This is excellent. I grew up listening to him on WOR. We listened to Shep as a family. I can remember listening to him in the family car driving through NYC in the 60s. We were all hams in my family. I totally get this!!
Wow! WOR! I was one of those kids who hid the radio under the pillow and listened to Shep on school nights unless a Yankee game was on another frequency. On Saturday nights the "Old Man" and I would listen to him from the Limelighter(?) night club, I believe. Great memories. "77, WABC!" Cousin Brucie, Scott Muny and who can forget "Sunday is Fun Day at National Speedway!" HA, HA! Great times, pre Vietnam. We were so young and generally happy. Guess every generation feels the same...
So I'm a teenager kid, living just outside of Philly, and listened to Shep on WOR in the mid-60's and I am aware that this guy is funny, thoughtful, and a seamless artist able to weave divergent strands of thought into a monologue you would listen to for 45 minutes (right after the top of the hour 15 minute newscast). Shep lived on for 30+ years after that, did musicals, movies, books, and TV but those shows at that time- mid 60's-was Shep at his absolute best. Thank you for the posting.
AHHHH..That wonderful voice from WOR. I have to wonder how many other kids hid a radio under their pillow after bedtime, just to listen to the greatest purveyor of most eloquent schmooze ever to grace the air. Thanks For The Wonderful Memory. Flick Lives.
I got my first novice ticket as an 8th grader in Metuchen New Jersey because I fell in love with ham radio through listening to Shep...WN2WRA. Later, N8DXZ when I moved to Michigan.
It was around 1977 that I remember working Jean on 2 meter FM from my then QTH in Richmond Va. He was passing through town and I recognized the call and so called him. Dan WA2CLP
me too. he had just come out with A Christmas Story and was making the trek to Boston on the interstate (3 miles from my QTH). Worked him on 146.52. Recognized his voice and chatted for 5 minutes before the logjam of fans converged
I fellow dorm dweller at IU from New Jersey told me about Jean Sheperd in 1970 or so. Robbie wanted to become a doctor. Hope he made it. He said that Jean was a legend on the East Coast. This only clicked with me much later/
Thank you for putting these up. He was not my era and is so entertaining to listen to. My era was computing and technology related to computing much like in his era, it was radio. I would have been obscenely obsessed with radio much like he talks about if it were my generation. The passion for it is so relatable. I'm licensed but there is really no commercial viability in radio anymore, it's unfortunately dying and as such remains a hobby.
@SpaceshipElvis I had a tiny AM transistor radio that I kept to listen to the 9:15 and 10:15 shows for a bunch of years. I even have a flat spot on the top side of my left ear from that radio. Excelsior!
@SpaceshipElvis I was one of those with the radio under the pillow. Tried to be a ham, but my hearing sucked so much I couldn't learn Morse. Now, even regular broadcasting doesn't require a license, which is why radio has gone down the toilet. When I got my license, as a college soph, my girl friend threw me such a fun party to celebrate. We broke up the following May, but that's one memory of her I have never lost.
And then amateur radio tests, like nearly every sort of test, became "multiple choice". So all you had to do (from then on) was recognize the correct answer - instead of actually knowing the correct answer. And the question pools for the various levels of license, from which the questions on the test you will take, including the identity of the correct answer to every question, became easily available. So all you had (have) to do is memorize the correct answers. Even the code test was eventually eliminated. All this in a effort to draw more people into the hobby. I guess it worked. Hey I have an extra class license myself!
This was a REAL hobby that guys had (and some girls, too!):) That, and stereos --- how many of you guys had a stereo when you were about 18 and had a stereo as a hobby?:)
What you mean Was?! :-) But yes! We need more YL hams. On that point (that women just don't understand...), ol' Shep was wrong wrong wrong! I've only been a ham for 31 years, since I was a 14 year old rotten kid myself...and love cw. Even after 20 meter phone. @@stillayl
I grew up with Shep every night and we discussed it the next day when i was in High School in Brooklyn. Do you all remember the night he had us put our parents radio facing out in an open window and shushed everybody and then Screamed 'I hate this stinking neighborhood"?-Jay, K2PBS
