My first exposure to the voice of Don Sainte-Johnn was in 1972. I was a college junior, actively involved at NYU's student radio station as a DJ. My student broadcaster inquisitiveness constantly drove me to seek out and listen to different radio personalities from outside of my home town territory of New York City.

There was no YouTube, but the desire to discover and learn about different styles could only be quenched by aggressively pursuing collectable audio signatures called radio airchecks.

My Sherlock Holmes mission was to uncover these mostly voice only segments recorded in real time at radio stations (or off the air on tape recorders) in different cities. When the curtain was pulled back revealing the soul of these relatable human announcing microphone masters, they delivered the goods.

Here's is one I obtained during the year of Curtis Mayfield's Superfly. This broadcaster's voice stood out. It was Don Sainte-Johnn. I had never heard of him, but he was Black, he wasn't a shuck and jive talker, and he was in another big city, one I would not visit until more than 20 years later.

Listen to Don Sainte-Johnn on WGRT, Chicago. 

 

San Francisco's Last Top 40 Disc Jockey (Another One Bites the Dust), is a memoir by Don Sainte-Johnn, who would eventually become inducted into both the Bay Area Radio Hall of Fame and The National Black Radio Hall of Fame.

The road to the hall of fame is long, with many a winding turn. Sainte-Johnn is somewhat of a radio renaissance man, sporting a vast, diverse array of character building, work and creative experiences.

Beginnings

Don Sainte-Johnn was an only child who grew up in Perdue Hill, Alabama. He talks fondly about his Grandpa, Grandma, mother, and other influential family members.

He passes through a series of homes the family occupies during his younger years. Sainte-Johnn skipped a grade in elementary school. He was a strong academic learner.

Reading his story you are struck by the narrative that flows off the pages in the true style of a journalist. Don acknowledges early during his years of maturity that he has a specific goal to be a Top 40 radio personality. What has to be discovered is the path to success.

After high school graduation, he leaves cotton picking, tobacco harvesting, a string of odd jobs, and his penchant for creative diversions to seek his broadcasting destiny in California.

One thing that follows Don to the golden state is his regional southern accent. Once upon a time, young broadcasters were trained to lose all regional accents if they wanted to work in the big cities or at a major network.

Sainte-Johnn, a good young student and eventual lifelong learner, shares how he discovered a vinyl record Living Language Better Speech training course in a pawn shop that he used to improve his enunciation and diction.

An early Sainte-Johnn California decision was to attend Los Angeles City College and major in broadcasting and telecasting. Prior to LACC, he had enrolled in a broadcasting school (Don Martin), but decided LACC was a better move.

Don Laments that many of his LACC white classmates "landed weekend on-air jobs in small towns just outside the Los Angeles" metro area. He didn't want to pursue the so called first job opportunities for African Americans in small towns along the East Coast and in the South.

Sainte-John was committed to finding opportunity in California!

San Diego comes through

Rock 95, "XEGM, Rosarito, Baja California, Mexico," the official station identification in Spanish, would be Don's first full-time experience.

He credits his college radio preparation in getting this position. Don's program, and the other radio shows, would be prerecorded one day in advance for playback. The recordings were then transported to Tijuana, Mexico for broadcast.

Despite growth as a music scheduler and program director, long XEGM hours and slim paychecks would take its toll on Sainte-Johnn. He states "after a very short while, I said goodbye to Rock 95." He also said goodbye to the name he used there, "Lord Wylbers!"

Yuma, Arizona

How the Yuma opportunity almost happened, did not happen, and ultimately happened is a fascinating chapter in San Francisco's Last Top 40 Disc Jockey. Our hero, Don Sainte-Johnn, used his birth name, Wilbur "Wil Johnson" at this station. It was the only time he used his real name on the air.

There is a cultural schism that defines Don's KYUM Yuma days. He says that "Yuma was a surreal experience, marked by near-total isolation."

Fortunately, when you are good, things happen for you. Sainte-Johnn got featured in the Sunday section of the local newspaper. He says that station management never acknowledged the article.

In chapter 3, California Love, you can read the full explanation about the genesis of Wil's broadcasting name "Don Sainte-Johnn."

Upon departure from KYUM, the ambivalence of his acceptance at the station by staff when he was first hired is noted.

St. Louis, MO

Sainte-Johnn was always improving his skill set. Fresh out of engineering school with a Federal Communications Commission issued First Class Radio Operator Permit, he received two job offers, WAYS in Charlotte, and KWK in St. Louis.

Accepting the St. Louis station offer was career defining. Don was rapidly promoted from nighttime personality to morning drive guy and chief announcer. Away from the mic, husband credentials would soon follow.

Don travelled thirty-one hours and nineteen hundred miles from St. Louis back to Southern California to marry the love of his life, Brenda.

There is the undercurrent of family stability throughout the entire Sainte-Johnn story. You won't find this in most radio memoirs.

In both John Records Landecker's eBook Records Truly Is My Middle Name, and Hal Jackson's hardcover The House That Jack Built, both radio performers talk about being married four times, a casualty of careers in the public eye and ear.

Don Sainte-Johnn credits KWK as a chance to redefine his emerging career. He met the big name movers and shakers who were the elite broadcasting executives of the day and shared conversations with them.

St. Louis was clearly a coming of age transition into the big time. In many of his radio job pursuits or interactions, several themes keep reappearing. Discrimination is one. Housing is another. Questioning the timbre of Black identity through one's broadcast voice is a third issue.

Sometimes, announcers can't win over this subjective appraisal. The issue reared its ugly head when Chicago radio legend E. Rodney Jones' voice was accused by ownership of sounding too Black at WYNR, before he jumped over to WVON.

When Sainte-Johnn felt he had hit a ceiling in St. Louis, overtures to Washington, DC were rejected by a Black station who thought his voice was better suited for Top 40 radio, but not for their Black radio station. 

All of us, me included, who have worked in general market radio have faced this "too white or too Black" criticism. Sometimes it is subtle. Sometimes it is right in your face.

Even when hosting a syndicated radio program after arriving in Chicago, one station in Birmingham, Alabama needed to see Don's photo to confirm he was Black!

Chicagoland

We arrive at what you heard in the beginning of this review. Don Sainte-Johnn embraces Chicago, and WGRT/WJPC. He was hired away from St. Louis by Jerry Boulding, a Black radio programming legend, to the Windy City.

Sainte-Johnn did well in Chicago, and was an attraction other stations inside and outside of the market paid attention to.

There are interesting anecdotes in the bigger cities of Don's employment including Chicago about the popular culture citizens he would meet, the broadcasting characters he would deal with, and life's idiosyncrasies. Jury duty was one of them.

Golden Gate Days

Much of San Francisco's Last Top 40 Disc Jockey is spent documenting the post 1975 Don Sainte-Johnn relocation to San Francisco where he became a fixture at KFRC. Twenty years at this facility is only a part of his Southern California story. Don was also on 93.3/KYA, 98.9/KSOL and K101.

You won't be disappointed in the attention to details. The stories, the awards, the elements of history, crazy radio promotions, the move to voice tracking, and whacky consultants all take center stage.

This memoir is as authentic as you might want it to be. The tone of the stories take the high road. None get nasty with vindictive jabs. Don Sainte-Johnn was and is a real role model we can all respect. He has left a lasting mark on the golden age of radio.

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