Hilly Rose — paved the way for modern talk-radio formats
Hilly Rose, a pioneer of talk radio, who spent his decades-long career chatting with everybody from politicians to pet psychics, died Dec. 27 from natural causes. He was 91.
Rose’s career in radio, which would eventually see him inducted into the Bay Area Radio Hall of Fame, started early. His first jobs were as a child actor on radio shows in the 1940s. Eventually he found himself in San Francisco, where he hosted one of the first talk radio programs for KCBS. Rose moved to Los Angeles, where he was perhaps best known for his show “Open Phone Forum,” which was broadcast by KFI. His career also saw him guest host “Coast to Coast” and frequently step in for Larry King.
Producers who worked with him said he could get governors and senators on the phone in a moment’s notice, but he also relished inviting psychics, UFO experts and other offbeat characters into his studio.
Margo Bart, who worked as Rose’s producer in the early ’70s, remembered coming aboard his show only to realize how much air time they had to fill. Rose’s show ran Monday through Saturday, midnight to 4 a.m.
“Just think about that,” she said.
The workweek was generally reserved for serious news. Bart remembered how easy it was to line up interviews with politicians and other news makers because Rose was always thoughtful.
“He was a good, knowledgeable, prepared interviewer,” she said. “He was a very highly regarded person in the Southland.”
On Saturdays, however, Rose liked to mix it up. Bart recalled one night when he decided to bring a pet psychic into the studio.
“We had all kinds of animals in the station,” she said. “You would not believe the number of people who brought their pets in to have them read.” (Bart, in fact, brought in her own cat.)
The time slot, though unconventional, ended up being a treasure.
“There’s a whole world that happens at night,” Bart said. “There’s just a whole world out there and he tapped into that. And it was very powerful.”
After Bart left as producer, Rose’s wife, Mary Rose, took over the production duties. She said those years were “the most fun I ever had in my life.” She, too, had been a journalism student, and as much as people might remember Hilly Rose’s playful talks with astrologers and paranormal experts, she also remembered the serious way in which he approached reporting.
“I think he got great enjoyment out of informing people, especially about politics,” Mary Rose said. He was always adamant that the opposing voice go first; to do otherwise, he’d say, was “not good radio and people don’t learn anything.”
Rose, his wife said, liked to think of his programs as town hall meetings, places to explore ideas and air them publicly.
“There are three sides to every story, your side, my side and the truth in between,” she remembered him saying.
His interests were diverse and so were the subjects he covered, Mary Rose said.
“He was an incredibly bright, bright man . ... You couldn’t really put him in one little niche.” In the late ’70s, he published a book about his chosen profession, the aptly titled “But That’s Not What I Called About.”
Rose’s voice — which Mary Rose described as a “gorgeous set of pipes, the most wonderful, just very lovely” — reached thousands and thousands of listeners each night and many more throughout the years. He hosted programs on a number of stations in both Los Angeles and San Francisco, including one of the very first talk radio shows on Sirius Radio Network.
Over the years, Rose became a mentor and friend to many, including Harvey Levin, the founder of TMZ, who in 1979 began working for him as Levin was just starting to make his move into broadcast.
“It was a critical time for me,” Levin said. “Hilly Rose is one of the great and biggest influences in my life. I never would have had a career in broadcasting if it weren’t for Hilly.”
In a field where people could be sharp-elbowed, Rose took Levin and others under his wing as a matter of course. He didn’t believe in broadcast as a “zero-sum game” in which there was not room for everybody’s success, Levin said.
“He was a great man, a smart man, a kind man. He was always willing to share what he knew with others.”
Rose, who was again a resident of San Francisco when he died, is survived by his wife, Mary; daughter, Patricia Sweeney; sons Roger and Adam; and six grandchildren. His son Judd Rose, a television news reporter, died in 2000. A private memorial for family and friends is scheduled for Sunday.