Thursday, May 25, 2017

I Remember Him Well

Joe Pyne Was America's First Shock Jock

6 comments:

Jeff Meyerson said...

Joe had a wooden leg, didn't he?

Unknown said...

From the article:

Zappa, 24, nodded to the booing crowd. Pyne looked him over and said, “I guess your long hair makes you a woman.”

Zappa shrugged. “I guess your wooden leg makes you a table.”

Cap'n Bob said...

The man you loved to hate. I got a kick out of him, wooden leg notwithstanding. There was another guy around the same time in New York I'd watch, Alan Something. He had a beard and looked devilish.

Unknown said...

I remember him, too, Cap'n, but not his name.

Todd Mason said...

Alan S. Burke (September 15, 1922 – August 25, 1992) was an American conservative television and radio talk show host who was on the air primarily in New York City from 1966 to 1969 on WNEW (now Fox Broadcasting O&O WNYW).

Burke was a pioneer of the confrontational style where he would attack or insult his guest and plant ringers in the audience who would attack the guest. Burke had programs on various Miami, Florida radio stations during much of the 1970s and 1980s, where he continued to employ his confrontational style. Burke's best known caller was known only as "Raymond", a presumed burn-out who spouted comically clever poetry, often espousing the virtues of his hero, Alan Burke. Burke was sufficiently well known in the late 1980s to get a guest spot on The Morton Downey, Jr. Show, where he, Downey and Bob Grant traded barbs.

NYT obit WIKI points us to:
Alan Burke Dies at 69; Talk Show Host of 60's
Published: August 26, 1992
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Alan Burke, the host of a syndicated television talk show in the 1960's who was known for his acerbic put-downs of his audience and guests, died yesterday at Boca Raton Community Hospital in Florida. He was 69 years old and lived in Boca Raton.

His family said only that he died after a long illness.

From 1966 to 1969, Mr. Burke was the host of "The Alan Burke Show" on Channel 5 in New York City and had a second program that was syndicated in more than 20 other cities. His subjects ranged from sex in suburbia to abortion. Among his guests were a nun turned go-go dancer, a transvestite and a Jewish anti-Semite. The American Jewish Committee and the United Church of Christ said his program was a platform for bigots.

Mr. Burke was born in Richmond, Va., and attended the University of Richmond. He began his career in broadcasting as a sportscaster at a radio station in Petersburg, Va. After Channel 5 discontinued his show, he moved to Boca Raton, where he worked in radio and television.

He is survived by his wife, Claire Canniff Burke; two sons, David Jonathan, of Los Angeles, and Morris Daniel, of Tamarac, Fla.; two stepchildren, Frank Maner Jr. of Scarsdale, N.Y., and Claire Maner of Albuquerque, N.M., and three grandchildren.

Unknown said...

Thanks, Todd. That's the guy, all right. Watched both him and Pine while living in Austin, late '60s, early '70s.