I, Mr. Aurandt (no Googling you cheaters) was born on September 4, 1918 in Tulsa, Oklahoma. My pappy was a Tulsa policeman who served as secretary to commissioner JH Atkinson. When I was three, in December of 1921, dad and another Tulsa officer, Ike Wilkerson, went rabbit hunting. TBC.........
Four masked men approached them with the intent to rob them, and my father was shot. He passed away in the hospital two days later. Thanks to a large scale manhunt, all four suspects were arrested the day after dad died. Taken to the local jail, a lynch mob of 1,000+ showed up, but, the suspects were smuggled outta jail. Two would later be convicted of murder after being identified by my father's hunting buddy, Detective Wilkerson.
As a child, I made radio receivers and attended Tulsa Central High School where I was a Senior when some feller named Tony Randall was a sophomore. Onea my teachers was impressed by my voice, so, she helped me get on to clean radio station KVOO in Tulsa when i was 14. Down the road a piece, they allowed me to start reading commercials on the air. My beginning!
Continued to work there whilst I went to the University of Tulsa, first as an announcer, then as a program director. Victor, this is boring, can you spiff it up a tad? I'll try.
From there. KFBI in Wichita, to KOMA in Ok City on then on to KXOK in St. Louie, MO. 1938 by now.
Mahalo, from Hawaii just after attack on Pearl Harbor to cover the US Navy and their fleet concentration in the Pacific. I joined up with the United States Army Air Corp - didn't serve too long (Medical discharge) but, twas there I gained my love of flying. I belonged to the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association for more than 50 years... and by gosh I spent a lotta time in Oshkosh with the Experimental Aircraft Association.
Spiff it up Victor.
After the War, on to Chicago, for, ha, fortune and fame, with my start hosting Jobs for GI Joe on WENR. Then I started that really famous program, but I can't tellya the name because this this blog would be kaput.
One of my topics was lax security, particularly at Argonne National Laboratory, a nuclear research facility 20 miles outside of Chicago. In fact, to demonstrate my concerns, on February 6, 1951, I scaled a fence, and was quickly apprehended by security guards. By the time I keeled, the FBI had over 1,400 pages in a file on me, something about "participatory act of journalism" (when I hopped that fence). The US Attorney for Illinois wanted the Grand Jury to consider an espionage indictment on me, I went on the air, pleaded my case and the Grand Jury declined to indict me.
Yah, my radio show went National in the 40's... I used a lotta catchphrases (not yet blog reader!).. and I always ended my program the same way. (Another giveaway, sorry). At the end of reports about someone who had done something, I'd oft times say "He would want us to mention his name" followed by silence... and then onto the next item, which, was usually a funny story... then, a "now from the for-what-its-worth department...
I'd do "Here's a strange" story with an unusual twist... and "self government won't work without self-discipline." I would often migrate from context to to commercial and some'a them folks called me the "finest huckster to ever roam the airwaves." Ahm, like I cared? I'd just signed a ten year $100 million dollar contract with ABC in 2000.
I had some buddies you might heard of.... .J. Edgar Hoover... they say he mighta help get me off that espionage charge... Senator Joseph McCarthy (I supported his campaign to expose and expel communists)... and the Reverand Billly Graham..
I passed in February of 2009. In my obitiuary, the NY Times wrote:
[He] personalized the radio news with his right wing opinions, but laced them with his own trademarks: a hypnotic timbre, extended pauses for effect, heart-warming tales of average Americans and folksy observations that evoked the heartland, family values and the old-fashioned plain talk one heard around the dinner table on Sunday.
"Hello, Americans," he barked. "This is _____ _____ ! Stand byyy for newwws!"
He railed against welfare cheats and defended the death penalty. He worried about the national debt, big government, bureaucrats who lacked common sense, permissive parents, leftist radicals and America succumbing to moral decay. He championed rugged individualism, love of God and country, and the fundamental decency of ordinary people.
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