David Fechheimer, private investigator. Noted here because this is one of the better NYT obits for a not-so-famous person I’ve read in a while.
Ron “The Ghoul” Sweed, late night TV host in Cleveland during the 70s.
Sweed broke into Cleveland TV in 1971 on WKBF Channel 61. He wore a lab coat and was armed with an assortment of low-rent props, from Cheez Whiz to firecrackers to flying pierogis, kielbasa and slime. He quickly was syndicated in six other markets — Boston, Philadelphia, Detroit, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco.
He got his start working as an assistant for another late-night TV legend, Ernie “Ghoulardi” Anderson. He received Anderson’s permission to appear as the Ghoul in 1971.
(Previously. Hattip: Lawrence.)
I just had to reminisce a bit about my youth. I am from a tiny town on the west side of Michigan, near the Lake Michigan, named Hesperia. Born in 1960, I was into radio and became a ham in 1972. So from the age of around 10 or so, I listened to AM radio late at night, on my trusty transistor radio, and got to hear skip from all over the place. I would climb up on my roof and get stations like WOKY out of Milwaukee, WCFL in Chicago, WBBM also I think in Chicago, and some others I can’t remember, on skip across the lake.
And of course, I would listen to the Detroit Tigers games on my 9volt transistor radio too.
Growing up back in those days had a sort of thrill compared to now days, with the coolest thing coming along being color television. I was a voracious reader, and once I learned to read, I read everything I got my hands on, from the Bible, to the dictionary, to an entire set of encyclopedias, each several times.
Now kids would not take the time to do something like that, with the internet to hold their attention, and while the internet is fascinating and holds much information, it also is an oblivion of waste and a trap that can bury a young mind behind the veil of nothingness. If it had existed when I was young, I don’t know if I would have used it for good or for harm. Most likely, I would have been so busy looking at naked women and porn, that I would not have taken advantage of the vast amount of knowledge and the ability to educate myself, the way that I did with my access to books, and would have grown up with little of the knowledge that I possess and none of the ability to string together two words to make a sentence.
I graduated from high school and had many opportunities to attend college, from playing music, as a professional sax player, to a football scholarship, to educational scholarships. Instead, I fell in love. I spent the next 35 plus years of my life making steel in a steel factory, for the investment cast industry, and for the aerospace industry. It actually takes some intelligence to do that type of work, but it also is the type of work that is considered general labor. In this country, it is a good and wonderful thing that one can become anything that they want, and if they work hard, and are devoted, they can end up making 6 figures at a general labor job. America truly is the greatest nation on earth. But you must be willing to start at the bottom and work your way to the top, and I mean, work. You hear of many CEOs who do that. I was not any kind of CEO, just a worker, but one with responsibilities, and knowledge, who was able to teach new workers, and to step in and do anything, and to help write new programs, and procedures, just by hard work.
I don’t know how I got off topic so far, in fact, I don’t know what the topic is, but I guess just sharing a bit of my life, with someone who has shared some of their life. The more I come here, the more I am intrigued and the more I enjoy coming back. So thank you, and have a wonderful weekend.
By the way, I am also known as Pigpen 51
Thank you for the kind words, Pigpen 51. You’re welcome to post here anytime you want: you wear well.