One of these days, I’ll get around to jotting down some memories of those days in 1988 that we spent locked-in the K-Lite studios waiting for Hurricane Gilbert. Short version? I was scared. We shipped my (very young) family to San Antonio. Turns out that San Antonio got something like 30 tornadoes as a result of Gilbert. The Valley was barely been touched.
Hurricane Gilbert was a beast. Don’t know if you remember it or not, but Gilbert kicked butt on its way in. And when the storm track looked like Gilbert was headed straight into The Valley, my mouth got pretty dry.
Mal Kasanoff — with his cup of coffee in his left hand! — was at the airport seeing that all of our families got out of The Valley safely. What a decent guy Mal was.
I remember being very impressed — and proud — that the people I busted my behind for gave a rat’s ass about the people I cared about the most. Tichenor Media System, as it was known at the time, paid for everything (flights out and back, hotels and food) for the evacuated families.Don;t think that would happen in the radio biz, these days.
For now, here are a couple of pictures that I must have taken. Hope you will feel free to add any thoughts and make any notes you’d like.
Laura Martinez, Paul Davis, Debbie Del Rio and Nathan Lindsay
Has anyone kept up with Laura or Nathan?
By the time we were riding out Gilbert, our studios had been moved to that God awful closet in the TV building. When I think of K-Lite, I don’t think of these studios at all. These were the days of something more along the lines of “K-Lite 2.0″. Or, K-Lite The Second Generation. Whatever.
The thing I remember most about these few days was that we never really slept. I was in a fog the whole time. Time really didn’t matter becasue nobody was on the air at their usual time. We were all good for a couple of hours at a time…and then someone else would stumble in and pick up the ball and carry it for a while.
This one was the most talented of all of us who came through the doors of K-Lite. What a tremendous voice. Debbie could take direction — and APPLY IT INSTANTLY. Debbie had the raw talent to make it to any level she wanted to in the biz. She just got smart and got out.
This one was a real Radio Guy. Always felt like Paul ‘had my back’. Worked his ass off, too. I BEGGED him to get his butt back inside at one point. He was outside smoking a cigarette and reading his book. Stuff was blowing hard. He said something like, “Alright. But I’ve been through a million of these and… nevermind. Fine. I’m coming in.”
That was a hard working group we had. I have exceptionally fond memories of many of those days.
That afghan my grandmother made me…I still have. The hair…not so much. What a great time of my life! If I remember, a tornado hit across the street from the hotel where our wives were staying in San Antonio.
Tad, yuppers I remember hurrican Gilbert, I was new to the biz and as green as grass working part-time for ya. I recall you wanted all full-timers on duty and you sent me home to be with my family only to have you call me in the middle of landfall to see if I’d drive over to run a couple of shifts, my thought was “are you freakn kiddin me?, the storm was getting worse! Great time and memories Tad. Laura last I heard was working at the college in Brownsville after a few years at The Valley Morning Star. Hope all is well guys!
Woody!!! Great to hear from you bud! Yeah. That’s me. Mister Considerate. Didn;t want you to miss out on any of the fun.
What are you up to these days? (How in the world did you find this website?) See ya Woodman.