Norman Davis was born in Walla Walla, WA and grew up in Boise, ID. His long radio career began in the Pacific Northwest, with jobs in Boise, Pocatello and Spokane before coming to the Bay Area in 1958 to work at KOBY, the first Top 40 hits station in the Bay Area, using the air name “Al Knight.”
Known next as “Lucky Logan”, Davis jumped to KYA in 1959 and helped make that station a dominant force in the market. Eventually allowed to use his own name on the air,Davis hosted a popular dedications and request show on KYA.
Davis took a break from the Bay Area, working in Denver and Kansas City. His family recalls that it was at Kansas City’s KCMO that Davis first used hallucinogenic drugs before going on the air. He was fired from KCMO after arriving for his morning shift still tripping on LSD and unable to read a commercial on the air.
Davis hitchhiked back to the Bay Area and spent two years at KSFO before reaching what many consider the pinnacle of his career at the “Jive 95” KSAN, where his overnight show took the station’s vaunted freeform concept to an even higher plane.
After leaving KSAN, Davis would work at KSJO, KTIM, KMPX, KKCY and KOFY as well as numerous other stations outside the Bay Area. All in, Davis was heard on 21 stations during his career. His final broadcast was back in Boise, where it all started. That show aired a day before he died.
Norman Davis died in 2024 at age 88.