Those pledge drives just won’t be the same without her signature New York harangue, but KCRW general manager Ruth Seymour has announced she will retire at the end of February after 32 years in the post.
The public radio station reported the news on the air on Wednesday morning.
A local public radio pioneer, Seymour built the station, an affiliate of National Public Radio, into a nationally recognized magnet for radio talent – which included hiring such tastemakers as music programmers Chris Douridas, Nic Harcourt and film aficionado Elvis Mitchell.
She is also known as having a feisty temperment and a highly personal, spur-of-the-moment style, one that has led to some high-profile arguments (notably with humorist Sandra Tsing Loh) and the nickname, "Lady of the Iron Whim."
In a letter to employees Tuesday night and one to station supporters going out Wednesday morning that were obtained by LAObserved.com, Seymour said after 32 years, she was leaving the station on an up note.
Seymour and her then-husband, Jack Hirschman, were early public radio programmers in the early 1960s, at KPFK.
A profile of her at Current.org recalled that after two years, they "left for Europe and embraced the bohemian lifestyle. She returned to the station in 1971, became program director and survived Pacifica’s withering internal politics until 1977, when she says she and general manager Will Lewis were driven out in one of the network’s all-too-familiar coups."
After that, Santa Monica College hired Seymour to resuscitate KCRW, which at the time was an eclectic-format station sitting on a middle school playground. "You opened the door from the swings into the studio," she told Current.
The station’s licensee, Santa Monica College, has begun the search for Seymour’s replacement.
Here’s the press release, issued Wednesday morning:
