The following historical
summary is reprinted without permission from MusicRadio77.com. 1968-1969: Roby Yonge (midday's originally and, later, overnights) Born in Fort Jackson, S.C., Roby
grew up in Ocala, Fla. and got his first radio job when he was
15 years old. Roby's first Miami Florida job was covering the
Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 and hurricanes as a newsman at WIOD,
which was then WCKR. Roby then moved to Miami's WQAM and became
a disc jockey (where he worked with another Miami radio legend,
Rick Shaw). He evolved into a character created out of a cartoon
in the back of Playboy magazine. In the "Little Annie Fannie"
cartoon, the "Big Kahuna" was a muscular surfer with
a deep tan and all the girls. It was a joke because Roby was
really the opposite, but the name stuck and he used his "surfer"
image to great success in South Florida. He was not terribly
athletic but the music he played was for the surfer crowd. At
25, Yonge left Miami for WABC. His first shows on WABC were December
30 and 31, 1967 . He filled in for Ron Lundy before starting
his own show on January 1, 1968 with the song "Devil With
a Blue Dress On" by Mitch Ryder. His 1-3 p.m. show was short-lived,
however. He was shifted to weekends when Bob-a-Loo (Bob Lewis)
went over to WABC-FM (now Thanks to Allan Sniffen |
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