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Don Imus

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Don Imus

John Donald Imus, Jr. (born July 23, 1940) is an American radio talk show host. Imus is best known for his sarcasm and the harsh language he directs towards his guests. His popular radio show, Imus in the Morning, airs daily.

The show is currently broadcast on New York's WFAN and is syndicated nationwide by Westwood One. Part of it is also simulcast daily by cable television network MSNBC.

Originally considered a shock jock, Imus has turned his show more towards politics and news and has gained public influence as a result. The show's many guests include prominent politicians such as John S. McCain III, John Kerry, Dick Cheney, J.D. Hayworth and Harold Ford, as well as reporters and columnists from Newsweek, NBC, MSNBC, and other media outlets. The show also has a regular cast of members who supply news, comedy, and act as foils to Imus.

Imus was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 1989.

Early life

Don Imus was born in Riverside, California. His father was an alcoholic and his family moved around the American Southwest a great deal. Imus escaped family tensions as a child by reading books and listening to Wolfman Jack on the radio. In high school he was impeached as class president for behaving like a dictator. His parents finally separated.

Imus served in the Marine Corps from 1957-1959, then had a series of unsuccessful jobs as a miner, gas station attendant, railway brakeman, and aspiring rock star.

Radio: comedy and music bits

Imus then found his calling. He started as a radio disc jockey in 1968. At KXOA in Sacramento, California, his pranks, such as calling up a restaurant and ordering 1,200 hamburgers to go, made his show immensely popular and raised ratings. He recorded a comedy album, One Sacred Chicken to Go in 1970.

After a stint at WGAR-AM in Cleveland, Ohio, Imus moved to New York City and WNBC in 1971, where he gained a reputation as a loose cannon who often favored crude humor. In 1977 WNBC fired Imus due to his cocaine and vodka habits and unprofessionalism; he had missed a hundred days of work in one year. As a result, Imus went to work again in Cleveland and cleaned up for a while. Imus was reinstated two years later as WNBC's morning drive time host.

From 1982 to 1985, the station also employed shock jock Howard Stern, and WNBC heavily promoted the pair in print and television ads; these often featured the slogan "If We Weren't So Bad, We Wouldn't Be That Good." Although Stern's show aired later in the day, Imus and Stern often made brief appearances on each other's shows, giving the audience an occasional glimpse of an on- and off-air rivalry that continues to this day. Due in part to Stern's combative relationship with WNBC, Stern has continued to blast Imus. Stern takes special offense to the developments in Imus' career that mimicked Stern's earlier moves; i.e. playing less music, creating a staff of adversarial characters that discuss their real lives, expanding the audience via national syndication, or bringing TV cameras into the radio studio. The truth of this dispute lies in the ear of the hearer, but there is no doubt that Imus' WNBC show and style of comedy was very different before and after the arrival of Stern. However, Imus was an established radio personality well before Stern's success.

During this time Imus was most known for a satiric character he voiced, Billy Sol Hargus, a radio evangelist who was a cross between infamous real-life radio and television preacher Billy James Hargis and infamous real-life Texas fertilizer swindler Billie Sol Estes. Imus, as Billy Sol Hargus, touted on-air the merits of the "First Church of the Gooey Death and Discount House of Worship." Imus published the novel God's Other Son in 1981 that further described Billy Sol Hargus' adventures. The novel was later republished in 1994 and overall spent considerable time on the New York Times bestseller list. Other regular Imus characters included the alleged general manager "Geraldo Santana Banana," and "Moby Worm," a monstrous creature who ate local schools, and whose maraudings were reported upon in the form of breaking news updates.

In addition to radio, WNEW-TV Channel 5 in New York gave Imus a late-night program Imus Plus which only lasted one season. Imus was also the inaugural video jockey for the launch of the VH-1 cable network in 1985.

In 1988 WNBC-AM was sold to Emmis Broadcasting; as a result, WNBC-AM permanently signed off the air and Emmis's WFAN-AM was moved from its 1050 AM spot to WNBC's former spot, 660 AM. "Imus in the Morning" remained at 660 AM among WFAN's sports programs. Throughout this period, Imus's music and comedy bits were staples of the program.

1988: A big change, news and talk

Imus had relapsed during his time in New York, but in 1987 had finally found effective treatment and personal resolve. In 1988, with his battle with cocaine and alcohol now part of his self-publicity, Imus reshaped his show into a forum for political issues, charitable causes, and news-based parodies; the Billy Sol Hargus routines were phased out. The radio show became nationally syndicated in 1993, and began simulcasting on MSNBC in 1996.

In the 1990s Imus and his wife Deirdre founded the Imus Ranch, a working cattle ranch near Ribera, New Mexico, 50 miles northeast of Santa Fe, New Mexico. The Imus Ranch is a charitable organization which operates for children with cancer and the siblings of SIDS victims.

Imus has four daughters from a previous marriage and a son (Frederick Wyatt) from his current marriage. As a result of his wife Deirdre being a vegetarian, both Imus and his son have become vegetarians. Between Memorial Day and Labor Day each year, the Imus family goes to the New Mexico ranch, during which Imus broadcasts from a studio on the ranch, while the rest of his cast broadcasts from New York and New Jersey. In 2000 Imus suffered serious injuries after a fall from a horse at his ranch, and broadcast several shows from a hospital.

Imus does not hesitate to broadcast parody songs and voices which comment on national and local New York events.

During the 1990s Imus in the Morning gained a reputation as a useful, non-traditional platform for politicians to express their views and gain exposure. When Imus has a guest of some fame, Imus usually asks obvious questions, which forces the guest to impart fundamental information. Imus was featured as one of Time magazine's "25 most influential people in America" and was on the cover of Newsweek.

Former U.S. Sen. Al D'Amato (R-N.Y.) was one of the first officeholders to ingratiate himself with "The I-man". Imus was a Bill Clinton supporter, but managed to offend the White House with off-color remarks in front of the Clintons during a 1996 Radio and Television Correspondents Association dinner speech. [1] In 2000, Imus was a George W. Bush supporter; however, after the Iraq War, Imus became more critical of Bush and supported John Kerry in 2004.

As of 2005, Imus in the Morning is carried by about 90 radio stations across the US. [2] Arbitron analysis puts the program in a tie for the eleventh most listened to radio talk show in the United States [3], and it has about 3.5 million combined radio and television listeners a week. Because Imus' listeners tend to be more affluent and less politically partisan than those of other radio talk shows, Imus in the Morning can command high advertising rates. [4] By comparison, the daily Howard Stern terrestrial radio broadcast attracted more than 8.25 million listeners on half as many stations, and yet the two shows' ad rates are comparable. Imus has been able to maintain this demographic cachet despite substandard rating numbers; the Winter 2005 Arbitron book had Imus in a three-way tie for 17th place in New York City's competitive morning drive. [5]

Imus generally selects country and western songs as bumper music, often playing them at substantial length, and has heavily promoted artists he likes such as Delbert McClinton, The Dixie Chicks, and The Flatlanders. Sometimes when sound bites are played as part of the news, a "SHUT UP!" sound effect will be played, effectively cutting off the speaker. He wears a signature cowboy hat during his broadcasts; during his interview on Larry King Live, Imus and Deirdre both wore Western clothing and cowboy hats.

Still keeping to his "shock jock" roots, Imus is a huge friend and supporter of Opie and Anthony. He even wears an Opie and Anthony XM radio T-shirt occasionally during MSNBC broadcasts. Imus and Howard Stern, on the other hand, remain unreconciled, with for example the two engaging in an ugly name-calling exchange in late 2003. [6]

Don Imus’ behavior has increasingly drawn the attention of the press. He famously called Rush Limbaugh "a fat, pill-popping loser," and Lesley Stahl a "gutless, lying weasel." More recently, his targets have not been so prominent, and his attacks have displayed a more vindictive quality. For example, he threatened Wall Street Journal reporter Robert Frank with unending harassment for his reporting on the Imus Ranch in New Mexico. The Journal's editor and publisher have editorialized on what has been called Imus’ "intimidation game" against Frank. His exchange of insults ("fat pig") regarding his show’s former news reader, Contessa Brewer, recently made news, as did Brewer's response ("cantankerous old fool"). When Tucker Carlson brought up Ms. Brewer on the program in 2005, Imus hung up on him, calling him "a bowtie-wearing pussy." Imus also attracted public attention due to two recent lawsuits, one filed by a former nanny, Nichole Mallette, 24, who was thrown out of his New Mexico home at 4 a.m., and the other filed by Dr. Howard Allen Pearson, a pediatric cancer and blood specialist at Yale University, who has initiated a defamation suit based on his claims of Imus' repeated on-air slander. An insurance adjuster in California has even set up a web site, somewhat cryptically entitled "New Ruskin College," to document Don Imus’ ongoing (though dubious) harassment of him through what he believes to be coded messages broadcast over the air. [7]

Cast members

Featured cast members of the Imus in the Morning include:

Part of the appeal of his cable show is the overt display of office politics: cast members are frequently the butt of Imus' sarcasm, largely because of their outspoken points of view, while McCord works very hard at being neutral and thus staying out of Imus' line of fire.

Previous sports reporters have included Sid Rosenberg (fired in May 2005 for comments made regarding Kylie Minogue's battle against breast cancer), Warner Wolf, Patrick McEnroe, Mike Breen (valued for his deadpan delivery of false sports news), and Christopher "Mad Dog" Russo (whose career was helped immensely by this role). Previous "scum reporters" have included Janice Dean and Christy Musumeci, who departed for FOX News Channel and MSNBC respectively.

Business interests

Don Imus was also a part owner of the Autobody Express with his brother, Fred Imus (who is a frequent caller to the radio show, commenting on NASCAR races, the NFL and related cultural matters with a drawl even slower than Don's). The Autobody Express stores were located in Albuquerque, New Mexico and inside the Mohegan Sun Native American Casino in Uncasville, Connecticut. In 2003 the company failed and both stores closed.

Imus still owns a small coffee/pastry store also located in the Mohegan Sun casino. The Autobody Express became Imus Ranch Foods, which offers its signature chips and salsa via online sales and in Northeastern U.S. stores. The proceeds from Imus Ranch Foods help fund the work of the Imus Ranch.

Like his former co-worker and fellow broadcaster Howard Stern, Don Imus is licensed to carry a concealed handgun for his protection. This license was issued by the New York City Police Department.

Books

  • Imus, Donald. God's Other Son. Simon & Schuster, 1994. ISBN 0684801663. (Originally published in 1981.)
  • Imus, Donald, and Imus, Fred. Two Guys Four Corners: Great Photographs, Great Times, and a Million Laughs. Villard, 1997. ISBN 0679453075.
  • Imus, Deirdre. The Imus Ranch: Cooking for Kids and Cowboys. Rodale Press, 2004. ISBN 0875969194.
  • Reed, Jim. Everything Imus: All You Ever Wanted to Know About Don Imus. Birch Lane Press, 1999. ISBN 1559725044.
  • Tracy, Kathleen. Imus: America's Cowboy. Carroll & Graf, 1999. ISBN 0786706082.
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