Glancing at obituaries in today’s Star, I noticed the passing of Don Burley. Who he?
Don was the father of sports talk radio in the Kansas City market.
Before Don Fortune, who begat Soren Petro, and before Kevin Kietzman, there was Don Burley on 980 KMBZ in the afternoons during the late 1970s.
Curt “Mother” Merz, an ex-Chiefs player, had a show on 610 WDAF, later followed by Dick Carlson, but Merz’s show was not strictly sports talk. Merz was something of a protege of the legendary Mike Murphy.
Burley had been on the air for a long, long time before hosting an afternoon sports show. By today’s standards, his show was about mild and white bread as it could be. But back in the day it was refreshing to have anything sports related to listen to while driving around the city.
I got to know Don, who was a very nice man, when I delivered a case of Delsey bathroom tissue to him at the station. This was during the great toilet paper shortage scare of 1973 (Google it), and I was a sales manager for Kimberly-Clark. After making that acquaintance, I was on his show every so often discussing MU football and basketball.
Don was the father of sports talk radio in the Kansas City market.
Before Don Fortune, who begat Soren Petro, and before Kevin Kietzman, there was Don Burley on 980 KMBZ in the afternoons during the late 1970s.
Curt “Mother” Merz, an ex-Chiefs player, had a show on 610 WDAF, later followed by Dick Carlson, but Merz’s show was not strictly sports talk. Merz was something of a protege of the legendary Mike Murphy.
Burley had been on the air for a long, long time before hosting an afternoon sports show. By today’s standards, his show was about mild and white bread as it could be. But back in the day it was refreshing to have anything sports related to listen to while driving around the city.
I got to know Don, who was a very nice man, when I delivered a case of Delsey bathroom tissue to him at the station. This was during the great toilet paper shortage scare of 1973 (Google it), and I was a sales manager for Kimberly-Clark. After making that acquaintance, I was on his show every so often discussing MU football and basketball.
