My dog, Maisie, was right on time back on the morning of April 8th, nuzzling me awake just after 4am. But this time I told her to go back to bed. “Dad doesn’t have to get up early today,” I said. I rolled over and went back to sleep for a while before getting up to start a new day, and a new phase of my life. Two days before, I’d closed out my radio career and entered retirement.
I’m now in my second retirement, actually. The first was 2019, after pulling the pin at Social Security. That lasted five months, until Tom Koser called me and asked if I’d be interested in doing some football games for his radio stations that season. Why not? Football led to basketball and hockey over the winter, then to a part-time studio slot in the spring, and eventually a full-time job. Finally, though, in the fall of ’23, I decided that an extra four-plus years was enough. Rice Lake’s victory in the state football championship game sealed the deal. Every sports announcer wants to end his career by calling his team winning the title, and I was one of the rare guys who got to do it. The ensuing basketball and hockey season would just be a bonus.
So it was that 35 years of radio came to a close on April 6th, with my wife Sue at my side, emceeing the finale of the Party in Paradise contest. A fitting end, since she’d been there at the beginning. On my first day at WJMC, May 20, 1991, I’d called her on the air to talk travel. What did I know about travel? I’d never been anywhere. Tom suggested I go down to her office to meet her. Three days later, I did, and my life changed.
When the radio bug bites someone, it tends to hang on a long time. Several alumni from the UW-Platteville radio program of the late ‘70s are still in the business. I could’ve stuck around another year or so, but I knew that eventually I’d have to make a choice: retirement, or maybe dying on the air. The second option wasn’t very appealing, so I chose the first.
I never thought I’d wind up in small-town radio, much less in northwest Wisconsin. When I was growing up down in Grant County, anything north of La Crosse was the wilderness. As for radio, one of my first instructors at UWP told us we’d all start out in small towns, and some of us would never leave them. “Doc” Gauger knew we didn’t believe him, yet he counseled us to remember that small-town and rural listeners are just as deserving of quality radio broadcasts as big-city and suburban folks are. As for my own radio road, after a swing out west to Montana, I returned to my home state in La Crosse, then went north to Menomonie and finally to Rice Lake. Every time I opened the mic, I kept Doc’s admonition in mind.
I’m sometimes asked why I never got to be the “voice” of the Badgers, or some big-time team. That was my goal at one time, but in life some doors open, some don’t. The door that opened to the northwest led me to the love of my life, and I wouldn’t trade that for a dozen Rose Bowls. I’ve met network broadcasters and while they have glamorous jobs (for glamorous money), they’re living out of a suitcase a good part of the year. Occasional trips to Madison or Appleton were enough for me. Over the years, I called 14 state championship high school games in four sports, plus three small-college national title games in football. Not a bad legacy to leave. Could I have stepped up to call the Badgers? Sure, but the pressure, the travel, the inevitable season-ending defeat…no thanks.
So, what’s next? Rehabbing a repaired foot, followed by training for our climb of Mt. Kilimanjaro this fall. More novels and blog posts to write, and afternoons on the deck with a good book, the Brewers on the radio, a glass of wine with Sue. My dad once told me, “Every day is Saturday.” He was right.
A Strenuous Writer's Life 