RE: Bruce Bradley

[Gary F <gff@mediaone.net>]

I worked as a producer at WBZ in 1979 and 1980 and spent a lot of time working with Bruce Bradley.  He was great on the air but in person was a pretty miserable human being to deal with.  Even then he lived in a small apartment in Framingham and bitched about everything from traffic going to work, to the station equipment, to the way management treated him, to being "pestered" by listener's at remotes (he HATED doing them), and on and on.
I came away from my experience working with him with a very sour feeling for him which is too bad because as an air talent I thought (and still think) that from the listener's side he was one of the best in Boston, ever!

- -g.f.

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From: 	Martin J. Waters[SMTP:mwaters@wesleyan.edu]
Sent: 	Wednesday, November 25, 1998 11:01 AM
To: 	boston-radio-interest@khavrinen.lcs.mit.edu
Subject: 	Bruce Bradley

        A recent post mentioned him, wishing he would come back to the
Boston market.
        Earlier this month he was mentioned on the AIRWAVES national radio
newsgroup. A post on November 9 by Frank Absher said that "unconfirmed
rumors" were saying that Bruce would not return to St. Louis to do a show
at KTRS, as had been announced by manager Tim Dorsey. Dorsey had said Bruce
would be on after January 1, according to this post. Absher said, "But now
we hear personal problems will prevent Bradley from returning."
        There was a long article, maybe three or four years ago, about
Bruce in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, which I once looked up. (You can get
it on their website, although I think you have to pay a fee to read the
article.) It basically was not a happy story and he didn't sound like a
vary happy man. The article, done after he left KMOX, had some stories of
serious family and financial difficulties. He seemed to be living in very
modest circumstances, in an apartment. He also was close to the standard
retirement age, at least in his early 60s, I believe. After he left KMOX,
he had a talk show for awhile on a small station actually licensed to a St.
Louis suburb. More recently, I heard he was on in Cincinnati, although I'm
not sure what station.
        Either in that newspaper article or another, though, there was a
bright spark when he talked for a moment about his WBZ days. He was quoted
as saying, in sort of a combination of pride and of amazement even all
these years later, that in one summer ratings book his show was not only
No. 1 in Boston, but "No. 1 in Baltimore."
        And why the hell not, because as though of us of a certain age will
recall, "He is the guy in the know."
        I'll personally buy a season's pass to Paragon Park for the Boston
PD who brings him back <g>.

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