by Al Brumley
Looking back on it, it makes good sense.
Why would Nationwide Communications Inc. submit itself to six weeks of potential haranguing from Howard Stern?
Still, that didn't stop thousands of listeners - including me - from waking up in surprise Monday.
After several weeks of semi-heavy sparring between Mr. Stern and "The Eagle KEGL-FM (97.1), station owner Nationwide finally said "the heck with it" and booted him six weeks before his contract was due to expire.
The company said Mr. Stern's show was too expensive and too hard to sell, but most radio analysts believe that's a smoke screen. Nationwide is a conservative company and didn't want Mr. Stern on its station. Simple as that.
More than 60 people called me Monday, all fans of the show. One woman - no doubt speaking for many other fans - said for her, it was like learning that a relative has six weeks to live, then he goes out and gets hit by a truck.
Sure it's melodramatic, but that's the kind of loyalty Mr. Stern inspires.
Some callers wanted to know if it's possible to listen to Mr. Stern on the Internet. A caller to The Ernie Brown Show Wednesday on KRLD-AM (1080) said there is a site that carries Mr. Stern's show, but well-placed sources tell me you pretty much have to be Stephen Hawking to find it, and even then, you need a carefully guarded password.
Others wanted to know if Mr. Stern was coming to Dallas to host his own "funeral." But as Mr. Stern put it, it's a moot point now.
Fans will be happy to know that most everyone in the radio industry believes Mr. Stern will find his way back to Dallas, although no one seems to know where or when.
I don't know either, although I am going out on a limb and ruling out "The Edge" KDGE-FM (94.5). That "Howard Stern Hotline" it threw together Monday was an old radio trick designed to generate publicity from the heat you put off by another station's news. (And sure enough - here I am writing about it.)
Finally, as many of you know, Mr. Stern has been nice anough to take my calls over the past few weeks and let me interview him. Whenever I'm on the air with anyone - let alone Howard Stern - I find myself torn between doing my job and trying to be at least a little entertaining.
Of course, I'm usually about as entertaining as a sock.
Once, when discussing the possibility of a Dallas funeral, Mr. Stern said he might send a stand-in.
Wit that I am, I said, "OK."
I wish I'd said, "Well, I'd be glad to do it if you were short, fat and red-headed."
So long, Howard. And hurry back.
© 1997 The Dallas Morning News
This article appeared in the Sunday, August 3, 1997, Dallas Morning News "Arts" section.
It was the first half of Al Brumley's regular, weekly, Dallas/Ft. Worth radio column that day.
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