human nature and he talked about every race. Denise Oliver said that people thought that Howard was anti-Semitic and against retarded people and that he was racist. She said that she could diffuse most of the complaints with simple explanations. She said that some people would call and they'd give specific times for when stuff was happening on the show. She said she knew that they were listening then and that's all that mattered to her.
We heard another DC-101 clip where Howard was playing a song parody that he had created. He was doing his black guy impression singing the song.
Denise Oliver said that they had an attorney in the Think Tank and he was a lawyer who helped George Carlin out with his case against the FCC and the 7 dirty words. Some of the guys from the Think Tank talked about what they did back then and then they went into a clip where Howard was taking phone calls and talking to those guys. It sounded like a morning zoo show. Howard was doing a creepy voice and someone was banging a drum and cymbal and laughing for no apparent reason.
In the clip Howard was asking some trivia questions and had people calling in to win a prize. A bunch of people called in and had the wrong answers.
One of the Think Tank guys said that the bit worked in two ways. They'd give the listener a prize if they got it right and if they didn't, they'd goof on the listeners. He talked about one of the answers that he had himself and how he gave himself some credibility at the time.
Robin said that they wanted to have those guys in the studio more often but they ended up getting into some trouble with the local PTA groups in Washington when they'd do their ''rank outs.'' That led into some more audio from DC-101 where Howard and The Think Tank would do their ''rank outs'' with the listeners.
In the clip we heard Howard preparing everyone to do the rank out segment and saying he was going to give away a Billy Squire album if the caller won. They then started in on the rank outs.
They interrupted the rank out contest with more of the Think Tank guy talking about how things worked at the time. They'd prepare with more and more rank outs during the time they had to play music. They faded back into the rank out segment that they had just interrupted. Howard and the caller were going back and forth with their rank outs.
Fred said that he was fed up with things in Hartford because he couldn't get a raise. He said that a guy came in and replaced Howard and he was a decent guy. He said he asked him to go up to Springfield with him and they wanted to pay him better than they did at WCCC. He said he was thinking that they would want him to stay there when he told them he was leaving but they didn't do that. He said he went to Springfield and stayed there about a month before he got the call from Howard. He said he didn't know what he was walking into at the time and wasn't sure if he should make the move. He eventually thought that it was a chance to be creative and not doing the stiff stuff everyone else was doing. He made the move to Washington DC and was blown away by what they were doing. He's been with Howard ever since then. It was 1981 when he went down there.
We heard a clip of Howard talking to Robin about Fred joining the show after Earth Dog Brent left the show. They were calling Fred ''Earth Dog Fred'' at the time.
We heard Fred talking about the article that came out about him joining the show and how the guy who wrote it was a huge fan of Howard's. He said that the writer really got the show and gave them a great write up. Fred said it was great to do an interview with the guy because he got the quotes right and he wrote a great article. He said it was a very nice article and it was the first time he had smoke blown up his ass.
We heard from Harry Cole from the Think Tank team who was talking about how great Fred was at doing his impressions and stuff like that. He worked incredibly well with Howard and Robin and used to do the stuff that this guy Brent used to do.
Robin said that Fred was amazing on the air but he was very quiet off the air so it was hard to get to know him as a person. She said that Fred would nail the voices and he came up with material quickly so it was wonderful to see him work.
Fred said that when he walked into Howard's show down there, it was like going from playing softball in a small town and then walking into Yankee Stadium and playing with the Yankees. He said that it was like ''Holy shit!'' because it was a totally different ball game there. He said that he saw the show explode around that time and it was the most exciting time of his life. He said that he still can't believe how big Howard has become and how quickly it was happening back then. Fred said that he was blown away by the way people were treating them and how they were like the three musketeers at the time. He said the station loved him when he started there but by the time they left they hated him. They were upset that he was leaving them though, not because he was doing anything wrong.
Robin said that they were on the air when Princess Diana married Prince Charles. She said that everyone was watching the wedding on TV so Howard wasn't sure why they were doing a radio show. They decided to pretend to be there at the wedding and covered it from their studio. She said it was just her, Fred and Howard pretending to cover it. They played a quick clip of that show that lasted about 10 seconds.
Fred said that the gay humor has always been a big part of the show and some people probably think that they were actually gay themselves. That led into an Out of the Closet Stern Show clip from DC-101. In the clip Howard was doing his Out of the Closet Stern voice with Fred doing his Mr. Blackswell voice. They were doing the Gay Hulk show that day. They went to break a short time later.
That led to a clip of the show where Howard brought up Robin's problem. He told the audience that she walked in that morning and lifted up her shirt and showed that she couldn't button her jeans. She told him not to do that to her. He continued on and said that she had shown him the unbuttoned pants and was wearing a sweatshirt to cover it up. Robin said that she showed him that as a friend in strictest confidence. That led to Howard talking about how much she would eat when they'd go out to Roy Rogers for lunch. Robin said she was going to go over and bust him in the lip for talking about that. Howard said she was eating two cheeseburgers, fries and a milk shake every day. That's too much for a woman to eat. Howard admitted that he was a cow at the time too. He had a belly hanging over his belt. Howard said that everyone around him has a belly now, Fred, Robin and his wife, who was pregnant at the time.
Denise Oliver said that they were playing 5 songs an hour at the time and that was outrageous in 1981. She said that they were cutting edge with Howard's show at the time. She said that they were doing some very innovative things back then. She said that he was doing regular radio stuff too but they were still cutting edge.
In another clip we heard Howard talking to God as he did often on his show back then. He'd summon him up and he'd have a tape of himself doing the voice of God and he'd talk to that. He was doing the weather with him at the time.
Robin said that Howard would bring up God whenever he wanted to talk about something like birth control or abortion or something like that. Howard said he's not sure how that got started, he thinks it must have just popped into his head during a shower or something. He said that no one talked about God on the air at the time so he came up with the idea to do that. He said he did that for a couple of months but people would write about it for years after that.
Denise talked about the weather report and how entertaining it was. She said it got a lot of reaction from the audience too. She said that Howard wanted to drop it but she convinced him to keep it going for a while. She said that she knows that you get bored with doing certain things and that's why he wanted to drop it.
We heard another clip of a news report about Howard's show and talking about the many different things that they were doing on the show at the time. They talked about Howard, Fred and Robin and how they were up before most people were doing their radio show. They played clips of Howard doing his thing, taking phone calls and goofing on the listeners. They were also talking about some of Howard's enemies. They had him interviewing some people out on the street and having some women complaining about how crude his show was. They also had an interview with Robin who was talking about what a nice guy he really is. They covered the dial-a-date stuff that they did. Station management was also interviewed and talked about how successful Howard has made their station.
Up next we heard Howard talking about how out of his mind he was in Washington DC. He said he was coming up in the elevator one day and this Spanish guy hops in with a machine gun in his hand and demands that he bring him up to the studio. He figured it was all over at that point. He got up to his floor and they took the gun away from him and figured out it was a toy gun. They were going to call the cops but Howard decided that he wanted the guy to be his sportscaster that day.
Howard said that one day this woman came in and said she wanted to make love to him. He couldn't do it so he told Fred to go for it. They started to mess around and came close to having sex. That was the kind of wild stuff they were doing. Denise Oliver said that they had one of the first delay devices in the industry and that was so Howard could edit out curse words and stuff from his show. She said that he did have to use it once in a while.
We heard another clip of Howard talking to a caller about a live show they were going to be doing and ended up hanging up on a caller because he seemed annoyed with the guy. He told Fred that he was going to have to wear a dress to the live show they were doing but Fred said he wasn't going to do it. He was doing a weird voice and demanding that he wasn't going to wear one. That led to a fake fight where Fred was supposed to be attacking Howard. Howard told him he'd talk to him about it later and told Fred to get out of there. Howard made it sound like Fred was attacking his leg and breathing down his neck.
Fred said that stuff was funny and he couldn't believe that they did that stuff together. He said he thinks that he was just playing back then and Robin was playing her part really well. He said that the gravely voice he was doing back then was just something he was doing to sound more interesting than his regular voice. He said that over the course of time Howard was calling him Earth Dog Fred so he was trying to make his voice fit the name. He hopes that people didn't think he was trying to be a phony, he was just trying to make it more real.
Ray Stern said that she went out to lunch with Howard one day and he was surrounded by a bunch of women. She said that he was signing autographs and it was a big shock to her. She said that she was really taken aback at the time.
Denise said that she was out talking about the station with someone else and someone overheard them talking and was amazed when she told them that she was Howard's boss. Fred said that once he came on board the show was already going really good. He just hopped on board and the show just happened to take off really big after that. He said that it was insane that they had so many fans showing up to events that they were going to back then.
Howard said that he still doesn't think that he's ''made it'' and that's why he still feels like a beginner doing the stuff he does. He still feels that he has to prove himself when he does these shows and that's what keeps him going strong.
Denise Oliver said that the first ratings book that they got after Howard and Robin started was really big news. She said she got a call from someone at Arbitron who congratulated her for the ratings before she even saw them. Howard and Robin had tripled the morning ratings for the station. Howard said they were getting an 8 share in the morning and they were only getting about a 1 before that. Howard said that 8 share was nothing to him, he figured that it should be a 100 share and he was motivated to keep the show going and making it even bigger.
We heard another clip from DC-101 where Howard had just learned about his ratings and was talking to a listener about how he'd like to go to Baltimore next and take over there in morning drive. Howard was reading some stories about the ratings and said that they're going to be more disgusting than ever. He said that the guys there used to ask him to change his show but now that he's gotten ratings, they think he's funny doing things the way he is.
We heard Howard talking about his 8 share that he managed to do in less than a year. He said that this guy who was his boss there, Goff Labar, would pull him into his office and ask him why he wasn't the subject of articles because he had plans for the station.
That led into another clip from DC-101 where Howard and Robin were talking about their boss and how he doesn't understand comedy. He only understands ratings. He doesn't like Fred on the air for some reason. Howard wondered what his boss had to say about their big ratings and Fred now. He said that he's so glad that they hired so many geniuses there at that station.
We heard Robin talking about Goff Labar and how he used to have this little bit of spit that would move around his mouth as he spoke and that's all she could concentrate on when she'd talk to him. She said that guy just never understood why no one was paying attention to him and he was disgusted by the whole thing.
Denise Oliver said that they had hired this guy Goff from Cleveland and he came from a station where they were playing easy listening and it was a big change for him to come and be Howard Stern's boss. She said that she got along better with Howard and Robin than she did with Goff so she had to try and keep Howard under control around him.
They went into another DC-101 clip where Howard was talking to Robin about their boss getting roasted the night before. He said that he should be the one roasting the guy but he wasn't invited to the thing. He said that he did have a guy who was there who wanted to talk about the roast. He called him up and put him on the air to discuss the roast. The guy told Howard that the roast was at the Washington Marriott and it was a black tie event. He told Howard some of the jokes that they were telling about Goff. Howard did a fake laugh for most of the jokes and hit a drum and cymbal after each punch line. Goff had some jokes about Howard that he told at the roast but the lines that the guy on the phone was telling him weren't funny at all.
We heard from another guy that worked with Howard at DC-101 who was talking about Goff and his cigar smoking. Denise also said that Goff came to her one day and said that Howard wasn't funny that day. She told him that he can't be funny for 4 hours a day every day and not have a bad moment once in a while.
We heard another DC-101 clip where Howard took a phone call from a woman who asked Howard how he got on the station. Howard said that it was miracle and his Detroit station had changed to country so he had to get out. He told the woman that he gets dirty looks from management there all the time. The woman said that he could probably get any price he wants if he threatens to leave. Howard said that he was going to leave then. The woman asked him not to leave. He got off the microphone for a short time and left Robin hanging and trying to get him back. Howard came back on and said that he tried to get more money but it didn't work. He said that asking for a raise there is like squeezing a brick for water.
We heard another news report about Howard protesting that Leave it to Beaver had been taken off the air and Howard was protesting by having people out on the street asking for them to ''Bring back the beaver.'' That went into a Leave it to Beaver bit that they did around that time.
One of the Think Tank guys talked about the Beaver bits they did and how they were doing them all tongue in cheek and doing some edgy stuff. They played another ''Beaver break'' after that. Fred said that those bits were fun back then. He said that it was like the way America would see the world through the eyes of David Lynch. They played another one of those Beaver Break bits after Fred's quick comments.
We heard from Mary McCormack and how she's been asked for years if she ever saw Howard's penis when she worked with him. She said that she did catch a glimpse of it real quick one time but didn't see the whole thing. She said it wasn't a full view so she wasn't sure how big it actually was. They went to break after that.
After that we heard Howard talking about how big those shows were even if they were the biggest form of narcissism. He said that his mother never made a big deal out of his birthday after he turned 13. He said that she told him she didn't want to hear about it after that. He may have craved some big parties after that and that's what led to those big shows. Howard said that he was always embarrassed by those parties but they were very entertaining.
We heard more of the first birthday show where Howard was listening to a clip of Joan Jett wishing him a happy birthday and calling him a pencil necked geek. He said it was very nice of her to do that. In another clip they had mayor Marion Barry call in. Howard spoke to the mayor about coming in for a visit but Marion said he was very busy that morning. Mayor Barry asked Howard how old he was. Howard was only 28 at the time. He thanked him for calling in a short time later.
We heard from Robin again about how no one was giving Howard any respect down there at DC-101. She wondered how they were going to get him some respect so she came up with the birthday show so they could have people come in and give him some respect. She had Petey Greene call in one time. That led into the clip where Howard spoke to Petey on the phone.
In the clip Howard told Petey that people listening to his show didn't know about him. Howard talked to Petey for a few minutes about his show. Petey didn't stay on too long before he said he had to get going.
Robin said that the birthday shows had to get bigger and bigger over the years so they could out do the last one. Howard said that Robin always took those shows very seriously and that's why they were always so great.
Dave Grohl from the Foo Fighters remembered hearing Howard's show and he remembers that day. Dave said that it was a horrible tragedy but Howard called how much a one way ticket to the 14th street bridge was and it was so brutal that no one else would have had the balls to do that. He said that he didn't remember hearing Howard on the radio in Washington DC much after that so he thought he had been fired.
David Brenner also remembered that day and how he was listening to the show that day, but he didn't know much about him yet. He said that he remembers hearing Howard calling the air line and asking how much a one way ticket to that bridge cost. He said that it was the darkest but funniest joke he'd ever heard. He said he told his driver to write that DJ's name down because he had to do that show if he was in town again.
Jim Forbes said that the Air Florida call never actually happened. Howard came on and said that he did talk about that crash on the air and did say that maybe that was going to be a stop on that flight and made up a fake phone call that he could have made to them. There was no controversy, no one got upset with him either. Fred said that Howard was just commenting on the situation and how fucked up it was. They should have never let that flight take off in the conditions it took off in.
One of the guys from the Think Tank talked about how Howard had been so thrilled that one of the rescuers there at the plane crash was a fan of his. He took that and ran with it. Robin said that Howard used to make fake calls on the air all the time and that's what happened that day and that's what the newspapers reported. That led to them playing the clip from the show where he made that fake call to Air Florida.
In the clip Howard said he was going to call Air Florida that day and tell them that he's fine with them crashing their planes into the bridges there. Howard picked up a fake phone call and they had some mumbling going on in the background. He joked that it was going to be a non-stop flight to the bridge and it was an obvious joke and not a real call.
Fred said that the broadcast news takes stories like that and they blow it out of proportion. He said they were commenting on the outrage instead of on what he actually did. Robin also said that there was a lot of fall out for that call. One of the guys from the Think Tank was talking about how it was rumored that Howard was fired over that call. They had made a bigger deal out of it than it actually was and the story changed over time. People were saying that Howard had actually booked a flight and tried to get on a plane to fly to the bridge.
Up next we heard a bit that Howard had done back then called ''Hill Street Jews.'' We heard some other people talking about the bit and how bit of a deal it was back then. It was something that would get people to tune in and keep listening to the show. Fred said that they were doing bits, song parodies and more back then and it was incredible.
We heard another clip from the show where Howard was doing a bit called Born Again Stern. He was doing a preacher character and talking to another character that someone was putting on.
Howard's friend Dr. Lou was up next and talked about hearing Howard for the first time on radio. He said he was laughing just hearing Howard on the air and thinking how he was actually on the air on a real station. He said that Howard telling him that he was going to be on the air seemed like a pipe dream at the time when they were in college. He doesn't think that Howard knew he was going to be the King of all Media some day.
Howard talked about how there are so many hypocrites in this world and how they're the ones who come after him. He said that he had to get rid of all of that phoniness on radio that everyone else was doing at the time. He wanted to break down the walls and do something honest with his show.
We heard another God weather forecast, this time it was from the movie ''Private Parts.'' It was the one where Howard talked about the miscarriage that his wife had.
Robin said that miscarriage thing was very interesting because they knew that it had happened and they went public with it. She said that it wasn't so personal after that and Howard must have gone around and around in his head thinking about doing that on the air. She said that he turned it into a whole bit where he was talking to his little blood clot and how much it meant to him. She said that they just played along with him that day and let him go where he wanted. She said that he never warned anyone that he was going there.
We heard from another guy who said that a reporter had picked up on that story and recorded it and called his wife about it and asked her what she thought. She really didn't need to hear that replayed for her though.
We heard more of the interview Howard did with the guy after he was fired from DC-101. In that one Howard talked about the miscarriage thing and how he got some letters from people who thought that it made them feel good hearing him talk so honestly about it. He didn't get why people found it so offensive for him to talk about that kind of thing on the air.
Robin talked about how people used to pretend to be something other than what they were when they were on the radio. Howard was just being himself when he'd go on. That's what he was trying to change in radio. Ray Stern said that Howard was trying to make the car ride for people easier every morning. She said that he was trying to help them out with their day. She said that if people don't get it then it's not for them and they don't have to listen. She said that if people want to hate him then they can. They don't have to listen if they don't want to. Ben Stern said that he thought that many of the things Howard was doing on the air were for entertainment purposes and that's it. He said that was the bottom line.
Howard said that he was approached to be a news guy on a station but he was doing something different where he was the host giving his opinion instead of getting the audience's opinion like the news programs were doing.
In another DC-101 clip we heard Howard talking about doing the Charlie Rose show and meeting Arnold Schwarzenegger in the bathroom there. He said that he and Fred were in the bathroom while Arnold was making a number 2 in the bathroom. He said that he and Fred ran in and yelled out his name. Arnold thanked them for telling him how great the Conan movie was. He said that it smelled really bad in there while he was going. Howard said he told Arnold who he was and then ran out. He said they spent about 5 minutes in there with him.
Howard's character Fartman was born at DC-101. Howard said that he was doing it around the same time that they had a fart man in National Lampoon and he figured that maybe he wasn't so original back then. He didn't remember the first time he did that bit but they did have tape of it.
They played a clip of Howard doing his Fartman character one morning and talking to Burpman on the phone. He and Burpman went back and forth with their farts and burps battling it out to the death. They went into another segment where Howard was talking about his Fartman costume and brought in a woman who was designing the outfit for him. He said that he wants to go out in public in the outfit because it'll freak out anyone over the age of 45.
We heard more from one of the Think Tank guys who said that Howard had a deal to work at the station for 2 years and then they were going to renegotiate with him. The contract was up in the middle of 1982 and they came back with an offer that was too low. He was very popular at the time and the deal was just chump change according to this guy.
Howard talked about how when he'd go home to visit his parents he'd hear about Imus or Scott Shannon's morning shows and he knew he could do better. He said that he was asked to go to a meeting with Jerry Nachman in New York City so he could bring the show to New York and turn it into an all talk format. Howard said that he asked to be put on WNBC but he was told he couldn't be on in the morning because that's when Imus was on. A couple of weeks later he went to a meeting with some people from WNBC who wanted to hire him. The picked up his show and even brought in Fred and Robin. Howard said he wanted to go to WPLJ but they wanted him to play music during the show, at night. He said he couldn't do that and took the job at WNBC.
Fred said that they were having some team to come down and tape them to get an idea of what the show was all about. They had this guy Douglas Kiker show up and do a story about them that was trying to bury them. The guy went off on him and said that NBC was hiring the devil. Robin said that they were sold a bill of goods saying that they were fans of the show and it turned out it was just the opposite. She said that they aired this report and Kiker really went off on them complaining about how NBC had hired them to be on the same network with him.
They played that report that Douglas Kiker did about Howard where he talked about how filthy Howard's show was and how his 7 year old son came down for breakfast and saying the same things that Howard had said in one of the clips they played. Kiker said that they had some concerned parents who wanted to talk about this show and played some of those interviews where people were complaining about the show and saying that it had no business being on the air.
After that story broke loose a bunch of the people who hired Howard were fired for hiring him. The shockwaves hit the whole company, including his future program director Kevin Metheney, AKA Pig Virus. Kevin talked about what had gone on back then after they hired Howard. He said they thought they knew what they were getting into until they saw that Douglas Kiker interview. He said that it caused a lot of problems within the company.
We heard more from Think Tank member Steve Chiconis who said that Howard always knew how to entertain on other shows like Charlie Rose, Petey Greene and others. That led to some clips of Howard talking about how he was leaving Washington DC to move to New York. In the clip he was talking about how he was insecure about his future there because he wasn't able to get a new contract going with DC-101. He said that the city had been great to him and he hoped that they'd return within a short time via syndication. Howard said that he was doing it for the cash but he couldn't say how much it was.
Howard said that Fred and Robin were supposed to be hired to work with him over there at NBC but he took it as a handshake deal. He said he was very naive back then and he didn't know that they were going to screw him over. He said that they refused to hire Robin after the whole Douglas Kiker thing happened. Robin said that she didn't know what to do then because she didn't want to stay at DC-101. She didn't want to work with someone else and have to pretend to work with someone she didn't like.
Robin moved back to Baltimore after leaving DC-101 before Howard left. That happened just a couple of months before Howard was supposed to move to New York. Robin said that she wasn't even speaking to Howard for a couple of months because of what was going on. She said that she would talk to him on the air but not off the air.
Howard said he knew that Robin thought that he had abandoned her. He said that she was offered a job working with the Greaseman and he still credits her with turning down that offer. They offered a huge amount of money to work with him but she still turned it down. She went back to being a regular news reporter at some shithole station in Baltimore. Howard said he told Robin that he was going to get to New York and hire her somehow. He begged her to listen to him and understand that he really wanted her to work with him.
We heard a clip of Robin's last day on the air at DC-101 where she said she was going on vacation and not returning. Howard took some phone calls from the listeners and asked for their response to that. Howard told Robin that she was a great talent and she would be missed.
Fred said that he thinks that Robin quit and left but everyone was upset. He said that DC-101 told him that they were willing to send him out to some lame station out in Alaska to work for them. He didn't want to do that and told them to go fuck themselves, in his head. He said he was very nice about it and didn't actually say that. He said that they were actually breaking up the team at the time. They wanted to keep Robin there at DC-101 but she didn't want to do that. He said there may have been some things that were said between Howard and Robin but he wasn't privy to them.
Howard said that Robin wrote him a nasty letter at one point. Robin didn't remember it though. She said that she wasn't a very stable person at the time and no one knew it because she was such a good actress. She said that she had trust issues and when that NBC thing didn't work out, she couldn't believe Howard and what he told her. She said that it just didn't make sense to her and she figured that everyone was just lying to her. Howard said it just showed how much Robin loved him and how much she really wanted to work with him.
In another DC-101 clip we heard Howard taking calls about Robin's disappearance. He said that she got kind of angry with him and she went to Baltimore.
Jim said that Howard had a show to do with or without Robin. After Robin left Fred read the news. He did it as Arnold Schwarzenegger one day and they played a clip of that. Howard and Fred tried to have fun with the news that day. Nine days later Howard's contract with DC-101 was terminated.
Howard said that it was big news that he was leaving the station and there were newspaper articles about him being fired over the Air Florida 14th Street Bridge thing. He said the firing was actually due to his signing with NBC. He said they were mad at him for leaving them with such high ratings. He said he wasn't fired for anything he did on the air.
Fred said that he didn't know where he was going after that. He talked about the way things were starting to go toward the end there and it was getting ugly. They started using things against him that he had been doing all along. He said it was the stupidest thing he'd ever seen in his life.
We heard more of Howard's interview with this guy Joel about his firing. He flipped out and screamed about the way they blew him out of there. He was putting that on for this guy though. Joel asked Howard what he did to get himself fired. Howard said he wasn't even clear on that and he'd have to talk to his lawyer to find out exactly what the reason was. He said that he was told that he was making fun of other DJs in other cities and towns but he had done that before.
Jim said that Howard's album ''50 Ways to Rank Your Mother'' was kind of a way to say goodbye to the audience there. Fred said that the song turned out to be a pretty big deal for the show but it had already been written before he started there. They played a couple of clips from that as Fred was talking about it. Fred said that they were going to put out some stuff that they had done on the show but DC-101 didn't want to release it because it was coming down to the end of their time there. That meant that they had to go out and write more stuff for the album. They wanted to make it a goodbye present for the fans but then they found out that they had to recreate that stuff and write new stuff. He said that it didn't turn out as well as the original stuff. He apologized for that and said that he's sorry to anyone who wasn't happy with it. He said they were trying to recreate something great that just didn't turn out quite right. They played an ''Unclean Beaver'' bit that was on the album.
Jim said that the album was promoted on TV commercials that ran on late nights on TV. Fred said he knows there were some commercials but he didn't remember what they were like. He said he'd love to see them though, they're probably funny as shit. They played one of the commercials after that.
The album never got played on DC-101 because they got fired before they could do that. Steve from the Think Tank was talking about how many people showed up to this record signing that they did back then. He said it was really eye opening when they saw just how many people showed up to that event.
We heard a clip of Howard talking to Sandra Bullock about being at his last appearance in Washington DC. This was a newer show clip where Howard and Fred talked about the old days and that last event they did down there. He said that his wife was already up in New York so he and Fred were there alone. He said that two hot chicks showed up and offered them a ride home. Sandra was only like 13 or 14 years old at the time. Howard said that he remembers doing that show and told Sandra that she should have come up to him at the time. She said she was only a kid. Howard said that he was only like 18 or so. Sandra said that her neighbor was the big fan of the show and he was the one who invited her down there.
Howard said that he and Fred were paid some cash by that club to do the appearance. He got back to the story about the hot chicks that picked them up. One of the girls was Siobhan, but not the transsexual Siobhan. He said that she was one of the hottest chicks he'd ever seen. He talked about getting drunk with Fred and the chicks asking to come in with them. He said that one of the girls was wearing one of those metal snakes around her arm. Artie said that any chick who wears one of those is willing to fuck. Howard said he had to get out of there and he's not sure why Fred didn't stick around to bang them. Fred said that he thought too much and didn't think it was right for him to stick around.
Howard made one last appearance on Washington DC radio before he left. He was on a station across town from DC-101. Fred said that they wanted to do something really big but they ended up doing something on this WAVA station instead. That led into a clip from that final show.
In the clip a DJ introduced Howard and then he and the rest of the crew took over and did their final show. Howard was putting on some kind of announcer voice and had his Think Tank guys laughing, screaming and banging on a drum. Howard did his God weather forecast and recreated some of his bits that he was doing at DC-101.
After that Jim wrapped up the show and said that they'll be talking about the NBC days tomorrow. They played a few preview clips and ended the show around 11:35am.
We heard Jim Forbes talking about Howard's start at WNBC in 1982. He had finally made it big and his childhood dream was finally being realized.
We heard Fred talking about driving up to New York and going up to NBC. They were told to bring their boxes of stuff to a garage across the street and no one was helping them move their stuff. Fred said they wondered why no one was helping them and they later found out that they wanted nothing to do with them at all. He said that the pizza delivery guys were being treated better than they were.
Jim said that one of Howard's first meetings was with the program director who filled him in on everything he needed to do, including how to say the call letters. That led to an interview with that program director, Kevin Metheney. Kevin explained how NBC and ABC sounded very similar in their call letters so they had to differentiate them somehow. That's what led to the ''W Nnnn BC'' call letters. We heard a clip from ''Private Parts'' where that scene was reenacted between Howard and Kevin with the two of them saying ''W Nnnn BC'' over and over again.
Kevin talked about how the whole WNBC thing became more of a big deal than they expected. He said that he did have conversations with Howard about the way he said them and he remembered some of those. He said that he had to have those conversations with Howard though.
We heard form Howard about how WNBC didn't want him there from day one. He said that they didn't even let him do his first show in the afternoons like he was supposed to. They told him to practice on the overnight shift. Fred said that they were asking a guy who had been doing radio for years to practice. Howard said that he was playing records at midnight one night. He told Fred that the music they were playing was the gayest stuff he'd ever heard. He decided to go on as a gay man because of that. Fred said that Howard decided to do the gay character thing and they went on the air.
Howard said that Fred told him that he was nuts to do that when they already hated him there at NBC. He said he went on a midnight and did his Lance Eluction character as his first broadcast. They played a clip of that night right after that. Then Howard said that the switchboard was lighting up like crazy. Fred said he thinks that the switchboard got overloaded and they operators got mad at them. They were used to doing nothing at midnight so they really shook things up over there.
We heard another clip of Howard as Lance Eluction coming out of a song and talking about the band. He was talking about the joke service he had and told a joke before going into another song.
Howard said that management wasn't even awake at that time so he decided to do some gargling before a song while trying to do the call letters the way that he was supposed to do them. Howard described what he was doing with the gargling and how it was supposed to sound like he was gargling his semen.
That led into a clip of Howard doing that thing he had just described. He gargled over the start of the next song that he was playing. He came back from break after that and said they had a choice of what they could do next. He said that they could do anything they wanted because management was asleep. He asked what they should do next and ended up talking about Imus for a couple of minutes. Then Fred chimed in and said that Imus was very exciting.
Fred said that some people were very upset the next day after that whole gay thing. He said that they had done a great show though.
Howard said that he and Fred were dragged into Kevin's office and he went off on them for doing that show. Howard said he tried to explain it to him but he didn't get it. He said that it was a fight to get where he got. Every step of the way was a struggle for him and his show.
We heard another clip of Howard's first show at WNBC where he was talking to their traffic woman Roz Frank. She was about to go into her traffic report but cut her off and spent a short time talking to her. She did her report and then they faded into a bit that happened later on that show. He was talking to a news guy about some of the stories they were going to be talking about. The guy sounded stiff and asked Howard to give him a proper introduction. The guy corrected Howard on his introduction and his call letter pronunciation thing. Howard came back from another song and called a woman who had gotten his name wrong in her article she wrote for Newsday. She told him that they'd get it right once he made his name big. She told him that they'd try from then on to get it right.
Kevin Metheney said that he thought that Howard's show was way different than anything else on the air. He said that it was a great show but he was destroying his format there at NBC. Howard said that his act was solid there in Washington DC. He knew what he had to do and that's what he was going to do there at NBC. He said that no one understood his show and they stripped out all of the good stuff he was trying to do there. He even had to change his voice so he'd sound different for them. He said that it was tremendously frustrating for him to be there. Howard said that he didn't know why he went to NBC, he really wanted to be at WPLJ.
We heard about Al Rosenberg who was hired on to work with Howard and Fred. Fred talked about how great Al was and how he still misses him every day now. He said that he seemed to really like him and he loves him for that.
Howard talked about how Al used to work for Imus but he was fired because Imus wanted to hire his girlfriend to work with him. He said that Imus was a real douche bag broadcaster back then and he said he'd love to have Al work on his show. He said that Al was doing the best radio of his career at the time and Imus actually asked him to do his characters on his show. He said it was great torture for Imus to have Al doing great stuff on his show and not on Imus' show.
Al said that he worked for Howard and Imus at the same time for 2 years. He said he'd come in and work for Imus in the morning and then work with Fred and Howard in the afternoons. He said he knew that Howard was magic and he was going to be huge some day. Boy Lee Davis also talked about what Al was doing and how great he was to have around. Al is 9 years older than Howard but he let him do his thing because he seemed to have great sensibilities about his show.
Robin talked about how WNBC had contacted her trying to get a meeting with her. She said that she and Howard ended up on the phone together before he left Washington DC and she figured she'd never work with him again. Howard said he always wanted Robin to work with him and he knew that Neil wasn't going to work out. Fred said that NBC never wanted to hire him and Robin to work with Howard. He said that Kevin was giving him that smiling jackal look and both he and Robin knew that they weren't going to get a job there. He said that he and Robin knew that they were snakes up there and they weren't going to get hired.
Howard said that Robin felt betrayed that he left her behind in Washington. Kevin said that he did remember Howard talking to him about Robin and why he needed her so bad. He said that Howard said he wasn't sure why, but he needed Robin with her because the show just worked with her there.
Howard told them at NBC that if they hired Robin there, he'd be more under control. He said he called Robin and asked her to come up there when they finally agreed to hire her and she came right up. Robin said that she was looking for something else to do and she got a call from one of his lawyers and he told her that she'd have to call Howard about what happened. She said she spoke to Howard about that and told him that she could put all of that stuff behind her. She said she was lying at the time but she did that so she could come back.
Robin said that she almost didn't get on the air because Howard got thrown off the air for doing a ''Virgin Mary Kong'' bit that caused a lot of controversy. Fred talked about that bit and how he might have to take the blame, or credit, for that. He said that video games were really hot at the time so he figured that they could have Howard's God character playing the game during his weather report. Fred said described the bit and how tame it seems now. Robin said she was about to make her way up there when all of that went down.
We heard the bit that they were talking about after that. Howard did his God weather report and we heard God talking about unveiling this new video game, Virgin Mary Kong. God then goes on to describe what happens in the game and how you have to keep Virgin Mary away from the men in a Jerusalem singles bar or she won't be a virgin anymore. Howard was pretending to play the game and ended up losing when Virgin Mary was trapped by a man. Howard went into a song after that.
After that bit we heard Kevin Metheney talking about how the response was very intense and they ended up having to have meetings with the religious figures in the city. He said that Howard and Imus had similar things like that going on in their careers. He said that he's not sure how they settled that but the real impact was that they had to man a dump button on the show to make sure they could end the bit and stop it from going out on the air. He said that he was the one who ended up being the one who had to listen to all of the bits and to hit a button that would alert an engineer to dump out of the show.
Jim said that on October 18, 1982 Robin came back to the Stern Show and never left again. Robin talked about the day that Kevin threw a phone at the wall one day. She wondered what Howard had gotten her into when she heard about that. She said that was her introduction to NBC.
We heard some audio from the day that Robin started with Howard again at WNBC. Howard talked to her about the training orientation she had before she started on the air. Howard asked her what they showed her. She said it was a slide presentation with Tom Brokaw narrating it.
Howard said that it was a nightmare for Robin to come there to NBC because they were trying to turn her into an NBC newswoman and that's not what she does. Fred said that Robin already had her own delivery that they wanted to change. Howard said that they really did a number on her and they really wanted her to quit. He said that they were trying to get her to leave but they all knew they had to hang in there and weather the storm through the whole contract. Robin said that Howard's plan was to convince them that this was a great show and that he should be allowed to do his thing. Boy Lee talked about how Robin was missed when she wasn't there to do the show.
We heard another clip of Howard's NBC show where he and Robin were talking about how Kevin, then known as Pig Virus, was there making sure they were doing their thing. Howard talked about how bad Kevin's breath is and how he told him that he should use some mouth wash. He was goofing on the guy on the air and said that his idea to count down the top 66 songs on Labor day wasn't so great. He was making a vomiting sound as he described what he actually thought of the idea. After that we heard Howard go into a song and when he came back he was talking about the top 66 songs and how Pig Virus had picked the songs himself.
Kevin said that Howard wasn't the first or the last person to vilify him on the air. He said that others called him worse than Pig Virus.
We heard from Donna Fiduccia who worked with them over there. She said that she was called Donna Fedouchebag over there. Al Rosenberg was talking about the way Howard would goof on Kevin and just drive him nuts over there.
Fred said he's not sure what Kevin's purpose is in the business because all he did for them was make their life miserable. He said that all he did was tell them how to do radio in the way he wanted them to do it. He said that the guy really knew nothing and most guys like him know nothing.
Jim said that the show was struggling to book guests back then. Boy Lee said that Howard was pretty unknown at the time and it was tough to get good guests on the show. He said that it did get easier as time went by though. There were some publicists who refused to book their clients on the show though. He said that it made a lot of people uncomfortable.
We hear from Joe Piscopo next. Joe was saying that he remembers hearing about Howard coming to NBC and working in the same building that they were doing Saturday Night Live in. He said that Howard asked him to come on the show and that's what he did. He said that he and Howard had a good time riffing back and forth that first day.
We heard another old clip from that day that Joe first appeared on the show. Howard was playing a Mystery Guest thing with some callers when one of his callers guessed who it was. Howard then went into an interview with Joe and kissing his ass a little bit. He wanted to do a dueling Andy Rooney bit with Joe so the two of them went into that. Howard did his ''Andy Looney'' character and did an awful impression. Joe said that he was going to be fired for doing this. He did some of the lines that Howard and Fred had written for him but he went off script a couple of times. Joe got them out of the bit when he asked him to bring it to an end.
We heard from Al Rosenberg again talking about how he could never measure up to the type of man that Robin needs in her life. He said that he would be the luckiest man in the world to be with her. He went on and on about that and how he wouldn't take long if he was to get her. They went to break after that.
Al Rosenberg talked about how brilliant it was for Howard to talk to his parents the way he did. He brought everyone in his personal life into the show. Ben said that he and Ray went in and did some shows for Howard because they felt they owed it to them. Ben said that even Imus tried calling Ray one time because he wanted a mother on his show.
We heard a clip from WNBC where Howard was talking about his mother and how he wanted to dress the way he wanted to dress on the air but his mother wants him to dress a certain way. He called his mother to talk about how she was still trying to control him to this day. He got her on the line and told her that he was going to be wearing jeans to the bar mitzvah that they were going to. Ray told him that there's no way he's going to do that. He went on to tell her that she's from a different generation than she is and he wants to wear what he wants to wear. He told her that he wanted to show that he's his own individual. She told him that he's not an individual if he's going somewhere with her. Howard was trying to get out of wearing pants to the Bar Mitzvah but she insisted that he wear nice pants.
In another WNBC clip we heard Howard calling his mother about how she has him over to her house for family get togethers all the time and he doesn't have time to go hang out with his friends. He told her that he was going to limit his visits to once a month from then on. Ray told him that just because he's a star doesn't mean that he can't see the family. Howard said that everyone expects him to be out with the family and he has things to do. Ray said that he's not that busy and he has to be with his family. She told him that he can't just give up his family commitment.
After that we heard about how Howard had the power and the gift to turn regular people into celebrities. Fred talked about how Janie the Cleaning Lady was one of the nicest people in the world. He said that she just did her job and didn't complain about it. He said that she was from another era where they didn't complain. He said that she was always entertaining to him and she never said an angry word.
We heard another WNBC clip where Howard had Janie the Cleaning Lady come in to do the show. He talked to her about how it was time that they learn to speak like a black man. He said he was going to go to the phones to pick up on that way of talking. He tried it out on Janie but she told him that he didn't quite have it down right. She was giving him some words to say and the guys would try to say it. Howard was trying to say things like ''one hip dude'' and ''what's happenin' bro?'' and things like that. Janie would laugh after Howard tried to say that stuff. Even Neil Seavy was getting in on it and pronouncing the words as white as any white man could.
After that clip we heard from Boy Lee who said that Janie was really the cleaning lady up there and not a character like some people thought. Robin said that Howard is an amazing observer and he knows who to put on the air. She said that he'd talk to her off the air and knew that she'd be good on the air. She said that she didn't seem to know that she was saying all of these things that she was saying on the air.
We heard another WNBC clip where Janie the Cleaning Lady was talking about her hang over from partying the night before. She ended up reading a fan letter she got there about her appearing on the show. Howard said that NBC was paying her to go through that stuff and tried to find out how much she's making. She wasn't talking about that though. He wanted to get her more money but she didn't want to say. That led into them playing the ''B.T. The Black Terrestrial'' bit that Janie was in.
After that we heard about how Howard would make his staff members stars on the show too. We heard from Al Rosenberg who said that their engineer Bruce Leonard was asked about doing some gay stuff but denied it until the rest of the guys made up stories about gay stuff that they had done.
They went into some other gay discussions and Boy Lee talked about the Out of the Closet Stern bit that Howard used to do with guests on the show. They'd get really big guests and Howard would interview them as a gay man. He did that with Bob Hope one time. Fred said that was something else that day. He said that Bob Hope showed up, on the phone, to do the show and he was like Mr. NBC at the time. He said that he did tons of movies and TV shows for NBC and a huge mega-talent. He said that he doesn't know what they were thinking by fucking with that guy.
Robin said that Bob Hope had come on to promote one of his specials and Howard decided to do the interview as a gay man. She said that Bob was very confused and got pissed off at them. Robin said that they were afraid he was going to go complain about them.
We heard a clip from WNBC where Howard was introducing Out of the Closet Stern and Bob Hope. He said that he knows that Out of the Closet Stern was going to be excited to talk to such an institution in the industry. He went into that character and then got Bob on the phone. Howard did the whole interview in character and Bob didn't seem to know what was going on. He laughed along with Howard a few times though. After the interview Howard said he thinks that the guy hated him and he's going to be in trouble after that. Robin told him he might be sunk because Bob talks to Grant Tinker all the time.
Fred said that when that interview was over they heard that Bob was very upset about it. He said he doesn't think that Bob even know what day it was at that point. He said that Howard actually got on the phone with Bob's handlers and told them that he was the manager there and he'd talk to him. Fred said that they got an interview with Bob years later and he still didn't think he knew what day it was and didn't know that he had done an interview with them before.
Kevin Metheney was talking about how he was trying to keep Howard under control but he was actually trying to keep him out of trouble. He said that he was trying to get the Standards and Practices people to lighten up back then and Howard probably didn't know about that. He also claims that he was trying to let up on Howard and what they were trying to get him to stop doing at the time.
Howard said that back then he wanted his traffic reports to be fun but they didn't want him to mess around with the reports themselves. He could mess around at the start and end of them. He said he really didn't care though.
Donna Fiduccia talked about how Howard started right in with her calling her Donna Fedouchebag and it wasn't anything new with her. She had been called names all her life. Howard and Robin both talked about how it would drive Donna crazy back then. Howard said that he hated those traffic reports and he really just wanted to have fun with them. Donna said that it really didn't bother her that much and he was just doing it on the air. She said that Howard would ask her once in a while if he went too far so she knows that he was just joking around.
We heard another WNBC clip where Howard was talking about how he couldn't make fun of Donna anymore because his mother made him feel guilty about it. He said that if she keeps doing that he's not going to be able to do his show. He got Donna on the line and talked to her about what his mother said about him making fun of her. Donna said that she knew she liked his mother for some reason.
Donna talked about how Howard would pick on her and then his mother would tell him to stop doing that and he'd actually stop.
In the WNBC clip Howard had Donna on the line and said he had to call his mother and talk to her about this. He dialed her up again and got her on the line. He told his mom that he hadn't made fun of her since she told him not to but it was very hard. He told her that it was near impossible to do that. He asked her what he's supposed to do if she says something dumb. Ray said she's never said anything dumb. She also pointed out that Howard isn't all that smart himself and maybe he shouldn't be picking on other people. Howard said that he thinks that his mother likes his sister's kids better than his. She said that they all have a special place in her heart.
In the clip Howard's mother was talking about how good Donna is on the show but Howard said that she says stuff that's not relevant to the show. Ray said that she enjoys her very much and so does his father. Howard asked her if she thinks that reading traffic is talent. Ray said it is and told Howard to try and do it himself then. Howard asked his mother what kind of money he and his sister are going to get from their will when they pass away. Ray said that she's planning on living a very long time and there won't be much left. Howard told her not to eat out so much and try to save some money. He spent a couple more minutes with her before wrapping up the call. He told her that he was going to be nice to Donna just for her.
Al Rosenberg talked about Howard using the word smegma on the air one day and how they got into some trouble with management after that. They all hated Howard and his crew over there at NBC. Howard said that he knew what the show was supposed to be back then but they wouldn't let him do it.
We heard another WNBC clip where Howard and the guys did a gay bit which was a spoof of ''2001 A Space Odyssey'' called ''2010 A Gay Space Odyssey.''
we heard more from Donna Fiduccia who said that Howard once had his fans flashing lights to her in the chopper she was in and she said that about 95 percent of the cars on that one street she was flying up were flashing their lights. They played a quick clip from WNBC where they did what Donna was describing. She said that she could see them flashing their lights as they were talking. They went to commercial after that.
We heard from Jackie after that and he was talking about how he was told to send Howard some of his material. Fred said that Jackie would send out those records and tapes to everyone he could just to get his name out there. Fred said that Howard got the tapes back then and they were listening to them in the car one day... we then heard some of that tape and then Fred came back and said that it was good stuff and he had a good energy for the show so they had him come in one day.
Howard said he didn't remember exactly how that came about but he and Fred thought it would be cool to have him come in and do something once a week. Fred said that they had the Stump the Joke Man thing that they did and Howard had come up with that idea. Fred said that Jackie would get almost every joke right when the listeners would call in with them.
We heard another WNBC clip where Howard was doing the Stump the Comedian bit with Jackie. He went to some phone calls and let some people tell Jackie some jokes. Jackie knew most of the punch lines which is what the whole point of the game was. They had a kid that kept calling in with jokes and he was one of the few people who stayed clean with the jokes.
Al Rosenberg said that before Jackie came in they all had their own voices. Then Jackie would come in and he'd write jokes for Howard and pass the notes to him. Jackie said that he wasn't sure when that started happening but he remembered Howard doing the Mama Lookaboobooday character on the show. He had some ideas for that and passed him the notes. He said that Howard wasn't interested in the jokes at first but then he heard him using them on the air the next day. He said he eventually went out and got a big stack of paper to write on and started writing Howard jokes.
Howard said that Jackie being able to write those jokes on the fly really helped him out and things worked out. Fred said that Jackie actually invented the moveable type, he came up with the idea to write the jokes on the paper and pass them along to Howard. He said that he really does have to give Jackie credit for making the note passing a regular feature of the show. He said that his invention still goes on to this day. He said that Jackie created that part of the show and it's a very important part of it today.
Al Rosenberg said that if Jackie laughed at a joke during the show, you knew that he wrote it. If he didn't laugh, it was a Fred line or a Howard line.
We heard Howard doing his Mama Lookaboobooday character doing a report from his chopper. He was doing some material that was getting laughs from Jackie so the jokes were most likely his. Howard was going nuts doing that character and another one with the two of them yelling at each other.
Boy Lee talked about how David Brenner was very much behind Howard and his show and he would support him in any way he could. He was always there for Howard. David Brenner also talked about how Howard was always complaining about how they made him stop doing stuff on his show and he thought that he should just keep doing it. Robin said that Brenner got the show and he understood what they were doing. Robin said that he even went to management and told them that Howard was brilliant and they had no idea what they were doing by trying to slow him down. Robin said that they never forgot about David backing them up in that.
Brenner said that he went out and spoke to Kevin Metheney and told him that he had the unique radio talent sitting 20 yards from him and on one was ever going to be like him. He said they were wasting him with making him play music and stuff. He said he knew that Howard was the best radio talent out there because he had done them all.
Kevin Metheney said that he thought that Brenner was kidding at first when he was telling him that stuff. Brenner said that Kevin was going to remember it differently than he did. He said that everyone does that. Kevin said that he thinks that Brenner thought he was doing the right thing by telling him that he thought that Howard was a genius.
We heard another clip from WNBC where Howard was talking about Pig Virus and how he had gotten drunk at a party they had the night before. Howard said that some people were excusing his behavior because he had been drinking but he said that he actually acts that way all the time. He went on to talk about how they had David Brenner on the show the other day and the guy really loves him. Robin said that Pig Virus started to tell her stuff when he was drunk and told her that he got a 20 minute lecture from Brenner about not letting Howard do his thing on the air.
We heard another clip of Howard talking about his wife being pregnant and wondering if it was going to be a girl or a boy.
We heard Howard talking about how he wanted good things for his daughter and wanted her to be safe and secure, unlike the way he grew up. He said that he was going to take his job as a father seriously just like he did with the radio show. He said that it was very important for him.
Jim said that the good news for Howard came when Randy Baungarten started working at WNBC. Robin said that those were the good years there at NBC because Randy understood the show. Kevin said that Randy was only interested in letting the talent do the things that would let the talent be successful. Kevin said that they figured that they had to let Howard do his thing.
Howard said that Randy really fought for him and he was a great guy. That led into a Stern Show clip where Howard was talking about the way NBC had screwed up with the advertising with him and Imus. They wanted to say he was ''coming back'' to New York but he had never really done radio in New York City. No one knew who he was when he was working up in Westchester. They wanted to do the same thing with him that they had done with Imus. He said that the poster they had of him is still hanging in his parent's house to this day.
Jim said that Randy paired up Howard Stern and Imus in a TV commercial. Kevin said that Imus and Howard pissed off a lot of people and they were going to have them apologize to the audience in the commercial. Imus and Howard didn't have any lines in the commercial, they just stood there as Randy did his thing and apologized to the audience.
We heard the commercial that Kevin was talking about where Randy was apologizing to all of the people that Howard and Imus had insulted and upset.
In the Stern Show clip we heard Howard talking about another advertising campaign they had them do one time. They actually gave Imus a gold Rolex to do the commercial at the time and he figured that he was an idiot for not doing stuff like that. Howard said that he remembers doing the commercial and what a pain in the ass Imus was that day. He'd have people applauding him for saying two words.
We heard more from Boy Lee about the way Howard and Imus got along there at NBC. Robin said that Imus basically ignored them or referred to them by their race or religion. She said that he didn't want to see them at all. Al Rosenberg said that a lot of that was NBC's fault because they were trying to turn Howard into Imus by telling him how to do his bits and stuff. They had no vision there according to Al.
Fred said he never liked Imus and he never will. He said he doesn't get his show and he thinks that he's just a fucking redneck. Al said that he really is just a dick. He said that he brought his daughter in to work one day and Imus met her and told him to get her out of there.
Robin said that Imus was a derelict and he'd always wear the same clothes and stuff. She said that she could insult him personally but he could only hurt her by insulting her race and things like that. She said that she heard stories about how Imus didn't want to hear her saying anything to him. Robin said she said something to Imus on the air one day and it upset him so much that he was going to try and get her fired.
We heard another WNBC clip where he took a call from Imus to talk about what he had been saying about Robin. Robin said that Imus called her a word that he later changed to ''Negro.'' Howard said that Imus was apparently sitting home listening to the show and he wanted to get on the air to talk to them. Howard was goofing on the guy and talking about how hot his girlfriend is. Then Howard picked up the phone and Imus claims that he called Robin a ''Negro'' and nothing else. He then throws out a bunch of other racist comments about her and Howard hangs up on him. He said that this station was going to hell in a hand basket after that. He said that everyone there is at each other's throats. Howard had a problem with a guy by the name of Johnny Dark over there. He had that problem and Robin had the Imus problem.
Howard said that he had Imus on the phone again and this wasn't a bit they were doing. It was really him. Imus asked if he could win the Jackson Browne tickets they were giving away. Howard talked to Imus and asked him what he's doing calling in. Imus said that the reason Howard had Robin there is because they have a new affirmative action program going on there. Howard mentioned something about Imus' show and Imus hung up on him.
After a quick story from Meg Griffin about how great Howard can do an interview with a boring band like the Moody Blues, they went to commercial break.
We heard another clip from WNBC where Howard came up with the idea to do the Bathroom Olympics. Robin liked the idea so Howard got some contestants on the phone to play along with them. He got a woman on the line and said they'd play for one record album and a tube of ''Prep H.'' Howard told her that he was going to jump up, run out of the studio and run to the bathroom there. It was about 15 yards away. He asked the woman how long it was going to take him to do that. She guessed 7 minutes. Then she extended it to 10 minutes. Howard said she must think that he's been holding it in for a long time.
Howard got another caller on the line to play along and that guy guessed that it was going to take 66 seconds. Howard put him on hold and got a third contestant. That caller said 2 minutes and 5 seconds. Howard said that everyone got their bids in and their answers were locked in. He said that Kevin Metheney was going to be the official time keeper.
Howard took a two way radio with him so he could still talk as he was running down the hall to the bathroom. He stayed in touch with the guys through the whole process. He went into the stall, unbuckled his belt and went to the bathroom. He was up at 1 minute and 25 seconds as he was peeing. He ran to the sink and washed his hands after that and ran back to the studio. He was back in 2 minutes and 7 seconds. The caller that guessed 2 minutes and 5 seconds had won.
Jim said that Howard stated the F-Emmy's back then but they were called the A-Emmy's (AMies) at the time since WNBC was an AM radio station.
We heard a clip from that day when Howard did the first A-Emmy awards. Howard played some clips of some of the bits that were up for awards. They had done some phony interviews that they threw into the mix as the award nominees. They then picked the winner and had Al Rosenberg doing his Dr. Ruth Westheimer impression as he accepted his award.
Al Rosenberg talked about how Jackie came on the show and played some characters on the show. Jackie said that they'd make him a character on the Match Game that they did and his impressions were really bad. He said he couldn't ad-lib and he just wasn't funny. He talked about how he was playing Michael Jackson in one of those bits one time and CBS TV had done a special on him at the time. Jackie said that at the time they were doing a ''Blank a Doodle Doo'' as the question for the Match Game and he was playing Michael Jackson and said the line ''No women...'' for his answer and he thinks that was one of the funniest things he had ever come up with. Robin and Al were talking about the dick jokes they used to come up with on the show and that's how they did the Match Game stuff.
We heard one of those Match Game segments from WNBC after that. Howard had people playing Jimmy Stewart, Mary Anne Mobley, Gary Burghoff, newscaster Sue Simmons, Richard Dawson and Brett Summers. Howard also had a player on the phone to play the game. He said that the story was ''Every morning before breakfast Mary squeezes John's blank.'' The woman guessed ''cheeks'' while the guys in the studio came up with Oranges, black heads, puppies, kisser and zits.
After an edited out break we heard Howard get to the next contestant and question. He talked to the guy on the phone for a short time. Then he moved on to the game and said that the next one was ''Meat blank.'' The caller came up with ''balls'' while the rest of the guys came up with Meat... The Beatles, Meat... Counter, Meat... Department, Meat... The Press, Meat... Market and one more Meat Balls.
After that we heard Robin talking about how Bill Cosby came on the show one time and had a good time doing the show. She said that there was just one thing that was said to him when he left. She said that Bill thought that they were just kids and they didn't know better and they'd eventually grow up. Years later Cosby hated them and would complain about them.
We heard a clip from WNBC where Howard interviewed Cosby who had never heard of him before then. Cosby was having a good time. Howard was talking to Cosby and taking phone calls from people having them try to guess who it was in the studio. Some callers didn't recognize his very distinctive voice. Cosby was trying to help out the show by telling some of the callers to hang up when they didn't seem to get what was going on. One woman finally guessed that it was Cosby so she won tickets to a comedy show and a tube of Preparation H.
Howard spent a few more minutes talking to Cosby and promoting his appearance on Live at Five that night. Cosby was busting his balls about the clapping that the guys in the studio were doing. Howard talked to him about his cigar smoking and how he thinks of a cigar as a symbol of maybe someone's manhood. He was getting pretty graphic about the long object he had in his mouth and how it turns women off. He said it was very much like being with a guy and throwing all the women out. Cosby said that his wife doesn't seem to mind it after 19 years of marriage.
Howard and Robin asked Cosby about his marriage and how things are going. Cosby said that things are fine after 19 years and 5 children. He said that they're afraid of the children now. Howard went on to take some phone calls from some people who were playing a Bill Cosby sound-alike contest. Howard had the callers doing their impressions and one guy sounded like Richard Nixon. It may have been Fred doing that one. Howard took another call, Fred again, who was doing an effeminate voice. He did his Cosby impression but it wasn't much different than the effeminate guy voice he was doing. Cosby said he didn't want to hear anything else after that. Then Howard took a third call from Fred who was doing a real Cosby impression this time. Fred went back into his Nixon impression and said that he had fooled them. Howard wrapped up with Cosby who was worn out from whatever it was he just did.
In another clip we heard Howard and Robin talking about his Donahue appearance out in Chicago. Howard got sick while he was out there so he had to stay home sick. He then went on to say that they had a mystery guest this morning. He had the guest come in and disguises his voice for them. He said that the guy was so big that he had to disguise his voice. It turned out to be Eddie Murphy.
Breaking away from the NBC clip we heard Robin saying that Eddie was on the show but he wasn't a great guest. She said that they were incredibly excited about him coming on but he came in and couldn't figure out what he should do there. She said that he just watched them and let them do all of the talking. Robin said that they had to tell him to talk because he was just sitting there laughing and shaking his head.
They got back to the NBC clip where Eddie was the mystery guest and Howard was talking to him. Eddie laughed with his very distinctive laugh while Howard was talking about how big he was. Howard picked up some phone calls and asked the people if they wanted to take a guess at who it was in the studio. He was giving away tubes of Preparation He as gifts. The first caller got it right when he said it was Eddie Murphy.
Howard talked to Eddie about living in Roosevelt Long Island which is where he grew up too. They didn't live too far apart there. Howard and Robin told Eddie how funny he was and how great his new album was. They couldn't play any of that stuff on the air because it was too dirty. We did hear some of that album unedited thanks to the freedom that SIRIUS has.
Howard continued talking to Eddie about his work on Saturday Night Live. They talked about his Mr. Robinson's Neighborhood bit and things like that. Howard said that Eddie is a genius in his opinion. Eddie didn't have much of anything to say during the interview. Howard said he thought he was going to be able to get him on a roll but that didn't happen. He said that his lips were brown from kissing his ass so much.
We heard a quick clip of Bruce Figler from WRNW talking about working with him up there. They went to break after that.
We heard another clip where Howard was talking to Robin about belching on the show. He asked one of the suits if he thought it was funny too and got a laugh from him. He said that some of the management was giving him a hard time about what he was doing with some of the guys they do the traffic with on his show. He said he hates doing those traffic reports on his show. He said that they don't want him belching so much on the show either. He thinks that he's wrong about that kind of stuff.
Howard said that they didn't like the way he was doing the traffic and the belching stuff so he told them that he'd stop with the belching. After a quick fast forward Howard talked about the belching thing and how Randy had asked him to stop. He asked one of his guests what she thought about it. She thought that it was going a little far and it was kind of gross.
Howard then tried to call Randy's wife, Fran, to ask her what's going on with him at home. The phone is usually busy when he calls. This time it wasn't so he got her on the air. She said that she doesn't take her phone off the hook when he calls. Howard told her that her husband is a pretty good guy but he's not sure he's right about this belching stuff. She said that she thinks that Howard is classier than that. Howard told her she doesn't know him very well then.
Howard told Randy's wife to give him some because he doesn't look so well these days. He told her to greet him at the door naked or something. He talked about how Randy doesn't even live in the city, he lives out in Westport, Connecticut. He let Fran go a short time later.
Jim said that Howard's belching slowed down for a few days but he didn't stop with the traffic department. That led into another WNBC clip where Howard went to the traffic copter with Roz Frank who was goofing on Howard about not being ready for her when he picked up the phone. Howard ended up bringing a 12 year old kid into the studio and asked him to do the traffic for them later on. Roz said that's fine with her. She said she'll be listening for him. Howard said that anyone could do the traffic reports. Howard said that they could save a boatload of money by hiring 12 year olds to do those reports.
Howard figured that Roz was going to be upset with him over the whole weekend thinking about how he had said that she could be replaced by a 12 year old. She said that she doesn't mind him saying that and she'd be listening in to the next traffic report.
After some edited out show we heard Howard talking to the 12 year old kid, Matthew Epstein, about reading the traffic report for them. Howard was asking him some questions about being Jewish and stuff like that before he had him do the report. Matt hadn't had any experience at all doing this. He also got Roz back on the line and had her listen in as Matt read the report. He actually did a pretty good job for his first try. He just read the report and didn't go on and on. The kid said he still has respect for Roz though. Howard said they could probably save 60 grand by hiring that kid to do the reports. The kid ended up asking for 20 grand after Howard said he could probably get him for 10. Roz offered him a chance to fly in the chopper with her one day.
Howard jokingly said that he was falling in love with this guy John. Howard moved on and went to the phones to find some gay men for John. He went through a few calls and picked out some guys for him. He spoke to each guy and asked about some of the gay stuff they like to do. He went back and forth with the three guys he picked out for John and tried to find out if they had anything in common with John. He'd ask each guy about their age, what they like to do and things like that. He asked them about how they got into the gay stuff and got as many details as possible. One of the guys turned out to be a fake but it wasn't hard to pick him out as the phony he was. John eventually had to make his pick and went with the guy known as Gay Bob. They went to another commercial break after that.
Fred talked about the interview and how bad it went for them. They were very excited about having her on the show but things just didn't work with her on Howard's show. Fred said that the interview went so badly that she started crying. He said that they were all shaken up and they didn't know what to do. Al Rosenberg talked about how he thinks that maybe Gilda thought that Howard liked her a little too much and thought he was a stalker or something.
We heard from Boy Lee who said that it was like Gilda was being held there at gun point and she really wasn't happy to be there. Robin said that Gilda completely misinterpreted what was going on there that day. She asked Howard why he was attacking her and kept receding throughout the interview. Robin said that they felt horrible about that. It wasn't long after that when they found out that she had cancer.
They went into the WNBC audio of Howard doing the interview with Gilda who was on as a Mystery Guest. The interview seemed to start off okay. Howard asked her to disguise her voice but she was doing her Barbara Walters impression talking to him. Howard eventually went to the phones and had some people play the Mystery Guest game. The first caller recognized her. Howard told Gilda that she had ruined his show by doing her voices. He said that he didn't know what to do with her for the next half hour since the callers guessed who she was already.
Howard talked to Gilda about her new book and asked her what else she's been up to. She talked about Alan Zweibel who had helped her out with her book. She also said that she has a new TV show coming out soon. Howard said that she's doing some very smart things by coming out with the book, album and movie. At one point he was joking around with her and Gilda wondered if he was making fun of her. That seemed to be the point when she cracked and the interview started to crumble.
Howard continued to talk to Gilda about working on Saturday Night Live and dating Gene Wilder. Howard went to the phones after she asked him to do that since she wasn't having fun with the regular interview. Howard told the callers that they were going to take sexual questions only. Howard told Gilda that he really liked her and she said that she thinks he might like her too much. Howard went to the phones and the first guy asked how many men Gilda had been with. She asked that they change the calls to non-sexual questions. Howard asked her what age she lost her virginity. He said he was 16 but she didn't answer.
Howard ended up hanging up on a few callers who were dragging out their calls and not getting to the point. He finally got one caller to ask Gilda a question but even she wasn't getting to them fast enough. Howard told Gilda that the callers were no better than him at this interview. Gilda seemed to be speechless after a while. Howard asked her if she had fun and she told him she didn't and it was actually kind of scary. Howard said that he was going to remain a fan of hers even if she didn't like him. He gave her some plugs and let her go a short time later.
After an edited out commercial break we heard Howard talking about how freaked out Gilda was after that interview. He thought that she was going to think he was funny but she was scared by him. Robin said she's not sure she wants to work with him anymore after that. She said that he's scaring people now. She thought that he was going to hit it off with her but that just didn't happen.
Howard said that none of Gilda's people would even look at him or shake his hand when she was leaving. He thought he was pretty respectful to her other than asking her about Gene Wilder. Robin said that they may be broken up and that's why she was upset.
Howard took a call from a woman and asked her if she thought he did anything rude. She said that he didn't do anything on the air, maybe it was something off the air. She said that maybe she was on drugs or something. Howard said she's not doing that. Howard spent some time talking about how crazy all of that was and how upset he was over it all.
That led into a bunch of Baba Booey clips and the other names he was called years later. We heard from Gary after that and he was talking about how he grew up in the same area that Howard did when he was a kid. He wasn't too far from Roosevelt. He talked about the school he was going to and how he ended up at this Adelphi college that wasn't too far from home for him. He said he went into a communications class and fell in love with the whole thing. He said that he remembered going to the college radio station and thinking about how cool it was.
We heard a clip of Howard playing a clip of Gary doing his thing at his college radio station. In the clip Howard picked apart everything that Gary was doing wrong. He told him he can't say ''Ya'' instead of ''yes'' on the radio. He also picked apart the things that Gary and the other guy on the air were talking about.
We heard a few other clips of Gary doing his thing back at college and doing interviews with people at Islander's games and stuff like that.
Gary talked about some of the jobs he had and how he ended up at one station that was fully automated so all he had to do was work the machinery. He didn't have to do much of anything else. He worked overnight's on Saturdays when all of his friends were out partying.
Gary said he got a job at NBC working in the traffic department. He had heard of Howard when he started there and he was told that Howard was the funny one and Imus was the legend there. He said that the younger people were with Howard and they thought that he was the best. He had no idea he was going to be working with him though.
Fred said that they needed someone to be their assistant and do stuff for the show. It turns out that Gary got the job after he went up to Fred one day when he saw him walking by. Fred said that Gary seemed to be a fun guy to talk to and he had a lot of energy so he figured he was the guy to work there. Gary said that Fred took him into an office and broke his balls for about 45 minutes during an interview.
Fred said the one thing he told Gary was to try dressing better. He said that he wasn't dressed up that well and figured Gary knew he was joking. Sometimes people just don't get the joke though. He said that Gary did show up dressed nicer and he was sweating like crazy when he came in. Gary said that he knew that Fred was goofing on him and laughed at him when he walked into work for the first time. Fred said that Gary was willing to do something really crazy to get that job.
Al Rosenberg said that Gary was the perfect guy for the job there. Robin said that Gary worked out well but she doesn't remember his first day there. Howard said that he didn't want to hire Gary when he saw him. He said that he didn't make a very good presentation when he showed up there. He said that once he started working there though, he was fine.
Gary said that the office that they worked out of was really far away from the studio they worked in. He said that he remembered seeing Boy Lee carrying the drum and cymbal that Howard used on the air and how proud he was to carry it for the first time. He said it was like carrying a flag down the hall there at NBC.
We heard a WNBC clip where Howard was starting the show and introducing Boy Gary who had just replaced Boy Lee. He said that he was doing a good job already and getting some projects done for him. He and Robin talked about Gary's look and how he was kind of ''swarthy'' looking. Howard asked him about his family and what his last name was. Gary said that his last name was and pronounced it ''Della-bait.''
Gary explained why he changed the pronunciation of his name. He said that Howard was the one who actually changed the pronunciation of it when he'd goof on him on the air. He said that he likes using that pronunciation now though.
They went into another WNBC clip where Howard was talking about Gary and the work he was doing there. He was handling all of the stuff he asked him to do no problem. He wondered if he was just trying to impress him or something. He wasn't sure. Howard said that he kind of looked like John Oates from Hall and Oates. Robin said that's exactly who she thought he looked like. Robin told Howard that she heard the odd things that they were saying about Howard during the NBC tour. She said the tour guide said that Howard had been thrown out of Washington DC and it didn't sound very complimentary to her.
Howard asked Gary if he had gotten something done for him and it wasn't done so he figured that Gary was screwing up already. That led to him asking Gary about going to Adelphi and how it wasn't the greatest school around. He found out that Gary got an 1190 on his SAT tests.
Howard talked to Gary about his Italian heritage and asked if he was circumsized. Gary said that he was because it had become a hygiene thing by the time he was born. Howard talked about how he thinks that's a bunch of bull and it's not like people can't shower and clean themselves down there. Howard said he wasn't sure if Fred was clipped or not. He thought that he had told them that he wasn't. Robin said she thought that's the way it was.
After that they wrapped up today's History of Howard Stern and promoted tomorrow's show. They're going to talk about Howard's big ratings and the big crashing to the ground when WNBC canceled the show. They wrapped up around 12:10pm.
Please visit Amazon.com for all of your shopping needs.
As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
Jim Forbes came on and introduced David Letterman who was talking about Howard starting at WNBC and how he had first heard about him. He said that he saw a guy in the elevator one day when he was leaving and asked the guy if he could help him. It was one of Howard's fans looking for him. He said that's how he found out that he was in the building. Years later he started appearing on his show.
At this point in the special Robin was cut off and they went right into a commercial break. After the break they went into the next segment so I don't know what we missed there. Sloppy engineering?
In the replay, which started around 12:30pm, they played the full segment so here's what they left out...
Robin said that they used to see Dave in the halls playing with a ball in the halls there and wearing a baseball cap and it was hard to believe that it was actually the same David Letterman they saw on TV. Jim said that Letterman would give Howard and his show the national exposure he wanted.
We heard from Fred who was saying that it was a big deal that Letterman noticed Howard's show and put him on a national show. Howard said it always drove him nuts that he wasn't known around the country. He said that it was his dream to be on radio nationally. He said that he was always told that he couldn't take a local morning show and make it national. He knew that was bull and Dave was the one who took him in and let the country know who he was.
Robin said that they had all grown up watching talk shows like the Merv Griffin and shows like that and they loved when they had guests that had something to contribute. Howard said that he loved talk shows like that when he was a kid and they'd watch shows like Mike Douglas and Merv Griffin when he was going up. He said that was like his religion and he got his comfort from watching that show. He said he took it very seriously when he went on Dave's show for the first time.
Fred said that the funniest thing he saw was when he and Howard got off an elevator on the wrong floor one time. Dave was bouncing a rubber ball off the wall as he was walking down the hall. He said Howard said hi to Dave and Dave started to run down the hall away from Howard. They thought that was kind of odd.
Al Rosenberg said that Howard came off very well on that first show. We heard from Dave again and he was talking about how Howard always made for a good guest on his show. Howard said he liked that Dave would have him on like he did. He was very grateful for that.
They went into an old clip of Late Show with David Letterman where he introduced Howard Stern and had him come out for an interview. He said that Howard represented State of the Art radio in his opinion. Howard came out and talked about why he thinks that he's a horrible disc jockey. He said that he hates the music that NBC plays and he's just not good at playing records. He and Dave talked about NBC and the kind of music they play there. Dave also had Howard tell the audience what he does on his show. Howard said that it's been described as ''honest radio'' and he'll talk to people that send him hate mail and stuff like that. He put the word out that he was looking for a job and if they wanted to hire him he'd be interested.
Howard predicted that he'd be fired from NBC within 6 months. He said that he was fired from a couple of other stations like the one in Washington DC. He said they fired him for making fun of other DJs. Howard talked about how badly NBC was treating him there and how he really deserves more money based on the kind of money he's bringing in for the company. Dave said that he has to listen to the show when he tunes in, he can't tune out.
Howard and Dave went through some of the hate mail that Howard brought with him. They read through a few of those e-mails and Howard said that they will call those people sometimes. They were going to do that on Dave's show but they ran out of time. Howard said that's because of the pet tricks segment they did on that show. Howard noticed the size of one of the animal's genitals and said that his wife was going to be jealous. Dave said that he found it curious that he noticed something like that. Dave thanked Howard for coming on and then wrapped up with him.
We heard a WNBC clip where Howard and Robin were talking about their new boss coming in and how they were afraid that it was going to be another guy like Kevin Metheney. Howard said it was probably some bozo from out of town who was going to tell them how to do their jobs. He said he's going to tell the guy to screw off and stay off his back. He talked about how bad he was expecting it to be when this new guy came in. Howard said he knew it was going to be some douche bag.
That douche bag would turn out to be John Hayes. We heard from Gary who said that they used to have fun with their other boss but when John came in they could tell they weren't going to have any fun with this guy.
In another WNBC clip we heard Howard talking about their new boss John Hayes and how he didn't want to have a meeting with the guy. He said that he did meet the guy but he really didn't want to go into a meeting. He said he had to go into the meeting for about 5 minutes and just get it done. He said he spent about 2 minutes with him and then got out. He said he's a really busy guy and doesn't have time to sit in meetings with general managers. He said he's positive the guy doesn't have anything new for him. He said he was a sales person for some other station and he wasn't going to be any more knowledgeable about radio than he is. There was no point in getting to know the guy.
Howard said he'd heard that Imus had gone to a meeting with the guy but to each his own. He said that he's busy with personal problems and stuff so he didn't have time for that nonsense. He said that the guy turned out to be a real douche bag like he thought he was. He said that the guy didn't have any ideas to push on him though. He liked that. He said he'd like for guys like that to come up to him and just tell him that they have no ideas.
Howard said he told John to just get settled in to his office and then have a meeting with him. He said that he hopes that it takes him a year to do that. He said that the guy wasn't a good looking man either. He told Steve the Engineer that he was better looking than this new guy. He said he was like 4'2'' tall but he was lucky enough to have some hair on his head, unlike the other GM's they've had to deal with.
Howard told Gary to go get this guy John Hayes so he could introduce him to Robin. He read an interview that Hayes had done about this new job he had. John showed up a short time later so Howard had him sit down and talk to him. He asked him about his life and about what his plans for the station were. John said he really didn't have any plans. Howard told John that he doesn't have a lot of time to meet with him and he really has to make a point when he does have those meetings.
After that we heard from Fred who was saying that Randy was promoted and then they got stuck with John Hayes who was also known as the Incubus. He said that he was humorless and never got the show. He said that he didn't care about the show either. He thinks that he was the kind of guy who didn't even need to work and he's not sure why he got into radio. He was all business and that's the way he treated the show. One of the engineers said that he and Fred used to do this demon voice whenever he'd come in and John always hated that.
Robin said that John was one of the least fun people to work with. She said he had a stick up his ass and it didn't move. She said he didn't think they were funny and didn't think that they should be at NBC.
Howard said that John wanted to make his own mark on NBC radio but he doesn't think that he knew anything. Al Rosenberg said that John is the guy who brought team tennis to radio and thought it was a great idea. He said that he also wanted to send Imus to El Salvador to do a show.
Jim said that John declined their offer to do an interview but they did have an interview from 2005 in which he mentioned Howard. They had John the Stutterer read that interview in place of John Hayes.
We heard another clip from WNBC where Howard was talking about how they didn't have any naked girls show up that day. He was saying that he has needs as a performer and he'd like to see some naked women there. He said that there have to be women in the audience who have done stuff where they get naked. He said he won't ask questions, he just asks for a little thing, just some live nudity. He didn't get any, he was burned.
Howard said that he needs to see a naked woman down there or he'll burst inside. He said he'll continue to give his fans great radio but he needs something in return. He said he wasn't going to do anything for the next hour to punish the audience. He said it was just going to be another boring radio show.
We heard from Gary about that segment and how they had some people agree to come in and get naked but no one showed up. Howard punished the audience by doing some bad radio and playing some awful songs like ''Send in the Clowns.''
We heard more from WNBC where Howard was complaining about the naked woman thing and how he was going to punish his whole audience. He said that there's no excuse for this and there has to be a woman out there who will take her clothes off. Once that happens he'll be done punishing the audience. Robin saw someone in the hall who might want to do that but it turned out to be a dud. Howard insisted he was going to keep this punishment going until a naked lady showed up. Howard said that he had a lot of funny things he could have done that day but he wasn't going to do it. He teased everyone with the stuff they were going to do and said nothing funny was going to happen that day.
We heard from Gary who said that the next day about 2 or 3 women showed up to get naked. One of them was a woman who was plugging a movie and another one was just a regular woman. There was another woman who was a stripper. Fred said that he still doesn't understand, to this day, why women want to come in and get naked in the studio.
Gary said that he remembered Howard telling him to put newspaper up on the windows of the studio so no one would see what was going on. He was also told not to let anyone come into the studio. They had to keep people out of the studio and one of the people was an attorney that was working there. Howard insisted that they keep him out and Gary did a good job at doing that.
In the next clip we heard Howard saying that they had 3 girls down there to get naked for them after having nothing the day before. He had the girls come into the studio and then said hello to Maria. He talked to her and then to the second woman who wanted to get naked but she said that the guy with her had to get naked too. Howard asked about the third woman who also wanted to take her clothes off. She said that she had done that many times before. She had a strip-o-gram to read to him too.
Howard asked how the girls wanted to work it and asked if they wanted to take their tops off at the same time. The girls seemed to be up for anything. Howard asked if Bruce and Fred could watch. They didn't have a problem with that. Howard then had them line up and take their clothes off. He asked if they felt bad for him that they didn't have anyone coming in to take their clothes off. Maria said that she drove up all the way from Philadelphia to do this.
Howard said that Maria took her pants off. Then Destiny took her clothes off. Maria took her top off and she had a black bra on according to Howard. The strip-o-gram girl took her top off and flexed for him. Maria was still taking her clothes off so Howard was checking her out. He said that she was almost totally undressed at that point. He told her that she looked really good. She said she used to work in a massage parlor before so she's done that kind of thing before. The third woman, Kathy, was over on Howard's lap. He had her stand up so he could check her out. He said he was in heaven and this was great!
The stripper read her strip-o-gram which was from someone from Clone Audio. Howard said that they were going to have Maria do a Dial-a-Date. She was over by Howard touching him so he had to ask her to stop or his wife would kill him.
Robin said that she was disgusted with this. Howard said that there was a guy in there with his clothes off and he said that this was the only way he could get on NBC so that's why he was doing it. Howard joked that Barbara Bush was going to come in next to get naked.
Howard had Maria sit down to play Dial-a-Date with them. She said that she's a comedian from Philly and her favorite comic is Jackie Martling. She was still naked so Robin asked if they wanted to let her get back into her clothes. Howard said he was enjoying seeing her naked. He said she could put her clothes on if she wanted but he was enjoying her the way she was.
Howard called his mother Ray to let her know what he was up to. She agreed to get on the air but told Howard she was thoroughly disgusted with him. She said the neighbors were out in the street talking about it. She said that she can't believe that people are so excited about naked bodies. Howard said he'd just enjoying looking at this woman's body. Ray suggested that he take his clothes off too then. Ray said that she can't imagine what he's getting so excited over. Howard said that if she could just see this girl, she'd turn lesbian.
Ray asked Howard if he's going to let his daughter listen to this kind of show. Howard said that he knows he's irresponsible but if they want to keep him on the air that's fine with him. Ray said she doesn't feel that women should be doing this kind of thing. Robin applauded her for saying that. Howard kept saying how great it was to see this woman sitting there naked.
Ray said that she likes to hear Howard doing creative stuff and not this nonsense. Howard asked Maria to take off her bra while he was talking to his mother. She did that and Howard said that it was so wrong for her to do that. Ray said she expects more from women of today. Maria said that she was a feminist and she's not inhibited at all. Ray said that it's the way Howard is carrying on over the human body that's so uncreative. She said that no one cares. She told him to grow up. Howard let her go a short time later. They went to break after that.
Howard said that he was in the studio doing the naked bit and some of the guys at the station were trying to get in to see the breasts and Fred did the right thing and kept them out. He said that there were a bunch of guys trying to get in but Fred threw them out and told them to go listen to the radio if the wanted to know what's going on. Fred said he was glad that he was still working there.
Howard said that he wished that he was a fly on the wall to see what was going on around the rest of the station. Robin said there were people with binoculars and telescopes trying to see what was going on. Howard said there were people who were willing to pay to get into the room, it was pretty wild.
Howard said that he got called into a meeting yesterday and he figured he was going to be suspended for doing what he did. He said it would have been hypocritical for them to suspend him though, they were all trying to get into the studio. It's the talk of the town now too. Robin said that they did order up a few copies of the show to listen to it so it may not be over yet. Howard said he'll take it to the supreme court if he has to.
Howard said that you can get good looking girls to do just about anything. He said that when you get that kind of power you go out of your mind. Robin said that power is corrupting. Howard said that the General Manager introduced him to his wife and she wasn't all that nice to him. He said she doesn't seem to know how to treat the talent there. He said that their daughter is 17 months old just like his daughter is. Howard said his daughter is speaking in just about full sentences already and theirs isn't. Howard said that it's basically a gift that they're still there and not suspended. Robin said that she's surprised that they didn't get suspended and they're actually there.
After that segment we heard Howard talking about being at NBC and having that naked woman on the show. That started the whole thing where women started coming in and doing that. He said that the show isn't all about sex, it's about the people who are willing to come down and get naked. He said that they never pass judgment on people like that either.
Robin said that they were just there asking questions and they were aghast that there were people doing this in front of them. Robin said that she was always surprised when they'd have someone come in and get naked like that. Howard said that it's not just about having naked women on the show, it's about exploring reality.
Howard also talked about George Bush's wife Barbara and how old she looks. He was wondering how he can get excited looking at a woman who looks as old as his mother. He was also talking about the tours that they were giving up at WNBC and how he was going to the Carl Lewis Acting School to learn how to act so he can do movies. We heard Dave asking Howard about the naked woman he had in the studio before they wrapped up the segment.
After that we heard Gary talking about the tours that they had at WNBC and how if they saw someone interesting on the tour he'd go out and get them to bring them on the show. They even set up a microphone out in the hall and they'd talk to the people on the tour once in a while. Al Rosenberg said that they'd charge the people $5 to come into the studio and NBC hated that.
Gary said that they ended up doing their own tour up there and he'd go out and get people to pay ridiculous amounts of money to meet the people on the show and to get bags of chips and stuff. Gary said they once had a woman come in and do the news for Robin and charged her to do it. He said they had a lot of fun doing that stuff.
We heard another WNBC clip where Howard was talking about Gary and Al Rosenberg being out in the hall with the group of 18 tourists. They had a microphone out in the hall so Gary told everyone that they were going to charge $15 per person to get into the studio. He was giving them prices for the food and drinks they were selling too.
Howard asked Gary what the women looked like. Gary said that there were about 5 and there were some good looking ones out there. Howard wondered if any of the women were going to sit on his lap. Gary said the women were saying that wasn't going to happen. Howard said he wanted a lap pad of some type if he did have any of them sitting on his lap.
Gary collected some money from the people on the tour. They were charging $40 to talk up a record. The guy said it was only $15 so Gary let him in. Some of the other people were haggling for other things so Howard told Gary to get tough with them and charge the full amount. Gary told the people that all prices were final and that was that. Howard said that he can't be haggling like that, that's why he's got Gary out there taking the money.
Gary said he had already collected $270 from a total of 5 people. There was one woman who paid $150 to come in and do a bunch of stuff. She wanted to sit on Howard's lap but Howard wanted an additional $10 for that. She had given Gary all she had though. He wanted to see what she looked like before he let her do that though. He caught a glimpse of her and said that would be fine.
Gary collected all of the money and came up with $592 from all of the people who wanted to come into the studio. Robin told him to get some more money to bring it up to an even $600. Gary said that he had to collect a little more and it should easily go up to that much.
Howard had two groups come into the studio. One went into the engineering booth while the others came right into the studio. Howard checked out the girls that came in and went right to them. ONE of the women, Laura, paid to do a newscast. She's the one who dropped $150 to do this. She really loves Howard. She said that she loves him even more now that she's seen him. There was a Philipino guy in there who had sent in a song parody for them. Howard had him sing that real quick. Then he moved on to another woman in there. She was with her boyfriend though. He wanted to talk to the other woman that he was interested in but she was in the other group that wasn't in there yet.
Howard talked to Laura some more and had her do the newscast. Robin told her to cover the marathon since that's what she was going to cover herself. Howard asked Laura if she watched that marathon and if they saw the person who had diarrhea. They spent some time talking about that before they wrapped up.
We heard the audio of Howard talking to this woman on the phone about what they were about to do. The woman had her kids with her and said she really hates this voice that she was hearing. She said the kids were in the other room. Howard told her to take off her jeans and he'd tell her when to do what she needed to. He told her to just take off all of her clothes instead of just her jeans.
Howard asked how she could take her pants off while she was on the phone. She said she just used her shoulder. She claimed she had her shirt on but her pants were off. Howard told her to rub her phone on her leg so he could hear what it sounded like.
Howard told the woman to turn up her speaker as loud as she could. It was just a clock radio but he said that should work just fine. She turned it up as loud as it could go and then Howard started to make these deep noises on microphone so it would vibrate the clock radio speaker like a vibrator. He kept it going for a little while and she said she could feel it. She said she couldn't stand his voice though. Howard told her to get back on the radio and he'd do it again. She said that his normal voice sounds nice but he puts on this radio voice that she doesn't like.
Howard told the woman to get back on the radio do he could do it again. He wanted it really loud because he wanted her to get off from his voice. She did it so Howard went into his deep voice again and started making the noises for her and started singing ''Old Man River'' for a couple of seconds. She didn't get off so Howard told her she was a cold fish.
We heard a clip of Howard doing the Mama Lookaboobooday character which was supposed to be their traffic reporter. He'd pretend that he was up in a chopper giving the traffic and would talk over his megaphone. He talked to Robin in his black voice and he'd talk about all kinds of various things. In this clip he was talking to Robin about some stuff he likes to use. Then he was playing his theme songs and tried to do some traffic to the tune of the songs that they were playing. Mama would eventually get to the traffic report and Howard would stick with his voice as he was doing that.
After that we heard Fred talking about the character and how he's not sure where Howard came up with the name. He said he heard that it's a lyric from a Harry Belafonte song. Fred said he's not sure if that's where Howard got it or not but that's the name he used. He said that Howard was able to do that street black impression of a guy who probably shouldn't have been doing the traffic, actually doing the traffic. He said that he's not sure if anyone thought that it was an actual guy or not.
Gary said that one of his favorite Mama Lookaboobooday bits was one where he talked about changing Nebraska's name to ''Neblackska.''
We heard another WNBC clip where Howard went into his Mama character and thought that he didn't sound like himself that day. He went on to talk to Robin for a short time and said he was going to do the traffic for them. He said that he was thinking of forming his own separate country for black people. They'd be moving to Nebraska and forming their own black state. He said that black men could walk around just being themselves there. He said that they can't make it in a white society so they need their own state. They'd all have jobs there because it would be their state. He said that it would be called ''Ne-black-ska'' and the capital would be Lincoln Hayes instead of Lincoln.
Mama talked about how they'd get rid of band-aids and use black electrical tape instead. He said that the flesh color on the band-aids isn't the right color. He also said that the wouldn't have a Supreme Court, they'd have The Supreme's court. Mama said that only pure black people would be allowed there, no white blood at all. Sue Simmons wouldn't be allowed there. He said that only the really dark colored blacks would be allowed in. He said that they might have to let in some of the hot white chicks though. He threw out some names of some hot white chicks that he'd let into Neblackska.
Robin asked if they would have police there. Mama said that they would have to of course. He said that they would also allow drug use but no heroin, maybe some coke. He said that they would bring some white stuff into the state but not all of it. They'd give up the bad white things, like white people. They'd have to buy TVs and things like that since they don't make that stuff themselves. He said they'd have to export stuff to the white people. They'd make fold up umbrellas and maybe batteries and things like they sell out on 5th Avenue. Mama said that everyone in the state would have their own special names and things like that. He went into the traffic after that so he could wrap that up. He had some Donna Summer disco music playing under him as he did the traffic report.
We heard from Al Rosenberg after that. He talked about a small rectal problem that he had one time and Howard talked about that on the air and his daughter ended up hearing about it since she was in high school at the time. He said they all had to learn how to deal with that kind of stuff over the years. They went to break after that.
Howard said that General Manager John Hayes was telling him that he has to get rid of his glasses and shave off his moustache. He said Hayes wasn't there today because he's at home moving. He said that the guy is a jackass but Imus said that he really likes the guy. Howard said he should learn from Imus and just say nice things about all of these guys.
Howard said that Hayes doesn't want him talking about his contract negotiations on the air either. He said that anyone else is allowed to talk about it, just not him. Imus said that he would just walk. Howard said that Imus was doing some nice things and said that he was willing to walk out if they didn't negotiate a contract for him. Imus said that he wasn't going to do it if Howard didn't walk out first.
Howard wanted to keep Imus stuck in there when he told Gary to bring him a bottle of vodka. Imus was in the engineering booth and said he hates Howard and he's not coming in if they bring in vodka. Howard told Imus to have some fun while his girlfriend is out of town and just have a drink.
Howard said that Imus was his good buddy and he wasn't sure what was wrong with him being so nice to him. He said that Imus must be back on drugs. He figured that he'd be back on the drugs and alcohol in just a couple of months. He said that Imus is supposed to walk off his show the next day in protest of his contract not being renewed. Howard said that Imus is friendly to him now but he could easily turn on them. Robin said that she doesn't trust him at all.
Jim said that in 1985 Howard's show was at number one in New York City. Howard talked about how NBC didn't know how tough it twas to be number 1 in the city. He said it wasn't easy to get there. Gary said that some of the people there at the station would stop in and try to be part of Howard's show. Howard said that Imus was never nice to him until he started getting ratings. He said that he wanted to hang out with him. He said that he was kind of tickled by that so he'd let the guy hang out on the show. He said that Imus was coming to their writing meetings and watching the way they were doing all of this stuff. He said it was kind of cool for him though.
We heard another NBC clip where Howard was talking about his number 1 afternoon ratings and how Imus was also number 1 in the mornings. He said that they actually had a higher rating than Imus did and they weren't even on in the morning drive time.
Howard talked about how they weren't thanking him for the ratings and he hadn't even heard from John Hayes this morning. He said that the only reason that they can afford to pay that guy what they pay him is because of his ratings. He said he wanted to call John Hayes and ask him how they're going to celebrate.
Howard called Hayes' office and tried to get John on the phone. He wasn't there so after a quick fast forward we heard Howard talking about John coming down to the studio. He wanted to confront him about the ratings and why they weren't congratulating him on that accomplishment. Howard was yelling at him to come in there and saying that he can do that now that he has a 4.9 rating.
John Hayes showed up so Howard asked him if he wanted to congratulate him or not. John wasn't saying much of anything. The guys in the studio were chanting at John to say certain things to Howard. John eventually said some nice things about him. Howard said that John actually made a tape earlier and he wanted to play that. John said that he wanted to make sure that people knew that it probably wasn't him. They played the clip that they had made up and had Randy Baungarten talking about how great it was when Howard came on board. They had Fred doing a John Hayes impression and goofing on him and what he might say about Howard's ratings. They had a couple of other people commenting on the big ratings and what it meant to WNBC.
After a quick fast forward we heard Howard making a call to Imus and talking to him about the ratings. Imus insisted that he had bigger ratings even though Howard had a 4.9 while Imus was at a 4.6. Howard told him that he's tired of carrying his show on his shoulders. Imus said that in the next book he's probably going to have a 3.1. Howard said that might happen to him but it's not going to happen to his show. Howard said that people counted Imus out but he came through with some ratings this time. He said that it was Al Rosenberg who was counting him out but Al chimed in and said that it wasn't him, he loves Mr. Imus.
Howard said that Imus actually thanked him for letting him come on his show because it reminded people that he was still around. He said that he was giving him some credit for the ratings. He said he had some tears in his eyes when he heard that from the guy.
Howard said that he thought Imus was losing it there for a while but now he thinks that he's doing okay. He said he was mumbling a big on his show. He played a clip of Imus on his show mumbling about something and goofed on him about that. Howard said he's mumbling as much as Tommy Hearns.
After that we heard Robin talking about how much attention they were having paid to the show. She said that Imus finally realized that maybe he should be interested in the show. She said that Imus was copying some of the stuff they were doing on Howard's show. They were using Al Rosenberg to do this Sue Simmons voice and Imus would have him do the same thing on his show. Al said that Imus really did rip him off and if Imus took the jokes it was like they were his because he was big in the ratings at the time. Howard would let him do that because it was his job and he had to make money somehow. Gary said that Imus was even calling Howard's mother on his own show. Robin said that Imus was sticking around and going to their meetings and even coming in to do their show with them every day. They had to throw him out after a while because he didn't want him there anymore.
Howard said that Imus claimed that he didn't get anything from his show but it was so obvious that he did. He'd like some thanks from the guy. He said that he's Imus' master and he should suck his dick after he taught him so much.
We heard another WNBC clip where Howard was talking about how Imus had changed his show over the time since they started there. He said that Imus started talking a lot not too long after he started there. Imus was playing 6 songs an hour until he heard the show and how he was only playing 3 songs and hour. Howard took a call from Imus and he called him an asshole. Howard had to dump out of the call and knocked him off the air.
Imus called back in and said that he's way off on him. Howard said that he likes Imus but he doesn't like when he does stuff like that. Howard asked Imus if he ever got any ideas from his show. Imus didn't answer and said that he was just about on his way out of town when he started there.
We heard from Fred about the whole Soupy Sales thing. He said that Howard was actually a fan of Soupy's but he never got that whole thing himself. He said that he didn't think that Robin thought much of him either. We heard from Robin who said that she only knew him from some appearances on some TV shows when she was growing up. She never saw his kids show or anything and didn't know much about him. She said that Howard was very excited when they booked Soupy on their show in Washington DC. She said that he came on the show and he was reissuing his song ''The Mouse'' and it was no big deal to her. She said she looked at Howard and asked ''That's your hero!?''
Robin said that when they went to New York they were fighting to get some respect at WNBC and the show was just starting to roll when they hired Soupy to work there. She said that once Soupy walked in, he got the car, the office and the sponsors sending him lunch like they had gotten over time.
Howard said that he was very bitter at the time because they gave him everything he wanted right from the start. Howard had to work for the stuff that they gave Soupy right away. He said it was a bad time in his life and he took it out on everyone there. Gary said that he disagrees with Howard on that stuff and he doesn't think that Soupy and his people were all that great. He said they gave Soupy everything he wanted right off the bat. He said that Soupy was kind of a pain in the ass right off the bat to him.
We heard a clip from some Soupy Sales show. Then we heard more from Fred, Al Rosenberg and They were talking about how Soupy was claiming that he was ripped off by shows like Saturday Night Live. Al was saying that Soupy would complain about people there and there would be a line of people waiting to apologize to him every morning. Fred said that he doesn't forgive Soupy at all. He was always snotty to him and once asked Boy Lee why he was talking to Fred when he said hello to him. Fred said he did nothing to the guy and Soupy was the one who was a dick to him. He said he took it to heart and said he was going to remember that. Al said that they used to call and cancel Soupy's flights and jerk him around as much as possible.
Gary explained how they used to get food from this restaurant that they were getting lunches from. The place was a client of theirs and Howard felt like Soupy and his people were really taking advantage of them. Howard went off on Soupy after they had left a mess of food in the studio one morning.
That led into another WNBC clip where Howard was starting his show and complaining about the crap that was in the studio. He said that he's all for Soupy being there but his people left a mess in the studio. He wanted to call Soupy's office so he could complain about the mess. They had left pineapple, chicken and more stuff in the studio. He ended up calling this guy Dale and asking him to put Boy Lee on the phone. Dale called Lee in there and told him that Howard had a problem. Howard asked him if he was done cleaning up in there. Lee said he wasn't done yet. Howard went off on him about the food, coffee cups and other crap that was in there. He said he was already 15 minutes into his show and it was still a mess. Lee gave him a bit of an attitude about having to come in and clean up that stuff. Howard said that it's not his problem, they clean up their mess after their show so everyone else should do the same.
Lee called Soupy to the phone. Howard told Soupy that they have to learn to clean up in there. Soupy said that he told Lee about that and he's absolutely right. He said that they called an emergency meeting and they had to go do that. Howard wondered what was so important that he couldn't clean up the studio. Soupy told him he was right because that's the way he'd expect the studio to be for him.
We heard from Boy Lee who said that he had spilled salad dressing on the floor one day and that's what set Howard off. He wouldn't let it go but Soupy backed him up and told him not to go in and clean it up. That led to Howard threatening to cut the strings to the keys on Soupy's piano for every set amount of time he didn't come in and clean it up. Gary said that they didn't know how dangerous it was to cut the strings in a piano because they're strung so tightly. He said that Howard did cut one of them and that's when Soupy really freaked out.
We heard another clip from Howard's show where he was talking about the cutting of the strings. He told Al to tell Lee that if he didn't come in and clean up, he was going to clip one of the strings on the piano. He said he was going to pop one of them with his hand if they didn't get in there and clean up. He was plucking at the strings and banging on the keys as he was talking about it. He told Soupy that he has to get his people in line and he won't have this problem.
Howard asked where Lee was and Fred said he didn't see him anywhere. He asked where Soupy was and said he'd better call before he actually breaks the piano. He called his office again and tried to get him on the air. He got someone by the name of Ray on the line and asked where Lee was. He explained to him that they had asked Lee to come in and clean up an hour ago and he still hadn't come in. Dale showed up to clean up but Howard told him to get out. He wanted Lee in there instead. He told Ray that they were going to cut the strings on the piano if they didn't get Lee in there. Ray said he'd do that and asked him for a minute to find him.
Howard spoke to Dale who said that it's his fault and he put Lee on another project. Howard didn't like that because he had asked Lee to come in there and clean up. Howard showed Dale where he was going to cut if they didn't get Lee in there. Dale asked what was causing the stench. No one was sure, they just knew that some salad dressing had been spilled. Dale wanted to clean up but no one knew what to clean up because only Lee knew where the spill was. Howard told Dale that he's not sure how they work with them there. They cause so much tension there. He suggested that they fire him.
A little later we heard Howard asking for some wire cutters so he could cut the wire on the piano. He said that if he has to work with the stench in the studio then Soupy has to work with a handicap, a broken piano. Fred had gotten Howard some wire cutters but Boy Lee was seen out in the hall. He didn't make his way into the studio though. It was 4:05 and time to cut the wires. Howard found the right wire to cut and asked Fred where he should cut. They looked for the wire and pounded on the keys for a few seconds an then Howard snipped the wire. He thought that he had clipped the wire but couldn't find the right key. Then he finally found it and said that the A note was dead. Howard ended up cutting three wires.
Boy Lee claims that Howard never actually cut the wires. He said that they were pretending to cut them and Soupy was going crazy out in the hallway. Howard that's right, he was just trying to drive Soupy insane by claiming that he was cutting the wires. He said that it was great radio and Soupy took it personally and he really didn't mean for him to take it that way. He said that he was just getting shit on so badly back then that he was in a bad, bad place mentally. They went to break after playing a quick clip of Rev. Bob Levy and Beetlejuice having a strange conversation about Howard being Beetlejuice's bro.
We heard from Don Buchwald who said that he had heard about Howard before he met him but he had never listened to the show. He said that people always came to him, he didn't go to them so he really didn't know anything about him. He said he got a call from Howard asking if he could come to see him. Don said he said yes and had a meeting with him.
Howard said he went to Don's office and got to talk to Don himself. He said Don told him what he thinks he should be making and that his career was more important than Johnny Carson. Don said that Howard was very interesting and he had never worked for a large company so he knew what Howard was going through working with a company like NBC. He said Howard had this persona that was pissing off a lot of people because he was doing things in his own way.
Don said that Howard was a wonderful guy and had a wife and kids and had to pay his mortgage. He wanted to achieve more but he was being held back. He said that he was ready to help him out. Howard said that Don told him that he was going to change history with his career. He said he was going to go in and double his money with NBC. Howard thought he was nuts. He said he went home and spoke to his father and a friend and told them that he wanted 10% of his money. Howard said that he didn't think that he should give the guy that much money. Don gave him a hard time about that.
Don said that the first guy he called was Mel Karmazin and asked him if he knew who Howard was. Mel knew him but he couldn't hire him because he was still under contract with NBC. Don said he called Bob Mounty at NBC and told them that he was representing Howard. They thought that was great and they wanted to get things on the right track and get Howard under control.
Don said he went to this meeting at NBC and talked about his contract. He said that he told them that he knew they had some problems with him but they needed to work out the contract so they couldn't just fire him at any time. Don said that they told him that they could only go so far with the contract because they were a corporation. Don said that he was going to establish a way to stay in contact with Howard and to keep him under control. He asked them to upgrade some of the elements of the contract. He said that way Howard would see that they were willing to give him a pat on the back for what he was doing. Don said he told Howard not to change a thing about his show. Don said that they were willing to renegotiate even though Howard was doing all of this wild stuff, so he told him not to change the show.
Don said that he worked out another deal with NBC so he could get some good raises and they couldn't just fire him. Don said that they couldn't just fire him and stop paying him. They were in a 4 year deal that said they'd have to pay him if they did fire him.
They went into another WNBC clip where Howard was talking to John Hayes about the new contract that he had just signed. Howard asked about the champagne toast they were supposed to do for him after the signing.
We heard Howard talking about how his agent wondered why he wasn't calling him every week. Howard said that he didn't know that he should call that often and he was embarrassed that he wasn't making enough money and that he had signed a contract to do a TV show called ''Live From the Porcelain Palace.'' Howard said he told his agent about it and Don got him out of the deal. The guy who was producing it ended up dying so he didn't have to do it anyway.
We heard a promo for the song parody contest that they were planning and everyone on the show talking about the upcoming trip and how they were going to have some fans coming with them out there.
Robin said that's what the people had to do to go on the trip. They had to win the song parody contest and they'd get to perform the songs on the show. Robin said that there were a bunch of women who were planning on sleeping with Howard that weekend. They were determined to find Howard but they had him hidden and it never happened. Gary lucked out though. One of the hot chicks on the trip slept with him to try and get the information out of him. Gary said that he had a lot of fun that weekend.
Robin said that people think that they're wilder than they are and some of the people got busted for skinny dipping in the pool and things like that. She said they found the band Pig Vomit during that trip and they became their unofficial band for a while. She said that they never again let the listeners know where they were staying though.
That led into a clip from that L.A. Trip where Howard was talking to David Hasslehoff. David said that he had Howard had gone to high school and college together but he they really hadn't. Howard talked to David about his TV show ''Knight Rider'' and about his wife and stuff like that. Howard said that he's a good looking guy and he must have guys hitting on him all the time. David said he had been married for just over a year at the time. He said she's in 3 episodes of Knight Rider and doing some other stuff with him as well.
Howard and Hasslehoff talked about the kind of money they have to pay their agents. David also has a manager and a publicist so he's paying out even more money than Howard is. He even had a hair dresser there with him so he introduced him to Howard.
We heard Gary and Fred talking about how Jay Leno was one of the big guests back then who actually did the show. They said that Jay was one of the cool guys who wanted to do the show and treated them pretty well back then. Gary said that Jay showed up on his motorcycle that day.
In the next clip we heard Howard talking to Leno on that L.A. Show. Jay and Howard talked about a bunch of various things and Howard had one of the girls come up and say hello to him. He had her show him her bathing suit. Howard said that she gave her number to Harry Reams but she didn't want to show Jay anything. Jay said that it was a beautiful suit. Howard told him that she ''shaves that thang'' down there.
Howard noticed that the woman had shaved a little too close and caused some irritation down below. He said he had to take a break and he'd come back to talk to Jay some more. They edited out the break and Howard talked about how one of the guys that was on the trip with them had dragged John Hayes across the floor the night before. Howard said that was even worse than Belzer being dropped on his head.
Howard spent a few minutes talking to Jay about David Letterman and how he was supposed to hang out with him but he never called. Howard wanted to create a new Rat Pack with Letterman, Leno, Dan Aykroyd and a bunch of other people. He was throwing names out left and right.
After that we heard Gary talking about how Robin yelled at him for the first time when they were on that trip. He said that she wanted all of the New York papers so she could do her news from those. He said he went out to try and find them but they didn't have that stuff. He said he ended up buying the papers from the say before and Robin took them and threw them on the ground saying they weren't good for anything.
We heard Al Rosenberg talking about how they had run into the Letterman people who were flying out to L.A. To do shows out there. They have a week to get there, they do a week of shows and then they get another week off to rest. Meanwhile Howard's show had to fly out, do a week of shows and then do more shows when they flew back. it was just another example of them being treated like shit.
Fred said that Howard was going to march into that office and ended up walking in and Hayes wanted nothing to do with it. He didn't see any humor in it at all. Howard ended up seeing some stuff on his desk and saw what everyone was making at the time.
Robin remembered hearing all of the stuff that was going on at the time and how John lunged at him and she yelled at him to lunge back at John. She said that Howard was just fooling around but John was really upset. Fred said that he wasn't sure what happened exactly but he thinks that there was some kind of wrestling match going on. He said that may have been one of those things that pushed things over the edge and they had no allies after that. It wasn't going to take much to get them kicked out of there.
Howard said that it was a mess there and he knew that it was a mess. He said that he demanded to see what everyone was making and pushed his way into his office. He said that it was good radio but he doesn't think that John appreciated it.
We heard a clip from that day at NBC where Howard was asking where john was and tried to get in touch with him in his office. He complained about John being busy hiring other guys there at the station and not taking care of him. He said that those other guys are probably getting paid big money. He said that there are a lot of inequities at that radio station. He said he needed a microphone and just couldn't get one.
Then Howard called John's office and asked his secretary to put him on the phone. She said he was busy in a meeting but she couldn't say who he was in the meeting with. Robin said there's no way he's in a meeting. Howard tried to convince her to talk to him but she refused to go into his office. Howard told Gary to go back and find out if he was really in a meeting. Gary said he had his door closed with a privacy sign on the door.
Howard sent Al and Gary down to the office to knock on John's door. They did that and told John that they were ordered to go down there. They came back and told Howard that John was mad and they might need new jobs. Al said that he didn't give them a chance to say much of anything.
Howard said he had a message for John but it wasn't going to be clean. She didn't want to hear it so Howard hung up on her. Gary told Howard that John came out really serious and told him that this wasn't funny. Howard and the guys were talking about some of the stuff that John may have been doing in that office all alone. They joked that maybe he was beating off or maybe doing some kind of devil worship since they did refer to him as the Incubus once in a while.
Howard said that he could go back there and talk to John on the phone. After a quick fast forward we heard Howard planning on going back to John's office. He told Robin that he was going to call them from the phone in his office and then knock on his door. Robin figured that he was going to be acting like a father and telling him he wasn't allowed to do what he was doing.
Howard headed down to John's office to do this thing. Robin said that this was going to be great and John was either going to freak out or end up doing some physical violence to Howard. They got the call from Howard a short time later. He had to lower the radio back there and then said he was going to yell first and not bang on the door because that's rude. He yelled for John and John came out but no one else was in the office. Howard asked John to come on. John said that this was great radio in a sarcastic way. John said he was busy working on some stuff and he didn't want to come on the air. Howard told him he wanted a new microphone and he needed to talk to him.
Then john tried to close the door on him. Howard started yelling at him saying he can't treat him like that. He said that John was back there and looking like he was about to cry. Howard said he won't come out of his office now. He yelled at him to come out and talk to him but John wasn't coming out. Then he popped his head out and told Howard to go back and do his show. He said that this wasn't fun for anyone. Robin said that it was fun for her. John said he wasn't having fun and then he saw Howard run into his office. John told him to get out of there. Howard said that his secretary was looking really nervous.
Howard said that John pushed him and called him a douche bag when he picked up his phone to use it. He said that the secretary saw him do it too. She refused to say if he did or not. Robin said they might be able to call the cops if he actually pushed him.
After another fast forward Howard was back in the studio and said that it really drained him of all of his energy. He said he had an on air confrontation with his manager and ran back to his office and yelled at John Hayes to come out of his office. He said that John was totally annoyed and he called and yelled at him afterward.
Howard called John's secretary again and asked if John was still there. She said that he had gone to a high level meeting. Howard figured he was trying to get him fired so the secretary gave him a ''no comment'' on that. Howard figured that he was up trying to get Randy to fire him. He called Randy real quick to try to head this off before he gets fired.
Howard waited on the line for a short time and talked about what he was going to tell Randy when he got him on the phone. The secretary, Bernadette, got back on the line and said that Randy was in a meeting and John Hayes hadn't been up there. Howard told her to give Randy a message and to tell him that John is lying about what happened if he hears anything from him. He asked her to tell him that if John calls up to Randy, don't put him through until he speaks to him himself. He said that whatever happened wasn't his fault either. Howard said that he also has tape of John pushing him around and calling him names.
Howard said that she should also tell Randy that John is plotting to get rid of him. He said that John is the Incubus and he will do anything he can to get rid of people there. Howard had her read back his message and had to correct her on a couple of things. He told her that she had to tell Randy not to talk to John before he talks to him.
Howard let the secretary go and then saw John's secretary leaving. He stopped her and asked her where John was. She said that he was upstairs. He spent a minute talking to her before they wrapped up and went to a break.
We heard a clip from WNBC where Howard and Robin were talking about John and how he was bragging that he knows the character names in ''Animal House'' like that's really cool. He said that it's just not cool though. They goofed on John about that for a few minutes. Howard wondered how that guy can like that movie and not like his show. He said that the stuff they do in that movie is even more ''lower common denominator'' than his show is.
Howard heard that John likes the character Flounder from the movie and ended up goofing on him about that. He said that John is trying to be a hip guy by telling them that but it's really not cool. Al said he's not even sure how that subject came up. Fred said that he was just trying to be one of the guys by blurting that out. He said that he Gary and Al were just hanging out having a good time and he came over and brought that up.
Fred mentioned John's wife at one point in a negative way so Howard told him to leave his personal life out of this. He said that she had nothing to do with this and she was a nice person.
Howard said that a Golden Retriever is an attractive dog so he's not surprised there. He said that the guy is a dog lover. Another caller said that he was a dog lover too. He said he had sex with a mixed breed dog and he was around 15 or 16 at the time. He said he didn't have intercourse with the dog. Howard cut him off and said that he was a prime candidate for this Dial-A-Date. He said he thought he was going to get calls from women who had done things with animals, he didn't know he was going to get calls from guys who actually did stuff. The caller kept saying the word intercourse so Howard had to ask him to stop using that word. Then he threw out something about a dog penis so Howard had to put him on hold.
We heard from Al and Howard about the Bestiality Dial-a-date thing that they did and what was going on around that. Howard said that Randy was okay with it at the time. Management came to them after that and they weren't too happy with calling it ''bestiality Dial-A-Date'' they wanted them to call it something else. He said that he's pretty sure they didn't want them to do it at all but Howard went ahead and did it. They ended up calling it something other than Bestiality Dial-A-Date. They called it Dog Lovers Dial-A-Date.
We heard a clip from that dog lover Dial-A-Date show. Howard was talking about how it was still going to be funny even with the change of the name. He said that he thinks that the censorship going on there is because of this Tipper Gore woman. He said that it should blow over in a few months though.
Howard brought in the guy who was going to play the dog lover Dial-A-Date thing. The guy was a 19 year old and a nice looking guy. Howard told him not to touch him when he came in. He asked the guy if his story was true or not. He said that part of it was true but he didn't want to say it was fake because he didn't want to get kicked out. Howard spent a short time talking to the guy but he wasn't allowed to talk about the dog loving stuff.
Howard asked for the women to call in if they wanted to date this guy. He said the guy seemed to be a little spaced out though. He said that he wanted to start his own computer software business. He said that he started it already but he needs more money to get it going.
Howard talked to the 19 year old about school and found out he's going to a local school that wasn't all that great. Howard figured he might be a little dopey. He took some phone calls after that and one guy was going off on Howard and the guy they had playing the game. A woman called in and didn't think that she was talking to Howard. She claimed to be 19 but Robin said there must be a 1 in front of that number. She sounded much older than that. Howard hung up on her and then they heard a caller barking like Dino from the Flintstones. Howard went to another call and found a woman who said that she would date this guy. The kid said that he's actually just 18, not 19 like Howard kept saying.
Howard said that the kid looks like Ralph Macchio but he said he's been told he looks like John Ritter. Howard went through some more phone calls and tried to find some girls to play the game. There were some people that the player just didn't want to play.
Howard eventually found a bunch of women to play with this guy, Richard, who has been a dog lover. He went to the first woman on the phone, Theresa, who claimed that she was 19 and works as a clerk. Richard had problems with some of the woman and the jobs they were working. Howard said that he shouldn't be putting any of them down, he's going to Kings Boro College.
Howard went through the contestants but Richard kept asking weird questions like ''When's your next period?'' Howard told him he was going to kick him out of there if he kept that up but then asked the woman to answer it anyway. She didn't answer it. Howard had her barking like a dog for this guy. He wondered if she'd jump through a hoop for him too.
Howard moved on to the next contestant, Jean, and asked her some questions. He found out that she's not into giving up sex that easy. She also lost her boyfriend to another woman that he ended up marrying. She also told the guys that she once had sex while hanging in a sex swing. Howard wanted to know what that was all about. He knew what she was talking about when she described it in more detail. He asked her to bark for them but she didn't seem to want to do it. Howard got her to moan a little bit instead. She didn't want to do that either so it was very quick.
The next contestant, Marcy, was 19 years old and said that she used to work in an animal hospital. She was wearing a peach and white jumpsuit with stripes on it. She gave her weight, breast size and height. She also said that she had a gall bladder operation one time. Robin thought that was kind of young to have something like that done. She said that she had gall stones from eating a lot of junk food. She said she likes junk food from fast food restaurants and stuff. She also claimed to have big eyes. Richard said ''... like a dog?''
Howard told Marcy he wanted to have her pretend to be in a shower with this guy but she didn't want to do that. She whined that she didn't want to moan for him. She didn't want to bark like a dog either.
Howard wrapped up and asked Richard which woman he was going to pick. He quickly picked number 1. Howard picked up on her and gave her the good news. She owns 3 dogs so Howard asked if that's why she won. Howard said that this date should be heavily chaperoned. Howard broke the news to the other women and wrapped up the Dial-A-Date. Howard asked the guys to get Richard out of there before he lost it. He said he was one weird kid.
Jim Forbes said that one week later, on September 27, 1985 there was a hurricane that hit. It was the calm before the storm though. Howard said that he knew he was going to be fired but couldn't imagine how it would actually happen or when. He said he was very shocked and scared when it actually happened. They went to break after that little teaser.
We heard a clip of that final show where Howard was talking about how he was sleeping on his couch in his office through that hurricane. He said he was hoping to be on the air during the storm but they came in later in the day.
Robin said that Gary's dad could have come in and made some good money selling ice cream today. Howard said that Gary's mother had put one of those religious statues in her house with a silver coin taped to the bottom of it. Gary was also talking about how his father has only missed 2 days of work in his life. He said he's just like Howard's father who didn't want to miss a day of work.
Howard said that he didn't think that they were going to be doing a show today and they were going to have people doing news reports. He said that Dale was telling him that they were up all night with news bulletins. He said that no one even listens to that station for news.
After that clip we heard Gary talking about how Howard got upset that day when he found out that Soupy Sales was getting a syndicated show. Howard got pissed and started calling management and threatening to quit. Gary said he thought it was ironic that Howard didn't know that it was his last broadcast and he was yelling at these people that it was going to be his last day because he was going to quit.
They went into another WNBC clip where Howard got the news that Soupy was getting a syndicated show. Gary and some other guy were giving Howard the news that this was a true story. Gary said that they talked about it on the air and they were congratulating Soupy on his show. Howard thought they were jerking him around because if it was true, they were getting up and walking off the show.
Howard called Randy Baungarten to ask him if this was true. He called his home number and got a busy signal. Howard then said that he wanted to call John Hayes about that. He tried calling him and threatened to leave NBC if it was true that he didn't have a syndicated show and Soupy did. He asked John Hayes to come on the air with him but John refused. Howard swore that he'd be nice to him so John agreed to come on.
Howard asked John why he didn't show up to work. He said he didn't know what the weather was going to be like. Howard asked John if it was true that Soupy had a deal to do a syndicated show. John said that as far as he knew he didn't have an agreement. Howard thanked him for that and was about to hang up. Then he said that he heard that Soupy went on the air and said he had the show. John said that he knew nothing about it. Then Howard asked him to swear to the sacred mother that he didn't know and he did that. He said there's no way he was going to lie about that because he's a religious guy.
Howard kept asking John about the syndication deal but John said that nothing had been formalized yet. One of the guys there said that he knows that it's finalized. Howard told John that if it's true, he got his wish, he's out of there. John said that's not his wish. Howard said he was going to call Randy and ask him about it too. Howard said that no one is going on that network before he does. He can't let that happen. Howard told John that if he leaves, that station will be in the toilet bowl. He said that they don't need him, they'll do just fine without him. He let John go a short time later.
Howard tried to call Randy Baungarten after that but he got another busy signal. Robin told him to try it one more time. It still didn't go through. Howard said he'd not sure what's going on but his agent better get his ass up to Randy's office on Monday morning and find out what's going on.
Howard asked Gary if he's sure that this was happening. Gary said that he was told that the deal is done and it's definitely happening. Howard said there's no way his friend Randy would do that to him. He said that maybe he really is a traitor and a scum bag like the rest of the people who work there. He said that guys come in and rip off his ideas and then they get a national syndication deal.
Howard freaked out and said that he's not sure where Imus is but he thinks that both of their agents should get together on this. He said that Imus has turned into an old turd. He tried calling Randy again and said that he's supposed to be his friend and there's no way he would let this happen to him. He got another busy signal. Howard asked if Bob Mounty was around so he could ask him. He needed to ask someone about what was going on and there had to be someone there who was running the place.
Howard said that he may have to go to ABC or WPLJ or somewhere like that so they can crush this station. He tried calling Bob Mounty but couldn't get through to him either. He said he's not going to be humiliated by this network again.
Howard called Dale to ask him about what was going on. He wasn't able to get him either. Howard said that he's going to retire from radio if this is true. He said he has to give up if that's the way they're going to treat him. He wasn't able to get in touch with anyone up there no matter how many times they called.
Howard finally got through to Dale and asked him if he knew about this deal. Randy said he knew nothing. Robin said that they're all saying that they just haven't heard anything, they're not denying the deal. Howard asked Dale what his ratings are. Dale told him he's at a 5.7. He asked what Soupy's ratings were. He said that they were a 2.7 and Imus was at a 3.9. They were getting a 1.2 overnight. Howard said that his numbers are the biggest there and he should be the one who is getting the network deal.
Howard and Dale talked for a few minutes but he was denying the deal just like everyone else was. Howard told Dale he was going to have his resignation if this story was true. He let Dale go and kept talking about how he was going to leave if this was true.
Howard and Robin were talking about how much they hate that place. Howard took a call from a guy who said he heard the Soupy Sales show and he was saying that he was told to keep quiet about the deal but he let it out on the air. The show was going to start on April 1st and he had John Hayes to thank for it. Howard said he's not going to work until he gets signed to a network deal. He said that this is like a knife in his back and it's going to be his last show there if that's the case. He said he's got offers from other stations and he's not just doing this for the money.
Howard ended up telling their traffic guy to get out of the studio because he wasn't going to do that tonight. He told everyone to shut up except for Robin. He said that it was nice entertaining the people listening to his show and he wasn't going to be around anymore. He said he might move to L.A. and get out of New York City. He said that they're just jerking him around there at NBC and telling him they're working on a network show.
Howard took some phone calls and had some fans asking him if he was serious about walking out. He said he was and he was going to leave as soon as he had confirmation that he wasn't getting that deal that Soupy was. A bunch of callers were getting Howard even more worked up over the whole thing. They didn't understand how they could treat him like this getting the huge ratings that he was getting.
Howard asked Gary what he had to say about this. Gary said that he works for Howard so he'll go wherever he goes. He said he's got nothing to lose because he's got nothin' at all.
Howard took a call from the guy who won the Dog Lover Dial-A-Date thing and he said that no one had called him yet. Howard told him that it takes a while to get that done, it's not going to happen overnight. He needed the show a short time later.
We heard from Randy Baungarten after that. Randy said that he was told to get rid of Howard when he got to be too much of a handful there. They went to break after that.
Gary talked about how Dale was all worked up and trying to get Howard to come to the meeting as soon as possible. Howard was shuffled off to one meeting room and Robin was taken to another office. Howard was in a cast and down on his luck as far as that goes. He was told that he had to sit down because he had some bad news for him. Robin said that she was in John Hayes' office and it was just her and him. She said that John told her that things were not good and they had just canceled the show. Robin said this is radio, not television, shows don't get canceled. She said that she couldn't believe it and asked if they were not doing a show today. She wondered why they didn't call them and tell them instead of letting them come all the way into work.
Gary said that he asked Robin to sign some pictures and she took them, threw them at the wall and said ''fuck that.'' Then Howard came in and he broke the news to everyone that the show was done. They were all shocked but Howard calmed them down and said that they had to get everything together so they can move on.
Gary said that Howard told him in private that he was the best producer he had and he'd see what he could do with him in the future.
Howard said he wondered if he was going to be able to work in the business again after that. Fred said that it was a bad time for the firing and he really couldn't believe it. Robin said that they had the number 1 show on the station and they still got fired. She said that they once walked out of a meeting where management was trying to talk to them and she thought it was a bad idea. Howard didn't think that they'd fire them because they had a number 1 show.
Howard said that Don Buchwald walked in and told him that he was free and they were going to have people bidding for his services. He guaranteed Howard that he was going to have a great career after that. He thought Don was nuts but it turns out he knew what he was talking about.
Al Rosenberg said that Don told him that was the best thing that could have happened to him and he was right. Robin said that Howard hadn't hired Don too long before they got fired. He didn't get much of a chance to work with their bosses before then.
Howard said he was about 30 years old at the time and he just had a baby, a new house and he had just gotten fired. His agent assured him that it was going to be fine but he wasn't sure if he was going to be able to work again.
Don Buchwald said that he got a call from Randy Baungarten telling him that they were going to fire him. He said he had a firm contract with WNBC so they were going to be paid for that 4 year contract. Don said that when he went down to visit Howard he wanted to make him feel as good as possible and brought a bottle of champagne and told them that things were going to be fine. He said that they needed any support they could get at the time. He said that Howard, Robin and Fred were all clients of his and he knew what to do. He said that he was actually kind of anxious for that opportunity and it turned out it wasn't such a bad thing after all.
Gary said that Howard and Robin had a car that drove Howard and Robin to work every day. They called for it but it didn't show up to take them home. Robin said that they were trying to hail a cab at rush hour so it took forever to get one. She said that people were walking by asking how they were and they had to tell people that they had just been fired.
Gary said that he actually wasn't fired from NBC. He was asked to stick around there so Howard told him to stay there until he found out what he was going to do next. Gary said he did that and stayed on with them for a while. He said that they just didn't fit in there at NBC so it was probably best that they left.
Howard said that he didn't have any bad feelings toward Randy who was the one who actually fired him. He said he knew that he had to do what his bosses told him. Gary said that there were rumors about who actually gave the word to fire him. He thought that it was one of the higher ups who heard the show one day and wondered why he was on their flagship station. Al Rosenberg said he heard that it was grant Tinker's wife who was offended by something that Howard said. IT turns out that was confirmed years later on Tom Snyder's show when tinker told him that he did think that Howard wasn't the right guy to speak for WNBC.
We heard a clip of Grant Tinker talking about why he handed down that order to fire Howard. He said that he would probably still fire him even after all that happened.
Gary said that they left behind a lot of boxes of stuff there when they left so Howard asked him to get it out of there. They had seized a lot of that stuff. Fred said that they were afraid it was going to be locked down and they wouldn't get that material back. He said that it was all written on paper bags and stuff like that. Fred said they wanted to get the archives out of there but they couldn't ask them for it.
Gary said that his buddy Big Frank came down with his old van. They drove it to Fred's house and waited until it was late at night and then went to WNBC and loaded up all of this stuff to get it out of there. Fred said that they thought that they had an alarm going off at one point but it turned out there was no alarm and it was just the megaphone that was in the box that they were moving. He said their hearts were beating like mad for about 10 minutes after that.
Gary said that when they were done there was only some dust left on the floor. He said that he wasn't sure what they were going to tell security if they got caught. They were on their last trip out when this security guy stopped them. Fred said the guy asked for change, he wasn't trying to stop them or anything. Gary said that they got the hell out of there after that and then hid the truck in his back yard. The next day he drove over to Howard's house and emptied it there. Fred said he still can't believe they got away with that.
Gary said that the one thing he remembers talking to Al about was how they were going to look back at that time and think that it was The Golden Age of Howard.
Fred said that he was offered the chance to stick around at NBC and he really had no prospects. Robin said that they didn't get much info from Don who was working deals all over the place. She said that he was asking them to give him a few months and he could make something happen if he had that time. Fred asked Howard if he anted him to quit. Howard told him to stick around as long as he had to. Howard said that he was offered the chance to go to L.A. To do something out there for NBC. He was still under contract with them. He figured that he was unemployable anywhere else.
Fred said that Howard was getting more and more depressed as time went by. He said that Howard was okay at first but his outlook got worse and worse. He said that he thought it could be the end of his career.
Howard said that they have about another 10,000 hours of this stuff they could go through. He said that he wanted to thank everyone who worked on the special and everyone who was interviewed for it. He said that there were too many to thank individually but he did that for Dr. Lou and his parents. He also thanked some of the guys who had kept archives of the show. They have Part 2 in the works already. He said they'll have that for everyone in the near future. He said that he had to thank SIRIUS too because they could never do this without them. The special was over around 12:15pm.