Good Morning Bob

Good Morning Bob Category: Sports

Good Morning,

It's a Wonderful Sunny Day here in Charlotte, though we could use some rain, I'll settle for the bright morning sun anytime.

Maybe because it's Friday or maybe because I went to a Baseball game last night, but I started thinking.....

Years ago, "back in the day" I spent a lot of time on the road.

Because most of my clients paid their employees on Fridays, so Friday was the preferred day for enrollment meetings, since for some reason they would all show up for work on payday. Go figure! Being in the investment biz and helping my clients with their 401(k) plans and enrollment meetings was just part of the job and a part I really enjoyed.

So most of my Fridays would start at 5AM so I could be out the door by 6AM then make a two hour drive out into the Carolina countryside where I'd do a few enrollment meetings before driving back to my office. Much of my drive was spent listing to Morning Addition with Bob Edwards. The highlight of any Friday on NPR was the once a week call to Red Barber.

Now you're probably thinking who the hell is Red Barber?

Well, Red was a radio announcer from the early days of radio, and the first days of television broadcasting. Red was the voice of the Cincinnati Reds, Brooklyn Dodgers (before they moved west) and the New York Yankees. Red was a radio pioneer, and his firsts are many, and back in the day he was the shit!

He had retired to Tallahassee Florida in the early seventies and was rediscovered by Bob Edwards much by chance in 1981.

So for 12 years Bob would call Red at home every Friday live on radio at 7:35AM and they would chat about just about everything, often Baseball, sometimes politics or whatever had gotten Reds attention during the past week. But not before Red went through the pleasantries and small talk that made Red a true southern gentleman.

Red Barber passed away in 1992, I'm surprised by that, because it seems like just yesterday I heard his voice on the radio and he would say..

Good Morning Bob, It's a Wonderful Sunny Day here in Tallahassee, though we could use some rain, I'll settle for the bright morning sun anytime.

Currently reading : FRIDAYS WITH RED By Bob Edwards Release date: By 21 October, 1993