Larry Glick

[Donna Halper]

At 08:29 PM 3/28/2009, Kevin Vahey wrote:

>Larry was so popular at WMEX Time Magazine did a story on him.

Yes, indeed.  And here's the portion about him-- 
the rest was about other late-night d.j.'s and 
what they meant to their audience.


The Hot-Hot-Hotline

TIME magazine, 18 June 1965

It is just before 1 a.m., any 1 a.m. from Monday 
through Saturday, and the din from the next-door 
Bowladrome has died away when Larry Glick climbs 
to the second-floor studio of Boston's WMEX ("the 
ever-new Wee-Mex, Home of Modern Radio"), eases 
himself into his chair, its torn plastic cushion 
oozing sponge rubber. Around him are ashtrays 
half-filled with cigarettes left by the daytime 
rock 'n' roll D.J.s. Staring at him is the 
control panel held together with electrical tape. 
On the scarred horseshoe table sits a six-line 
beige telephone, equipped with six lights that 
will flicker when the telephone calls come in.

But first he relaxes as his taped introduction is 
played over the air: "Well, it's night and 
everything's all right. Just as right as it can 
be. Ladies and gentlemen, you're tuned to the new 
WMEX in the new Boston. The station in a growing 
Boston, headquarters for the nighttime Glicknics. 
A Glicknic is a thing called happiness, and 
happiness is a thing called Larry Glick."

This is Glick's signal to turn himself on, and 
hunching toward the mike, a big smile spreading 
over his face, he greets the great unseen 
listening audience in his deep, friendly 
baritone: "How do you feel? I really mean it. How 
are you getting along with your wife? How are you 
getting along with your boy friend? We'll discuss 
all these things. CO 2-9600. You call us. You're 
the star of this show." And before he is done, 
the lights do go on. The fans are calling in, and 
Larry Glick's all-night hot-line show is in business.

2 1/2 Years on the Bottle. Glick's telephone 
call-in program is just one of dozens that are 
proliferating across the U.S., giving the platter 
parades and baseball broadcasts a run for the 
ratings. Glick, 43, now with his eighth radio 
station since 1953, has become a glib, gemütlich 
master of the new formula. All he has to defend 
himself against his telephone callers is a 
tape-delay device, which gives him a four-second 
time lag in which to erase obscenities from the 
air. To ease the strain, there is an occasional 
celebrity visitor such as Songstress Edie Adams or Rocky Marciano.

The rest is up to the listeners, and for Glick's 
fans it provides nighttime fare that combines all 
the appeal of a stormy town meeting with the 
piquancy of listening in on the party line to 
real-life drama. "Oh Larry," begins one mother's 
voice, "my boy's been on the bottle for the last 
2½ years; what am I going to do?" Another caller 
wants to wipe up the Viet Cong, the next 
discusses self-hypnotism, a third knocks himself 
out with his own imitation of Bobby Kennedy, and 
then along in the wee small hours comes a dope 
addict, who swears he would have committed 
suicide long ago if Larry had not made him feel 
that he "belonged to a family."  [snip]