Evan Slack

I will never forget the beginning of my association with the Ag information network. I have done a lot of broadcasting in my life, almost exclusively television, and had worked with and interviewed some very famous people who were icons of the industry. So when I joined up with senior team members KELLY and SUSAN ALLEN, they prominently mentioned a legend of farm broadcasting by the name of Evan Slack.

All right, as a kid on the farm in Springfield, Missouri, we used to listen to WTO. I said, someday I'd like to do what you're doing. And like the station personality he talked with back in the early 1950s, he did. In fact, Evan Slack was a radio fixture for almost 70 years. That voice from a 2013 interview, a voice familiar to many in the intermountain west across the country and in the farm broadcasting community. Evan Slack, a pioneer in broadcasting in the West, died Saturday at age 86. His best known catch phrase: “on the air and in the air” was due to the extensive miles he flew as a licensed pilot covering events across the country. His stops included Canada and Australia. His interview highlight real impressive with names including Elvis Presley, John Wayne and President George H.W. Bush, another catchphrase that became a sort of nickname for Evan from his listeners, “Hirahara”, a reference to his daily commodity market reports