Hello and thank you for joining me for this very special presentation: A Conversation with Bob Sievers.

I'm Jane Avery Doswell.

Bob has been the voice of WOWOland this area for a number of years.

Many of us can't even remember growing up without hearing his voice on the radio.

In fact, he's our own local Walter Cronkite.

Many of us have heard Bob do his presentations over the past, telling us about his experiences in broadcasting.

And we want to share some of those with you tonight and also maybe get Bob to expand a little bit more on on some topics in terms of thoughts that he had in the past or maybe what he's thinking about is going to happen as we approach this new millennium.

But anyway, whatever we end up discussing tonight, we know it's going to be very interesting to everyone in the audience, because Bob has just been such a legend and a local gem for us all to enjoy.

So join me now as I introduce to you Bob Sievers.

Thank you, Jane.

Thanks for being here tonight.

It's a pleasure to be here tonight.

Normally, I'm out speaking on my 50 years in radio.

Mm hmm.

Actually, it's been a lot longer than that.

But I want to tell you how I got started in radio.

Would you like to hear that?

I do want to know that.

First of all, when I was a boy, there were three major makes of radio.

Philco, Atwater & Kent, and Majestic.

And what inspired me to becoming an announcer?

The old Majestic hour they had is their theme song, Pomp and Circumstance.

You know that in the background, the announcer would say, from the boundless, everywhere comes the magic name Majestic, mighty monarch of the air.

And I would rehearse that and tell my mother I'm going to be a radio announcer someday.

She said, Robert, get that out of your mind.

You're going to be broken hearted.

I can't send you to college.

I don't want you to be broken hearted.

I said, Nothing is going to keep me from that.

Oh, don't talk that way.

Well, anyway, I spent my entire life on the south side of Fort Wayne and the Gospel Temple on Rudisill Boulevard, broadcast on WOWO.

And I hung around there and got to carry the microphone from the choir to the minister.

They had only one microphone.

And to me, that was the biggest thrill in the world to carry that one microphone.

I thought, Oh, if I could only talk.

How old were you then, Bob?

About 13.

And so I got to carry the microphone there and be and one day.

And they were also on the air in the morning, on the morning radio Bible class.

And one day the radio operator didn't show up and they thought they couldn't go on the air.

I said, Well, I can put you on the air.

They said, Do you know how to run all these controllers?

Oh, sure.

I had it all memorized in the old days, for instance, I knew I could run a streetcar.

I'd see the old motorman take the big river, go round this way, and we'd go.

We've got to stop.

He'd bring it back and use the air brake the same way on the radio controls.

I ran the.

I became the engineer and the broadcast went fine.

Then one day, WOWO said, if you could, just the tempo, if you could have somebody say in the station on the air, we wouldn't have to bring an announcer in.

So I said, I will.

So every morning, all through high school, I carried by Route 64 Journal Gazette paper out on Bozer and Oliver from Mckey to Rudisill, so that I would go to the Gospel Temple and sign onto WOWO and then go to school.

Do you remember what your sign on was for that?

Did you write it yourself and all?

Yes, but we were we were on 1160 kilo cycles and and, uh, after I signed on and our first broadcast this morning was the morning radio Bible class from Rudisill Boulevard in Fort Wayne.

And I, when I graduated from high school, the I would go down on what was door every two weeks and I knock on the door for a job and they would say, No, we are not hiring.

They're pretty sure that I could get it.

So there's that doggone kid again.

Tell him to get lost.

And so one morning after the broadcast, Paul Rader said, Well, Bob, you believe the Lord answers prayer, don't you?

And I said, yes.

He said, It was just kneeled out here on the rug and pray that you get into radio.

So we did.

And he put his big have on the back of my neck.

And I almost had that goose pimply feeling like the power of the Lord was right there.

And we prayed that I would get in the radio and two days after that prayer and I had been knocking on WOWO's door for two years.

My phone rang at home and they said, Are you Bob Sievers?

And I said, Yes.

He said, We just wondered if you had ever thought about getting into radio.

And they said, We heard you do a commercial on the back home.

Our the other Sunday evening.

So had I ever thought.

But nobody can convince me beyond any shadow of a doubt that it was an answered prayer that I got into radio.

Oh, well, I certainly think it's and I speak to career days to boys and girls all over the area graduating from high school, and I'll ask them what they want to do.

And I said, well, I think I might be a lawyer or I think I might be a doctor.

And I would tell them, Forget it.

No, what you want to do beyond any shadow of a doubt and work to that end and pray to that end and nothing can keep you from being what you want to be.

Mm.

And then I ended up telling them my favorite sentence I got from Glen Steeping in my Foster Park Lions Club.

A ten word sentence made up of two letters, each word.

If it is to be, it is up to me.

That's absolutely right.

I'm going to have to have a sip of coffee.

My mouth is getting ready to go right ahead and do that and that.

Anyway.

Well, Bob, WOWO they called and asked you if you'd ever thought of that of getting into radio, did they realize they were talking to the kid?

They'd been down there every two weeks?

No, no, no.

Well.

Oh, no.

When the when I went down there.

No, they didn't.

They said, well, you look familiar that they found out.

I might mention the one unusual experience I had on the platform of the Gospel Temple.

This was in 1938, and I think this gentleman was about a year or two older than me.

I was there on the temple platform with him and he was auditioning to be the next minister of the Gospel Temple.

Paul Rader had just left and they were interviewing him, along with Clifford HAVERFIELD, whom they did hire, and they turned this young man sitting beside me down, and he was brokenhearted.

And he said, I said, Oh, that's a shame as well, Bob, I'll make it someplace else.

And the young man whom they turned down and didn't think had any chance of being a success as a minister in life was none other than Billy Graham.

Oh, you're kidding.

Oh, I'm not.

So those are the I have lots of those stories to tell at the end of the program today.

I did want to mention that, Jane, some of the early stars that I worked with and I know many listening tonight will remember some of these stars, Ambrose Haley and Little Mary Lou.

And I understand little Mary Lou has grown up and now lives up somewhere around Rome City.

And I'm sure somebody will remember her.

Joe Trim the Black Hawk Valley Boys.

Norm and Bob, Nancy Lee and the Hilltoppers.

Kenny Roberts.

The famous yodeler.

Howard Roper.

Fact I thought of him as I drove down Broadway, coming here to the Old Yokel Supply on Broadway.

His old homestead there.

Happy Herb Hayworth, Fitz and the Fellows, Jean Brown.

The old songsmith Jay Gould.

Sorry.

And Elmer was Shirley Bowersox.

And by the way, she's still living Rosalie Robbins.

Margaret has been Fern Gable, Hilliard Gates.

I could go on and on.

And these are all Fort Wayne people, all local Fort Wayne talent.

I did want to mention one thing.

You know, even in those days, Jane, we had serials story as the soap operas.

Oh, okay.

I announced three of them.

One was Linda's first love.

In fact, I think she had about 17 loves while I was there.

A dancer.

Oh, wow.

One was Mary Foster, the editor's daughter, and one was one man's family.

So I'm sure that'll bring back memories to others.

Oh, I'm sure some of the early announcers.

I worked with Lester Spencer, Joe Reilly, whom I understand is still living in Fort Wayne and calling square dances.

J. J. Howard Ackley.

John Hackett.

Bill Robins.

And I could go on and on.

We had one news announcer, Bob Wilson, who always signed off his newscast by saying 73 and good night.

Would that mean I was going to ask you if you knew that now?

Well, 73, because I'm a radio ham, an amateur and a 73 an international Morse code means best regards.

Mm.

And so and as means best regards, we say 73, whether it's in Chinese or German or you name it.

So he always said 73 and best regards at that same time on WLW Cincinnati Peter Grant would always sign off by saying good night.

And thirties and 30 and international Morse code is end of transmission.

Oh wow.

So but people did what they always it why does he say 30 or why does Bob say 73.

Now did you have a signoff code like that or No.

No, I didn't.

I would just go into my last number of the most of the time.

I didn't even have time for my theme song.

But I had a man on the street program for 25 years in Fort Wayne.

Mm.

From Calhoun and very the Barber Corner.

Actually, it was from the many corners.

We started out at the old Roxy Grill.

Then we went to the Emboyd Theater.

It was envoy to those days or not Embassy?

Mm hmm.

And then Golden Sands, where the grand leader Garner the last 20 years, was from the barber corner of Calhoun and Berry.

But in all kinds of weather, even that were ten below zero, I would be out there.

One moment.

One moment, please.

Do I to people.

And the thing is, in those days, downtown Fort Wayne was crowded.

We all ate at the last 2 minutes.

I didn't want to disappoint anybody.

The last 2 minutes I'd go around.

Let's see who else is here today.

And I let each person give their name so they could go home and say, Did you hear me on the radio?

And that would be a big deal.

Yes, it was.

So I enjoyed that.

It's kind of sad to see that Fort Wayne, the downtown.

I mean, if you did that today, you'd have a very limited group of people that I'd have to talk to.

The first stray dog.

Yeah, that's right.

He talked about the stars You.

You got the chance to interview.

Is there someone that you wanted to that you never got a hold of?

Yes.

Who was that?

The probably Bing Crosby.

And why did you want to talk to him?

Well, because I had listened to him all my life.

He was in every decade.

He was the top star.

Mm hmm.

And when I was interviewing these stars at the policy rate interview of Charlton Heston, Perry Como and people like that.

Wow.

Charlton Heston, by the way, was just a budding artist in those days.

And what I always really wanted to interview Bing Crosby, but I never got to do that.

Were any of these people that you interviewed, did they were you just kind of star struck by him and just kind of lost yourself in that one as usual experience?

I always liked Orrin Tucker's orchestra and the vocalists with him was we Bonnie Baker?

And I think she had the song Oh, Johnny, Oh, Johnny.

And and I always liked we, Bonnie Baker.

And I never thought that someday I would be kissing her.

Oh, this happened at Northwest.

I can't remember the name of the nightclub, but it was Christmas Eve and or New Year's Eve.

And they had the mistletoe hanging in the lobby.

And she called me over after we finished the band and gave me a New Year's Eve kiss.

I thought if anybody would ever taught me someday I'll be kissing wee Bonnie Baker.

You know?

So some of your dreams came true?

Yes.

I want to talk about the ratings.

You might wonder why my ratings were so high.

Well, I think you're wonderful.

But I suppose they.

They based it on more than that.

But the 5 hours I was on the air, I consider this you're 5 hours, the listener.

And anything I could do to help you?

I did, for instance, of a little elderly lady who brought lost her dog.

I would have it on the air.

It would only take 10 seconds of my time.

But if I could help her find her dog, maybe that was her whole family.

Oh, sure.

And I know in my life what?

But my dogs.

I. Even though I have a family.

Mm.

Finally, one day, the manager called up the Sievers.

If you put any more dog announcements on the air, I'm going to let you go.

And lo and behold, the next morning, this little elderly lady had lost her little brown dog.

I said, Folks, I have a heck of a problem this morning.

I said, The boss told me that yesterday if I put any more dog announcements on the air, I would be fired.

I said, What?

You know, a little elderly lady has just called me from rudeness Boulevard.

I've lost a little brown dog and I'm not allowed to talk about it, but I'm talking about you, Snake.

So I said, I'll tell you what I'll do.

I have her name and telephone number and I'll stuff it in my shirt pocket when I get off the air.

If you find this dog, you call me and I'll tell you.

And we got her dog back for you.

And it got to be a standing joke.

Jay Gould would come in for the Little Red Barn in the morning.

They'd look at my shirt pocket receivers.

You got any more lost dogs stuffed in your shirt pocket this morning?

I had then, for instance, I was out speaking that all the time and I spoke to a number of hitting secretaries one night and they said, Bob, if you'll just give us the degree days in the morning, all 300 of us won't have to call the weather bureau as a degree days what the heck are they?

Well, now when you hear them give degree days, they have to be computed after the day has passed.

Let's say yesterday the temperature averaged 40 degrees or you would subtract 40 from 65 and we would have had 25 heating degrees yesterday If the temperature averaged 65 the whole 24 hours, we would have no degree days.

It would only average zero.

We'd have 65 in Fort Wayne.

On the average winter, we had 6205 degree days.

Wow.

And of course, in the summertime they have cooling degree days, you know.

Right.

But so I knew every morning when I gave that degree days, I would have those 300 ladies tuned in.

They wouldn't have to make the telephone call.

So I was helping them in the fall of the year, I would help fishermen going up to Lake Michigan.

I'd say the trout are running this particular week, up such and such a river.

Next week on such and such a river, they'd go.

The fishermen lady would call me the first robin was sighted.

Usually they'd come back in February.

In fact, I saw Robin in my yard the other day out here at Winters that I thought, he must be awfully stupid.

He hadn't gone out of here.

But a lady, you know, robins carry birdseed.

They can't.

Oh, no, no.

Robin's got birdseed and they can't eat.

They can't dig the ground for fish worms in the wintertime.

So they are only fruit and meat eaters.

So this lady would tell me, when you see Robin, I tell my listeners, for goodness sake, from the first Robin, show up.

Don't throw them in the yard, but take raisins and put them on the sidewalk that's clean where they can see them.

And I that's one reason.

Three years ago, I hated the move from my old home.

I had the same Robin come back to my yard every year for six years in a row.

The reason I know it was the same Robin you'd have a white feather in his right wing and his right wing hunting down a little bit about the middle of February.

Harriet and I'll be sitting there having our coffee.

Say, look, look, look.

I look down and here's the robin with his nose at our door saying, Hey, Bob, I back at the races in those days, we have transcriptions to that were 16 inches in diameter and at 33 R.P.M.

and if I they were all all of our commercials recorded on transcriptions as well.

So I would have to take a stack of transcriptions like that.

Maybe the Chevrolet spot was on.

Transcription 17 Cut B I'd have to and I'd have to hunt that up at the biggest the three biggest changes, I think in radio when we went from transcriptions and records in 1947, tape was invented, Uh, and now that same rather than hunting through the stack of records, I put out the Chevrolet spot cartridge and put it year to press the button.

Now, did you think that was a great advancement?

So I was like, Oh my gosh.

And my last story tonight, I'll tell you, will be involved with tape.

So the invention of tape, from a technical standpoint, the invention of tape and transistors to me were the biggest changes in the entire industry.

Had you foreseen or thought something like those things would come around or or did you just know that it was going to progress to that?

No.

Before a few years before we had tape, we had wire the old web car wire recorders, but it would get all tangled up.

No, I never I didn't foresee that.

Mm.

But then some of the other big changes in radio in addition to the development of tape, was the development of FM broadcasting and then FM and stereo.

And a few years after that was television.

But those three big changes.

But my last story will involve tape also.

But those were the biggest technical changes.

Now, from a programing standpoint, in those days, everything was music, talk shows weren't even heard of, you know?

Mm hmm.

And then maybe 15 or 20 years ago, talk shows started and they're quite popular now.

All you have to do is tune across the band at night.

But another thing that's shocking to me is shocked talk radio.

I was going to ask you about that.

Do you think talk radio is added any quality to radio yet?

It has from from a number of standpoints, but not from that standpoint.

My favorite talk show host, one of those Bruce Williams at night out to an across the land I like him is the Bruce Williams or Jim White out on KMOX St Louis or Michael Reagan on WOWO at 9:00.

Mm hmm.

And my wife thinks he's a character, but I think he's he's fascinating.

From midnight to 5 a.m., I've always tuned to Art Bell.

You listen to the radio all night?

Well, the other way.

If I don't have the radio on, I can't go to sleep.

I think of all the things I do to borrow.

Oh, I listen to talk show.

5 minutes, I'm asleep, but maybe 2 hours later I'll wake up and I'll.

I'll listen again for a while, but.

So I like talk radio.

But the shocking thing to me is some of the language and the stories you hear on some talk radio.

I, I think our morals are going down the drain.

And I said, if we don't start improving 100 years from now, I think our country will go the way of the old Roman Empire.

We're just lowering our standards continuously.

Mm.

But I like good talk radio.

Why do you think that's happening?

Is it?

People just don't care.

They confuse that with freedom.

Or what do you think it is that makes the.

And why do people listen to that?

I'd have to give that some thought.

I don't know.

I, I have a lot of ideas.

A lot of good.

So very good.

Our morals are going down the drain, though, and it's it's just shocking what some people get away.

I can remember when I was a disc jockey years and years ago, if a hit record came out and it had the word hell or damn in it, we would touch it with a ton of bricks.

Mhm.

Or else we would record it and edit that part out.

Mhm.

Now that's nothing compared to what you hear now, you know.

Oh absolutely.

But.

So I don't know.

But that's the shocking thing to me is the way our morals have changed.

I was talking to my daughter Cynthia.

It's like last night, the rest of it when I saw you.

Yeah, She said, Daddy, she thinks the pendulum is going to start going the other way.

They're going to start cleaning things up.

I sure hope so.

I sure hope so.

Are you surprised, Bob, that radio has remained as popular as it has with all the.

Yes.

Yes, I am.

Because when the TV first came out and when FM first came out, I felt that that that especially AM radio was going down the drain.

But now that huge piece of pie with all of the dozens of stations they're programed to.

One group likes this kind of music.

They're going to have that station tuned in.

So it's individual programing.

But I think I think radio has come back.

It's almost as strong as ever.

Mhm.

Because what I am frankly surprised that it came back like it did and I would think you might be a little surprised too when you listen to the radio today that some of the sounds are coming back like the swing, you know.

Oh yeah, my daughter's in high school.

Oh yeah.

The big band swinging.

Yes, the big bands are beginning to come back.

So maybe like my daughter said, that's the pendulum beginning the other way.

I'll get that for you.

Oh, by the way.

What?

I dropped the news.

That what I told you?

The Billy Graham story.

Yes.

That was a 1938.

Yep.

This is said to be in the mail the other day.

I got it from Bob Henchin, my neighbor over on River Hayes.

Why did Emily Canvanaugh break her engagement to William Franklin Graham in 1938?

Says because she wanted to marry a man who was going to about do something and didn't think Billy Graham was ever going to make it.

Oh, are you?

I used to tie that in with my story.

Huh.

I wanted to tell you what a lot of people in Fort Wayne will remember.

My old music teacher.

And she was a favorite friend of mine.

And I remember all of my teachers, by the way, was at Harrison Hill School, was Verna Mae Zeigler.

And when I was in the eighth grade, our Glee club was going to broadcast and they auditioned two people to be the announcer.

I was one.

And Richard Shannon, Judge Shannons son was the other.

I'll be darned.

You may be listening tonight if you are high tech, have that.

So she picked Richard Shannon because he was from the South Park area.

And Judge Shannon, the son.

And and I was really a nobody from the other side of Lafayette Street.

So on her deathbed about ten years ago, my call rang.

My phone rang from a lady at St Ann's nursing home.

Just Bob, would you come out to see your former music teacher, Verna Zeigler?

I said, Well, yes, I see her about every three months.

Take a route.

She said, Well, she has something.

She says she wants to confess to you.

And I thought, What in the world by music did you go to confess?

So I went out and she held my hand and she was on her deathbed.

She said, Bob, do you remember in high school when I picked Judge Shannon's son to be the announcer for our Glee club and turned you down?

It's just I sure do remember that she said you were broken hearted.

I said, Yes, I was.

She said, For 40 years I listened to you and J on the Little Red Barn.

And every morning when you're on, that comes to my mind and I regret that I didn't pick you to be the announcer.

Had I have done so, I would have felt that maybe I had a little part in your being a success on radio.

So little.

And I think back when I was in the eighth grade at Harrison Hill School and my teacher turned me down that 40 or 50 years later, she would be apologizing to me for not going to be the announcer.

Mm hmm.

Those are some of the unusual things that makes me think I come from.

I'm a Catholic.

I come from a Catholic background.

When you said confession, you just couldn't get away with that, could you, If you were Catholic?

Everybody knows your voice well, it's, you know, it's comical.

It was like last night my wife went out.

We're going to a straight whether when Muncie, Indiana, or cold water bet you're going to write Ohio and we're all going that's really not I'll keep your voice down.

You know when I write that somebody will come.

And, you know, I don't think I'm using my announcing voice when I'm talking.

But they remember and I always do your voice and I always have in my pocket here a picture because they'll come up.

Want me to sign a paper napkin?

I said, Well, better that I'll give you a picture.

Oh, how nice.

That's I was going to ask you, how many times have you been able to go out and order a meal or probably going through a drive thru, which is something you can't do that you have been able to sit down, order a meal, have people at the next table hear you and not be interrupted.

I mean, does all get to eat in peace?

Oh well, yes, but the thing is, almost every time I'm out because I've never learned to hold my voice down too much, I guess.

But I don't mind that I feel honored that they do remember me.

It's a compliment.

I'll bet they do.

And rather than sign a paper napkin, I'll say, Well, better than that.

I'll.

I'll give you a picture of just the life away when you get home, you know, talking about your school.

And you said that you went to Harrison Hill.

You know, I feel a kinship there because I volunteer for junior Achievement and that's the school I go to.

And if it is, I'm going to start doing that again in February for Mrs.

Helmke, our mares Oh, yeah, sure.

Yes.

For her class.

Well, I'll tell you about two things about Harrison Hill.

First of all, I would have been the first student to walk in Harrison Hill when a girl was walking up the sidewalk with me and I opened the door and left her in.

Oh, I was in the third grade, I think, when Harrison Hill opened.

While you were definitely the first gentleman to walk into Harrison Bell, But and the only time I was ever in a play in my life was on the stage at Harrison Hill.

And I had the part of bad English, bad English and that and I only had one line in the play.

They called me up in front of the judge and they would say, Bad English.

What do you have to say to the judge today?

And my only line was, I ain't got nothing to say to nobody.

So I remember the play.

I was in it.

Harrison Hill I went to kindergarten in South Side High School.

Kindergarten in South Side.

High school teacher was Esther Erickson.

Mm.

And the first and second grade.

Then at the third grade, Harrison Hill was built that I went to Harrison Hill.

Mm.

So then you went back.

Oh sure.

I knew you were from South Side because I saw you at that big homecoming that they had a couple of years ago.

That 75th?

Yes.

When did you go to college?

No, I never had a day of college.

Oh, you're kidding.

I wanted to go to college, but my father had died.

There was just mother myself.

Mm.

And I wonder what I learned by doing.

I bet you did.

And I've done everything that you can imagine.

Well, how did you and Jay Gould pair up and get together?

What did you know?

Well, you see.

Well, j a came while I was.

He came as the old songsmith.

He taught boys and girls to sing.

He was a good musician and a wonderful poetry writer to an author.

But he came.

Then I got called away to the Navy, and I put in four years in World War Two.

Oh, you did?

Oh, yes.

And then I came back and they said, The Jay Gould is our farm director, and I about laugh my head off the farm director.

He's a song leader and he always wore spats over his shoes.

I bet you didn't even once.

That's after of you.

Only because I was in marching band.

All right.

Okay.

And he had glasses.

He would put on his nose, and I called him a stuffed shirt.

What?

I have the greatest respect for him, but I mean, in those days.

But when he said he was our farm director, my gosh, I don't think he even knows what a cow looks like.

But J at about six different college degrees.

And he was very, very active.

And he got every day on his desk.

He'd have all the latest releases from all of the agricultural colleges.

So he was getting his education every day and he was just a brilliant man even in farming.

MM So I and if it wouldn't be for Jay, I would never be out speaking because he kept twisting my arm.

I had to give the Gettysburg Address one time in school, and I was frightened, scared to death at Jason's even.

You've got to get out and meet the people.

This happened three years ago at 125 in the morning on Sunday morning.

I'm listening to WJR Detroit, and the announcer said, Folks, we have some sad news to bring you tonight.

He said, A fellow I grew up with an announcer WOWO.

In Fort Wayne died yesterday and his name was Bob Sievers.

Dear, I think God didn't wake me up.

Start pinching yourself.

I believe our goodbyes.

I think I'm still alive.

So I thought, I can't let that go.

So I called him up.

I said hi.

As a soldier?

Yeah.

He said, Who is this?

This is Bob Sievers.

It was a long pause.

He said, Well, you sound like him.

He says, Where are you calling from?

I said, I'm calling from heaven.

It's long distance.

Yeah, but he got me mixed up with Jack Underwood.

Oh, right.

Jack Underwood had just died from Alzheimer's.

Mm.

And the lady got me mixed up, and she told him that I had died.

You guys were great friends all along, weren't you?

Oh, yes.

In fact, to this day, my wife has dinner with Jack's wife, Pat, every Wednesday.

Mm.

Well, you used to do that with him, didn't you?

I did that every Wednesday with him because I remember I still go out every day.

I still go out every Wednesday now.

Yeah, You hit it.

Uh huh.

Well, Jack and I would alternate.

We'd go to Lambros one Wednesday and Zolis the next Wednesday.

And then when Jack left us, some other buddies got together, Ron Gregory and Don Chevillet.

A lot of us meet together on on Wednesdays.

They know either every Wednesday, they don't make it every Wednesday, but now runs a favorite of mine, too.

I just Oh, I love his voice.

I could just listen to him for hours.

Well, and I you know, he's going through some hard times right now for a week.

You know, about that?

His cat is sick and that's his whole life.

Rochester.

Oh, no.

He had to take Rochester in for an operation, and we're pulling for Rochester.

Oh, well, we'll remember Rochester, I told him.

But I'm on the right track.

There's the SPCA.

And when Rochester does go to sleep, finally, be sure to come out the SPCA and we'll fix you up, get a new one.

But Ron is just a great fellow and he's he's a good showman.

How long were you and J together on the air?

About 40 years.

Oh, my.

And, uh, uh, he he always, uh, put me on.

Oh, my mother didn't like him at all.

Oh, really?

She'd say, I heard that old jingle.

What he said about you today.

I said, Oh, Mom, he was just kidding.

J As a showman, I think anybody who has put down the audience feels sorry for that person.

It builds them up.

That's right.

And he was being kind to me.

But what my mother couldn't understand, did she ever get to meet him?

Oh, yes.

Yes, She straightened him out.

No, no, no, no.

But, uh, she, uh, she didn't like the way he put me on.

And then he would say things that could be taken two ways.

Mm hmm.

Like what can you remember?

Well, I have some examples, but I don't like to use them all.

Oh, because everybody else would take it the other way, so.

But.

But I would take it the other way and break down and laugh, you know, and, uh, and so there'd be a little humor, but yeah, I don't know what different things I'd have to sort those out, but, uh, they like to put me on.

But that was the show he said, We have to have fun on in the morning.

Sievers We can't just read the price of corn and hogs and and have a show out of it.

That's right.

So he was a showman.

Do you ever miss being on the radio?

Would you like to go on again?

Oh, no, I. I tell you, I'm on and off now.

I do commercials for different companies and I'll hear myself on the air, but, uh, I enjoyed it.

But now I get my kicks out of going around the area and speaking live the people and reminiscing about the old days.

I don't think I would like a steady job for over well over 50 years.

I'm 51 on the air, 36 to 87.

I was up at 230 every morning.

Oh, dear.

Minus the time I served twice in war as I served four years in World War Two, that I was called back for two years during the Korean War.

And that was in the Navy both times.

Yes, maybe both.

But other than that, my seniority went on all the time with World War Mm.

That first day of retirement.

Did it feel strange?

Yes, it really did.

You know, I might mention do I never missed a day being sick that whole time.

Oh You're kidding.

When I know I never was off sick.

I was on the air one time with 104 fever, but I wouldn't go home because I didn't want to break my record.

Oh, Bob, you're a workaholic.

Carl Vandagrift didn't like that at all with the last.

The last hour he took me off the air is that I sounded so bad, but I was there and worked my whole shift.

Mm hmm.

But that's what I appreciate.

Young people in life do what you want to do.

In life.

You'll feel worthwhile.

And it won't be work.

It'll be fun.

Mm hmm.

So the first morning that Bob Sievers didn't go to WOWO.

What was that like?

Well, I think it was.

You know, frankly, I don't remember it.

I don't remember it.

I wonder if I asked Harriet which she would say she might know he wandered around this house.

Yeah, I it took me a long time.

Uh, getting used to sleepy little, maybe 6:00 in the morning all the way till six, because I got up at 230 every morning, you know, and I would stop down at Powers, and I had my cup of coffee.

Never a hamburger of that time of the morning, but I, I know I would when I would get up early in the morning.

Even now I go on they have bands they have a microphone in front of.

We would talk on shortwave.

Mm hmm.

I enjoy that.

That was like early Internet, wasn't it?

Yes.

Yeah, right.

With its own special language and write code and everything.

Tell me about Westinghouse Studios.

That's who owned the world.

Well, I think our most beautiful studios were the ones on Harrison Street right across from the parking lot, which was just north of the Kenan.

Mm hmm.

Before we moved around to the other building, we'd go up to the main lobby.

Westinghouse appliances were on the first floor.

We'd go up to the main lobby on the second floor, and it was a photo bureau of a huge microphone and coils and tubes.

And radio was really classy.

And we had two beautiful studios, Studio A and Studio B mm, And it was really a first class broadcasting in those days.

Mm hmm.

And then you moved from that studio around the corner to the Gaskin building, was that.

Yes, Yes, the building, Yes.

I couldn't think of a name.

And then we were there for a long time.

Well, so we moved to the central building.

Who came up with the famous WOWO, fire escape?

Ron Gregory.

Did he really?

Yeah.

Ron Gregory With the talk, the body, the janitor.

Yes.

Bodie was great.

And when they would call me Mr.

Woodward and I have to credit Jack Ed Wood with that, we'd go to all of our basketball games, and he would introduce me as the coach of the WOWO Aces, Mr.

WOWO himself.

Bobby Sievers.

Or I'm indebted to Jack Underwood for that.

Yeah.

And I think that's the first time I saw you in person was at a local area since game.

Is that right?

Yes.

Yes.

And it was.

And, you know, it's always funny.

And I wonder how many people ever came up to you and said, you don't look like you sound.

Yeah, I know.

People get an idea, you know, And I was speaking, a lady would say, You don't look like you like you sound at all.

And I was like, Well, you don't look like I thought you looked either with all that you have seen in the past.

And here we are at 1999, the last year of the 1900s, and we're ready to go into the 2000.

What would you like to see in the next millennium happen, whether it's in broadcasting or just in life in general, any kind of an event or or transition?

Well, I would like to I would like to see, first of all, peace all over the world.

Mm hmm.

Putting down all the racial problems.

And we all have to live.

So I would like to see peace and I would like to have poverty done away with and hunger and hunger.

I don't know.

And, uh, and the pollution problem.

Problem solved somehow.

Does radio have a place in that or broadcasting in general?

Is there a way that that medium can be used to help bring those dreams about?

Do you think?

I hope it will have a part of it.

I really don't know.

MM Jane, before I leave you today, I have four letters and I have baskets of leaves at home and in I draw their telegrams with a lot of the famous stars, but they're just four letters I've got to read to you.

A just part of them.

Dear Bob, may I take this opportunity to extend best wishes and congratulations as you celebrate your 40th anniversary at war?

Well, this is my 40th year.

Mm.

I understand that you have not missed a single day on the air since 1936.

With the exception of your military service, you are certainly to be recognized and commended for the outstanding quality of your radio programs.

A dynamic vocal announcing ability with kindness, personal regards.

Orders are born.

I'm the governor for the state of Indiana.

I'll be darned.

Here's one for a little 12 year old boy who grew up listening to me.

Dear Bob, many congratulations and best wishes for a healthy and happy retirement.

You will be sorely missed on the airwaves, but I am sure the love and goodwill you were brought to your Fort Wayne community will continue for many ways.

You and Harriet, even in my wise name, can sit back now and reap the rewards of your almost 50 years with WOWO radio.

Enjoy all the fishing and traveling you have planned.

Best wishes.

Dan Quayle.

Oh, wow.

Now I have just two more.

One there.

Mr.

Sievers, my warm ups.

Congratulations on your 40th anniversary of continuous service to radio listeners throughout the states of Indiana, Ohio, and Michigan.

I can readily understand the respect and affection in which you are held by your many fans.

I welcome the opportunity to join them on this occasion and applauding your important contribution to the positive influence of broadcasting on our national life.

Sincerely, Gerald Ford, President of the United States.

I'll be darned.

I just one more.

Dear Mr.

Sievers, congratulations.

Your retirement.

Almost 50 years of service with World Radio.

Yours has been a career marked by outstanding dedication and achievement, earning the respect of your colleagues.

And you're listening.

Audience As a former member of the broadcast fraternity, I know you have played a vital role in your community.

Nancy joins me in sending warm best wishes.

Sincerely, Ronald Reagan.

Earlier.

I'll be darned.

Those have to be pretty special, don't they?

Yes, they do.

One of Bob, it strikes me everything we talked about.

You know, you worked as a youngster delivering papers.

You begged to work at.

WOWO.

And finally they were wise enough to bring you on.

And you went to the Navy.

Have you ever not worked?

No, I've.

I've never been out of a job.

I've never been out of work.

Are you a workaholic?

Well, when I speak to a teenagers in school, I tell them whatever you work at.

Do what you love to do.

Then it isn't work.

It's fun.

Mm.

If I were a millionaire out of work all those years for nothing, you know, because I enjoyed my work.

Mm.

So.

But there is only one thing about that.

What's that?

If you really love your work and love your enjoyment in life, the years go by so fast.

I saw it on the air one time.

It seems like all I do is put up and take down the Christmas tree.

Mm.

If you really love your work, that's how fast.

Right.

Time goes by.

Right.

So is retirement difficult or.

Although I am.

I'm still out speaking about, oh, 100 times or 150 times a year.

Mhm.

And I've about eight boards of directors helping in the community so I never have really a dull day.

So you didn't really retire or you just don't work at woe anymore.

Yeah.

Well I you're still, I still cut commercials and the enjoy helping people out.

In 1947 I received a letter from a mother and down south of Bob, my son and I listen to you and J every morning on the little red barn and we hear your song of inspiration at 615 in the morning.

And my son has just recorded a hymn.

We would feel so honored if you and Jay would play in the morning.

And this was just before tape was invented.

And those days, the first record was acetate or aluminum, the first record on the mother record of snapper was made for that stamp, the record job.

And on one side was the hymn How Great Thou Art, and the other side was the hymn Softly and Tenderly.

Well, I always loved How Great Thou Art.

And so and I had helped dozens of young people get started in radio.

So I had this young 12 year old boy singing How Great Thou Art, what his name meant nothing to me.

So after I played it, I know they were happy.

So I threw the letter away and when it was good enough, I put it in my mailbox.

And about every ten days for about three months, I would bring it out and put it on the air and have this young boy saying how great thou art.

And then after that, three months, oh, I got the greatest thank you letter from his brother.

Oh, Bob, thank you so much.

We couldn't get anybody down here to play his records.

We are so eternally grateful to you.

Well, it made me feel good, but I threw that letter away about five years later, I received a call from a mother in Mississippi.

She said, Bob, I'm five years late in thanking you, but you helped our little neighborhood boy down the street get his first start in radio.

You were the only one who played his first record on the radio.

And we are eternally grateful, grateful to you and the shocking thing is, with my most regretful experience, the letter I threw away in the wastebasket was a letter from none other than the mother of Elvis Presley.

Oh, kidding.

And how I wish I had that letter now and that first acetate record of how great thought.

Yes, that was a sweet memory.

What other memories do you have of Fort Wayne that stand out that you know, when you think back to the best things about Fort Wayne, what what are they?

Well, first of all, I always, as a younger person, like to go visit sighted Wolf, and that's ours downtown.

Mm And my favorite Chinese restaurant was the Golden Dragon, where I was born, right out here and there we are where we are now on the the it was on the Goshen Road actually.

Mhm.

Between here and the Boulevard and now there are many, many Chinese restaurants in Fort Wayne.

But the lady who built the Golden Dragon, I had dinner at her Golden Dragon in Hong Kong one night.

Oh my God.

I remember going there.

I remember of Christmas shopping downtown at all the crowds.

Now everything is out of the center, you know, And as I said, the greatest tragedy.

I can remember it.

I, I have their name in a drawer at home someplace.

The mother and father and ten children right around Christmas time.

That ah, buggy was struck at Grabill, Indiana, right there near Salter's home.

The center.

And it killed every one of them.

And the the caskets were lined up the gospel double, the mother and father and the casket, each one getting smaller.

The youngest child.

Oh, all in one family.

That's the greatest tragedy I remember in Fort Wayne.

Mm.

I it's amazing how things have changed.

They all live at the hospital on Fairfield Avenue and add the.

The dueling clinic, then the old building.

Mhm.

I remember how I would always walk to Foster Park to fish in the river.

And I can remember when Rudel Boulevard, east of Lafayette Street, was all muddy.

I could remember when it was being paved.

Oh, wow.

The thing I remember the sounds funny, but from the Boulevard South in the spring of the year, the favorite fun of all of our neighborhood children, which run through the fields and collect garter snakes.

Oh, dear.

We'd have a an all male gang full of garter snakes.

Now, I don't think there's a gutter snake in Fort Wayne, and I'm glad for that.

I am, too.

But we had.

We had fun with the balloons raised.

I never was afraid of them until one day we we would throw them at each other and one rug itself rob my neck and went down inside of my shirt.

Those are my waist.

And that put some kind of a chill on me that from that time on I've been afraid of snakes.

I don't doubt that for one moment.

But I remember the old number 11 firehouse that wrote us all and Lafayette, every time the fire engines got a call, I'd run down and ask like Mr.

Epperly was his name.

Archie's?

Definitely Where was the fire?

And I was the kid.

Bother going to get a the I say it was a rail fence down the road.

But I remember that firehouse starting.

I remember well a bad plane crash, which is Southgate Plaza now.

It was just a man in a single play in the wing fell off of the plane.

Hmm.

I don't know if anybody remembers that, but anyway, I have lots of memories of Fort Wayne, but I just, uh.

What about Harriet?

How did you meet her?

I mean, we've all heard about Harriet over the years.

Oh, on the radio.

And as I said before, we sat down here, she must be one of the patient most tolerant people, because she had.

And your daughter to share you with thousands of people all these years, you know.

How did you meet her?

And.

Well, first of all, my daughter's been asked to write an article about me.

She won't let me read.

She went through drawings and got pictures of me for this window paper that comes out every.

Oh, yeah, that's a good one.

So in the next couple of weeks is going to be so I haven't read the story yet, but I met Harriet.

She sang in the choir of the Gospel Temple, and I met her through being an associate early days in radio.

Mhm.

So you didn't go to school together?

Oh no, no.

She went to graduated from Elmhurst.

Mhm.

I'll be darned.

What I said on the air one day my whole life is made up of females.

I have a I said I have a wife, two daughters, four granddaughters and a girl dog and cat.

All she's, she's had to put up a lot but uh, the phone rings a lot at home but.

Mm mm.

She's a very caring wife, you know, my dad grew up in Wiltshire, Ohio, and a big deal for him as a kid, and young man was to come to Fort Wayne and he would talk about going to the cent liver park and, and different places like that where we're fresh trailers of the park, the roller coaster drivers and the airplanes would just fly over the red hot trees and skimming leaves.

And you got quite a kick out of that too.

Oh yes, that was a favorite fun part of me to go to Trails Park.

Now I'd hear my mother talk about Robinson Park out of the northeast, out on the way to Leo, out of the Saint Joe River.

But that was long gone before I was around.

Mm.

But my favorite park was Travers Park and the front house.

I'll be darned.

And did you go dancing as a teenager or young man?

Oh, no, no, I don't know.

Oh, how can a man who's been on radio all these years and want to be still be bashful because you are even now you're bashful.

I still, you know, deep down inside I am still bashful.

I can tell I and I when I go to before I get up to speak, I'm all nervous.

I just like I was a little boy at Still give the Gettysburg Address worrying about it.

You don't know how I worried about this dog.

I know.

Oh, bless your heart.

This was.

Well, anyway, of I. Of all the troubles in the world, as I said, it's always a pleasure to get back home to Fort Wayne.

Did you ever want to live any place other than Fort Wayne?

Oh, no.

Good for you.

My wife and daughters both are in love with Arizona.

They'd move out there in a minute.

But no, I was born and raised on Clay Street.

Now I have a little drive that I moved to Sherwood Terrace and lived there for 33 years near the Saint John the Baptist Catholic Church in South Fairfield.

I moved from there to witness that and from a little boy who would walk from my home on Clay Street to either St Mary's River, either at Foster Park or up with the Stone Bridge.

So I my whole life has been on that end of the town.

Wow, that's been great for you.

What Fort Wayne has really done well with me and I. I love it.

Jane It's been a pleasure.

Oh, it has been a pleasure, too.

But I hope I didn't bore you.

You did not bore me a single, solitary bit.

I'm just glad you could join us.

Thank you.

And I want to thank all of you for joining us this evening, too.

And I know that, like myself, you enjoyed this special evening and conversation with Bob Sievers.

For all of us here at PBS 39, I'm Jane Avery Doswell.

Thank you and good night.