Remembering Don Barrett
• UPDATED: We were deeply saddened yesterday to learn that Don Barrett, whose LA Radio website was exhaustively dedicated to chronicling and preserving Southern California’s rich radio history, has died after a battle with liver cancer. He would have celebrated his 82nd birthday this Friday, Sept. 15.
Barrett, who lived in the beautiful California coastal town of Avila Beach, had announced last month via a devastating Facebook post that he was battling advanced liver cancer and was shutting down LARadio.com. The site currently shows only two images of Don and his beloved wife Cheri (one of which is featured below), along with this simple statement: “In an ordinary instant — cancer has taken LARadio.com.”
Barrett grew up in Southern California and graduated from Chapman University. As the story goes, he started his radio career in St. Joseph, MO, and quickly became successful to the point that he was named GM of WDRQ and WWWW (W4)/Detroit before the age of 30. Barrett went on to spend five formative years under the guidance of legendary programmer Gordon McLendon (who personally hired him as one of McClendon’s “Magnificent Seven”), later rising to National Program Director, based in Dallas. In the early ’70s Barrett moved home to SoCal, where he launched KIQQ (K100)/Los Angeles, the market’s first successful AC station.
In 1974 Barrett changed careers, going to work in the movie industry, serving in executive marketing roles at Columbia Pictures, Universal and MGM/UA Pictures. Barrett officially entered the indispensable radio historian phase of his career with the publication of his first book in 1995, Los Angeles Radio People — 1957-1995. An expanded Volume 2, which covered 1957-1997, soon followed.
Don was also a regular attendee of the Art Vuolo-organized “Radio Dream Lunches” which convened at Steve Resnik‘s home or the Smokehouse in Burbank during our December holiday hiatus for nearly a decade. Art and Don were friends for nearly 50 years, and as Art recounted in a Facebook post, in 1971 Barrett had asked him to produce The History of Detroit Radio — a six-hour retrospective to celebrate the launch of WDRQ. “Don told me I had the three most important qualifications — I was the only one with all of the airchecks necessary, the contacts to get all of the interviews,’ and most importantly, he felt that I was crazy enough to think I could do it all in three weeks!” Art said. “Don taught me how to edit audio, and when I got this news I cried. Most of my friends won’t find that hard to believe. Love you Don, and we will all miss you A LOT!”
In addition to Cheri, Don Barrett is survived by his three children, Don, Tyler and Alexandra, her husband, Simon and their son, Matthew. Don’s many friends and fans have been posting some beautifully heartfelt tributes on his Facebook page.
