- Date Of Birth: June 12, 1951
- Date Of Death: April 7, 2020
- State: Alabama
I grew up in some of the most interesting and diverse places in Alabama in the latter half of the past century.
My earliest years were in Sheffield, a small town in Northwest Alabama. My memories were of my faithful dog, Wayne the kid next door, and singing, “It’s a long way to Senior High School but we’ll get there some day,” in Mrs. Dunning’s Kindergarten.
After her divorce, Mom and I moved to Huntsville in 1960, it was exciting to be in a city where science fiction became science reality. I remember as a child going with Mom to the Kroger grocery store on Governor’s Drive. I was always fascinated to hear the differing accents of the people in the check-out lines. More than the typical Southern accents were German, European, or Oriental accents.
In the mid-sixties my dad was transferred from Atlanta to Birmingham, so I would split a lot of my time between Huntsville and Birmingham. During this era, I witnessed Birmingham as a focal point of the Civil Rights movement. It’s also of note that, while in Birmingham, I was a member of a not-particularly-talented rock band appropriately named, “The Apocalypse of Sound.”
In 1971 I graduated from Huntsville High School. A few days before graduating high school, as I was walking down the main hall just about to pass the Assistant Principal’s office, he called out my name and invited me to come in. I wasn’t exactly a stranger to being in his office. As I nervously sat, he asked, “Rob, I’m curious, did your parents ever actually sign any of the forms or write the notes for your absences?” I said, “Of course not. Why would I have let them sign anything? If I had, you would have had something to compare the handwriting to.” He just smiled and shook his head.
Following high school, I spent some time in Europe. There were a lot of European adventures, most of which shall remain untold except to say as a post-adolescent, I was not prepared for Amsterdam.
Like many in Huntsville and Madison County, I remember the Night of the Tornados in April 1974. It seemed as soon as one tornado came through that another one followed. A friend of mine and I were at the Malibu Apartments off South Parkway and we saw the twister that hit Johnson Road, Parkway City, and Drake Avenue.
In 1977, I interviewed as a reporter for WBHP News. I had no experience other than a lot of persistence and enthusiasm. The News Director seemed to like me and sent me home with books on Reporting, Journalism, and Copy Writing, a cassette recorder, and a grocery bag of news stories from the UPI and AP teletypes (for you who don’t know what teletype machines were they were very noisy “clack-ity-clack” machines where we got Regional and National News from the two major News Services). Several times each week I would go to the radio station and the News Director would review my news stories, listen to my tapes, and mentor me. Finally, one Friday afternoon, he said, “Rob, I appreciate all the hard work you’ve done, all of your time, hours, and efforts. I have to make a decision on who to hire today. There is a girl from Huntsville, who has a lot of experience, she is in Atlanta and wants to come back home. Rob, this is a terrible job, the pay is lousy, the hours are, at times, long and horrific. You have to be here at 5:30 in the mornings, there are times you’ll have to cover meetings and events and your work day could be up to or more than twelve hours long. You’re on salary so you make the same amount of money if you work forty or eighty hours a week. So why would you want to even consider taking such a job?”
My answer was the same it had been in our first interview, “Huntsville is my adopted home. I grew up here, I love it here. If I could write one story or cover one event that might make a difference to someone or make an impact to my community, I would have succeeded in a dream come true.” With that he reached into his desk and tossed me the car keys to the red, white, and blue WBHP Chevrolet Vega News Car and said, I’ll see you at 5:30 on Monday morning.
During the next two decades, I would cover lots of interesting stories and events, see history unfold before my eyes, meet people ranging from a man who pushed a grocery cart around town to dignitaries, astronauts, governors, even Presidents Reagan and a life of contrasts it was.
Although I loved being in news and the excitement of discovering what came with each day, being on the air as a D.J. and unleashing my alter ego was just plain fun! While working as a Rock Jock, one of the listeners dubbed me as “The Psychedelic Relic.”
In the mid-1980’s, while I was working at WFIX, I coordinated a promotion with the radio station, the Chamber of Commerce, Parisan’s, and the Birmingham Stallions professional football team. During the promotion, I met with the Stallions management and presented them a job outline and ultimately became their North Alabama Sales & Promotions Rep.
As with many Huntsvillians, I mark time and dates in reference to which tornados happened when. I returned to Huntsville in 1989. During an afternoon that November, I was working at WTAK when the Emergency Phone rang. The Emergency Management Agency was calling all the local media and responders to let them know, “they thought a tornado had just hit Airport Road.”
In the late 1990’s I hung up my microphone and headphones and said good-bye to the broadcast media. My choice in leaving the media was to fulfill my dream of finally finishing up my Bachelor’s degree as the new millennium arrived. I achieved that goal and got my Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Faulkner University in 2000 and another Bachelor’s degree in Human Resources Management in 2008 from Athens State.
For the past several years I worked for Phoenix, a company that hires people who have some manner of challenge or disability in their lives. My job was at a Security Desk in a facility on Redstone Arsenal. The people in my building were, what I referred to as, “My Daytime Family.”
I lived a good life. Like with everyone else, there’s been the good, the bad, the happy, and the sad. There have been forks in the road of life that sometimes led down the Yellow Brick Road while others went the wrong way on a one-way street. There were adventures too numerous to mention. There were loves and battles won, tied, and lost. But, overall, it was a good life that I am happy to have lived.
I’ve seen a lot of Europe and America, had one-on-one sit downs with Ronald Reagan, seen Pink Floyd in concert three times, driven across country on different routes at least a half dozen times, had many amazing adventures, grew up with an outstanding family and friends, seen Alabama win the most National Championships in college football history, and even witnessed Auburn win a National Championship. It was a good life that God gave me, and I am grateful!
