Watsonville native Les Malloy traced his radio career to San Francisco’s perennially-struggling KGTT, where he first found work at age 16. Malloy would go on to become a memorable force in Bay Area broadcasting as a performer and as a station owner. Malloy is considered a pioneer of the talk radio format.
Malloy was red-hot in the 1940’s, working simultaneously at KYA, KFRC and KGO.
In the 1950s, Malloy made the transition to television, hosting his Les Malloy Show on KGO-TV.
In 1953, Malloy bought San Mateo station KVSM, where popular country-western star Cottonseed Clark held forth. Malloy fired Clark, and would sell the station within two years.
A year later, Malloy bought Seattle’s KJR, Portland’s KXL and a Spokane station.
In 1964, Malloy and bandleader Del Courtney bought KSAN, the same station where he’d started his career (under different call letters). The station was carrying a “should music” format, so they changed the call letters to KSOL and launched a “soul music” format.
KSOL became KEST, and Malloy continued to be heard on the air for years as the voice of the comedy sketches Freeway Funnies.
Malloy’s various broadcasting ventures were widely-noted. San Francisco Chronicle radio-TV columnist Terrence O’Flaherty wrote in 1964 that Malloy “…made so many commercial plugs on his innumerable television ad radio programs that he developed back trouble from carrying those heavy sacks to the bank…”
Les Malloy died in 1996 at age 81.