| Wolfman Jack was a gravelly-voiced, American disc jockey who became world famous in the 1960s and 1970s, and whose real name was Robert Weston Smith (January 21, 1938 July 1, 1995). Smith was born in Brooklyn on January 21, 1938, the younger of two children of Anson Weston Smith, an Episcopal Sunday school teacher, writer, editor, and executive vice president of the Financial World, and Rosamund Small. His parents divorced while he was young. To help keep him out of trouble, his father bought him a large transoceanic radio, and Smith became an avid fan of R&B music and the disc jockeys who played it, such as "Jocko" Henderson of Philadelphia, New York's "Dr. Jive" (Tommy Smalls), the "Moon Dog" Alan Freed, and Nashville's "John R." Richbourg, who later became his mentor. After selling encyclopedias and Fuller brushes door-to-door, Smith attended the National Academy of Broadcasting in Washington, DC. Upon graduation (1960), he began working as "Daddy Jules" at WYOU-AM in Newport News, Virginia. When the station format changed to "beautiful music," Smith became known as "Roger Gordon and Music in Good Taste." In 1962, he moved to country music station KCIJ-AM in Shreveport, Louisiana to be the station manager as well as the morning disc jockey, "Big Smith with the Records." He married Lucy "Lou" Lamb in 1961, and they had two children. Disc jockey Alan Freed had played a role in the transformation of black rhythm and blues into rock and roll music, and originally called ... |
