Stories From Sam – “The Sign Off” Part 1

The Sign-off

My radio career began in the Summer of 1963 when I attended a broadcast school in San Francisco, and I got my first paying job ($110 for a 6-day week) in February of 1964, at the tender age of 17. My first shows were nervous comedies-of-error, but as I settled in, I thought that, just like my favorite DJs, I needed to have a sign-off. My idol Don Sherwood would sign off with “Out of the mud grows the lotus”, and Emperor Gene Nelson first signed off with “Put on the coffee, Bubbles – I’m coming home”. And after Bubbles wasn’t home anymore, he said “Totskiddaha”, the meaning of which is unclear to me but probably means something like “good life”. My absolute favorite sign-off is my friend Brian Copeland’s:

“Be kind to your neighbor – he knows where you live”. Admittedly mine wasn’t all that original: my idol Dick Clark signed off from American Bandstand with “Dick Clark – so long”. So, I decided mine would be “Take care and so long.” Over 50-plus years, this was how I said goodbye at the end of my shift. Through stints at KPER, KTEO, KDON and KCBS-FM in San Francisco, I said goodbye with those words. It wasn’t until I had been doing PM Drive at KIOI for five years that a “consultant” decided to change things. Renowned radio programmer Al Casey decreed that nobody cared about the personalities, just the music, so we would no longer be allowed to say hello or goodbye on our shows at KIOI. My first time being “signed off” – fired – came later in 1981 when Casey decided that I wasn’t a team player.

Sam At KYA WithGene Nelson &Gary Mora

My next stop was up the street at KYA “The Personality Station,” where I was once again allowed to be myself, and where personalities were still respected. I was happily working there when KYA’s Ken Dennis signed me off in 1984, saying he wasn’t sure how to replace me, but he would have to figure it out. To be fair, I had made Ken’s job difficult with my own erratic behavior, and shortly after being fired, I entered a drug rehab facility in Oakland to straighten myself out before I was most certainly going to be signed off by the risky lifestyle I had been living. For the next ten years, I signed on and off at KNEW in my usual way: “Take care and so long”. KNEW was a top-rated Country Music station, and the perfect fit for someone who was trying to settle his life down and rehabilitate. It was an awesome time for me, supported by some broadcast talents I had admired for years, like Frank Terry, who had been a big-time Boss Jock at KFRC and KHJ, and the unstoppable Steve Jordan, who had worked with me at KYA and KIOI, and seemed to bring the ratings up wherever he landed. I learned a great deal just by observing them. After a decade at KNEW, I was offered a spot at KBBG “Big 98”.  Big 98 was a rock station that focused on the biggest hits of the 1980’s, and after years at a bucolic job on a mellow Country station, I was uncomfortable with Big 98’s frantic pace. The great Oldies programmer, Bob Hamiltion, decided to sign me off in 1996, replacing me with the legendary John Mack Flanagan, who was an iconic “name” in the Oldies format. How Bob did it was special: I had heard rumors and instinctively sensed that I was on the way out, so when Bob ordered a new jingle package, I went to the Production guy and asked to hear mine. He could not find it, so I went to Bob, who denied that he was replacing me. On the day he fired me I went to the General Manager, who also denied any knowledge of it. That day at 5 O’clock, in the middle of my 3-7PM shift, Bob came in and said “OK Sam, you know the drill – come with me. Poor Steve Garland was hiding in a doorway, stuck with having to take over. I had cued up “Shaft,” because I knew I was getting the shaft, and for my last act on Big 98 I played it as my non-verbal sign-off. I was five days from my 50^th birthday – scary-old in radio back then.

Next stop, KFRC, where I did fill-in and Public Affairs off and on for several years. In the middle of that period, I took a job doing a morning show in Sacramento for three years, and the way we were “signed-off” was fairly typical of radio in the 90’s. Clear Channel owned COOL-101 in Sacramento and our “Breakfast Club” had taken the morning ratings up from ninth to third in the demographic when Clear Channel decided to dump Oldies from their portfolio of radio stations. A programmer with the pseudonym “Steve Rivers” made the decision. It was a Monday morning and my producer, T-Rex, said he heard we were finished.

STAY TUNED FOR PART 2 – COMING NEXT WEEK!