Halls of Fame

Rex Davis – Legacy

​Rex Davis began his career in Cincinnati as Frank Zwygart (his real name), but management there awarded him the nom de air of Rex Davis, and that’s how he came to St. Louis in 1946. He was immediately thrown into action here as an aggressive newsman at KMOX.

His biggest success, in terms of ratings, came in 1974 when station manager Robert Hyland teamed Davis up with Bob Hardy for a two-person morning drive program called “Total Information AM,” a show that, during its peak, pulled a 33 average share of the listening audience.

He was the consummate newsman, felt by many listeners to be the true “Voice of St. Louis,” which was the motto associated with the station since its inception.

Davis also had a humorous side, which began to come out in 1973 with his regular appearances on the Jack Carney Show, another KMOX ratings phenomenon. Carney would regularly set up Davis, alternately giving him the punch lines or making him the target of jokes. Listeners responded with delight, hearing their authoritative newsman as a human being.
Rex Davis retired from KMOX in 1981.

Ron Morgan – 2004

​Ron Morgan came to St. Louis in 1973, taking an on-air position on Pulitzer powerhouse KSD. It was the beginning of a stay in St. Louis radio that would span nearly twenty years.

Known as “Morgan in the Morning,” he peppered his programs with droll humor supplemented with an infectious laugh and gave his program team plenty of opportunities to share the spotlight.

He also did mornings at KSD-FM and KLOU, as well as other shifts at KMOX and KHTR.

Morgan was also program director at CBS-owned KLOU when it hit the air with an oldies format, giving the station a strong group of personalities to complement the music, and he served as operations director at KSD-FM.

Ron Morgan was visible in the community as a long-time supporter of the Easter Seals Society.

Nance and Clif St. James – 2004

​Clif and Nance St. James began their husband/wife radio show at WTMA in Charleston, SC, coming to St. Louis in 1952 when Clif landed a job at KWK. ​After several months, he began concentrating on free-lance work while serving as KWK’s movie reporter. ​Within two years opportunity knocked when Laclede Gas bought sponsorship for the “Clif and Nancy” Show on KSD Radio and the married couple became a part of St. Louis radio history. ​Theirs is believed to be the first regular local program featuring a married couple as co-hosts. ​The program was eventually taken off the air in favor of the then wildly popular “Liberace” show from NBC, but Clif maintained a presence on KSD as a disc jockey in both the jazz and middle-of-the-road genres. ​He also had a long career in television and Nance continued her presence in the media as talent in many local radio and television commercials.

Lester Arthur Benson – Legacy

​Lester Arthur “Eddie” Benson was literally a part of the radio business in St. Louis at its inception.

In 1920 he was commissioned by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch to build a transmitter at its downtown headquarters. In 1922, KSD, the city’s first commercial station, began its experimental broadcasts with this transmitter.

But he had preceded that accomplishment on November 2, 1920, when he and partner William E. Wood teamed to broadcast the results of the Harding-Cox presidential election, using transmitters they had built.

Benson was 20 years old at the time, having entered Washington University to study electrical engineering at 16. His obituary in the local paper said he had first begun broadcasting from the basement of his home when he was only 14 years old.

He put his own station, WEB [later to be WIL] on the air in 1922, eventually running it from his radio store. Two years later he built a transmitter for KFVE [which later became KWK].

Buddy Blattner – Legacy

​Buddy Blattner made a very big impression on basketball fans with his play-by-play work for the St. Louis Hawks professional basketball team, but he had begun his broadcasting career in the late 1940s and did 26 years of baseball broadcasts. He covered the St. Louis Browns and Cardinals, the Kansas City Royals and California Angels.

He was also a television pioneer, having worked in the booth with Dizzy Dean in the early 1950s for the first 8 years of the nationally televised “Baseball Game of the Week.” He and Dean also paired for radio’s “Game of the Day,” and he did baseball recreations on the Gordon McLendon Radio Network.

Blattner was the lead announcer on the first 800 games for the St. Louis Hawks, becoming the first announcer to travel with his team and broadcast home and away games. He was twice elected to the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame and received the St. Louis Browns Historical Society Award for Distinguished Broadcasting in 1989.

Nellie Booth – Legacy

​While Nellie Booth was working as an actress in St. Louis in 1937, a group of people in New York was organizing AFRA, the American Federation of Radio Artists (later to include television by becoming AFTRA). As the organizational activity spread west, Nellie was contacted by one of the people organizing the Chicago local.

She agreed to be one of the founders in St. Louis, and she and six other people organized the St. Louis AFRA. Nellie Booth became the first president and executive secretary in 1937, and she served as the executive director until the 1960s.

In 1968, Ms. Booth received the George Heller Memorial Award, AFTRA’s top honor. She had been recording secretary of the national office since 1937, and the St. Louis local of AFTRA established an annual award in her honor following her death.