I have a Gloria Allred story that I don't think I've shared here, unless it was a LONG time ago and I've forgotten.
I handled the morning news at this one vintage Top-40 station in L.A. I'd always done a good job, got there on time, didn't make trouble, tried to do right by the news and what I understood about our audience and what they wanted/needed/expected.
Had no trouble with either programming or the morning man I worked with. Until a new program director arrived. With some very different ideas, none of which included me. He brought in a new morning man from another market - someone who later became a big name in showbiz, but ultimately failed at this particular gig. To woo him from the other station, they agreed to move his entire radio team, including producer AND his news guy to L.A. The jock flew in and I worked with him for a week. His news guy was driving to L.A. from the old job and didn't arrive til the following Monday, mid-shift.
And that's when I heard about the whole arrangement! That next Monday. They kept it from me until that morning. Then, the program director told me the new guy would be here soon, and when he arrived, just to let him go on. By then I'd had a week of horrible treatment and neglect from the programming office, no recourse from the general manager's office (he was new, too, and rather hostile to me, and didn't much care what I thought about anything). I had a gnawing feeling all that first week that my neck was on the chopping block. I was clearly on the "B-team".
So mid-morning or so, the new news guy did arrive. I was told, by the new morning DJ that he had this great idea for "explaining" the transition between the long-established female morning news voice and, suddenly, a new male morning news voice. "We're going to say that you're having a sex-change operation and then (new guy's name here) is gonna take the rest of it." That's all the notice I got.
So, the next newscast time arrived, and I was in the booth ready to start what would ultimately be my last newscast on that station, and began. The jock cued me by announcing to all our listeners that I had for some reason decided to have a sex-change operation and had for some reason chosen the name of the new news guy as my "new air name". And he cued me to start. Which I did, feeling a sense of doom and dismay. It would do no good to complain to the PD or the GM. They'd both already made clear to me that they weren't a bit interested in anything I thought or wanted.
And as I was reading the news copy I'd written, all of a sudden all these loud, grating, attention-grabbing, and frankly disgusting and horrifying sound effects started playing: chopping sounds, buzz saws, manual saws, a woman's screams. The mic in the news booth was turned off. And while all that noise was playing, the new news guy entered the booth ready to sit down and take over, and I got up and vacated my seat and left the booth. And before you knew it, this male voice broke through all the sound effects and - well - took over and proceeded with chitchat with the jock.
I went to my little office and shut the door and cried. I think that was the most humiliating experience of my entire career. But I was determined that they WERE NOT gonna see me break down, and man, I held it in, with head held high, didn't flinch, didn't react in any way. (On further thought, that was probably why the PD avoided me, and made sure we didn't pass each other in the hall.) That was one genuinely stormy Monday. And they lied to me, saying I was still news director and that I'd have a noon newscast, but then somehow, no noon newscast was ever set up nor intro sounder produced, nor any meeting or discussion about how long, top-of-the-hour or not, what to call it, what the outro was, nothing.
So I decided to start cleaning out my office of my stuff, packing up, and loading up my car. Odd moment, midweek when the PD timidly knocked on my closed office door and tried to stumble through asking if I were leaving - "because there was talk." I smiled and shrugged and said, "well, how'd you get THAT idea? I'm not going anywhere." I remember being surprised that he seemed to accept that answer and nodded and said "oh, okay" and then left. It felt almost like somebody had told him he better watch it around me because there was a very good chance I might sue. There actually had been listeners calling in, defending me and complaining that I wasn't there anymore and that they didn't like the new morning show.
But I left at the end of that week. I'd had enough time to clear my office out and got everything that was legitimately mine.
Which brings me to Gloria Allred. She contacted me at the station sometime during that last miserable week and offered comfort, support, and action if I needed to go that far. She invited me to lunch, and to lunch we went, and I got choked up again. She offered to represent me if I wanted to sue. I didn't want to. It would stir up too much noise and probably mostly hostile to me, since I wasn't holding any strong cards. Hell, I wasn't holding ANY cards! I declined but thanked her profusely and told her how much her support meant to me because I was already a fan - but now I was a MUCH BIGGER one! She also said she would not speak of this openly or make any noise about it in public, unless I ever needed her to, and she sure kept that promise. To this day she's kept that promise. I love Gloria Allred, and I'll always be grateful that she was there when I needed support and a shoulder to cry on, and there were no strings attached.
And other gigs came my way, some of 'em absolutely fantastic, and the last one - once you made it through the nine-month probationary period, and achieved permanent status, you could NOT be fired, unless you committed some really grievous illegal offense or maybe shot some people in the newsroom or something. Turns out I made permanent in record time. It was a really cool job! And I held it for the next nine years before retiring to become a full-time mom.
And as for the - um - "hot new morning show" on that other station, it didn't last long. The ratings just weren't there. Listeners evidently didn't like it. The celebrity DJ disappeared for awhile and then either got a new agent or something, and regrouped, and came back very successfully. His rumpled news guy who'd driven a couple thousand miles to L.A. to replace me after that live on-air "sex-change operation" disappeared. Nobody else in town ever picked him up. We didn't exactly keep in touch. I think he went back to the old station or something, but that's just a guess. He was never heard from again.
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, that will hopeully get more Dem's and youth DEMS out to vote.
