The publication is reproduced in full below:
CONGRATULATING RAY DUNAWAY ON HIS RETIREMENT
______
HON. JOHN B. LARSON
of connecticut
in the house of representatives
Thursday, December 23, 2021
Mr. LARSON of Connecticut. Madam Speaker, Ray Dunaway has been the voice of Connecticut for nearly three decades. Ray was hired by WTIC-AM to replace another Connecticut legend, Bob Steele in 1992. Since then, he's been the voice of talk radio in Connecticut each and every morning. Over his tenure, he's helped raise millions of dollars for the Greater Hartford Salvation Army through his annual holiday store. I have had the pleasure of joining Ray over the years and I'm honored to call him a friend. Both the following articles from the Hartford Courant and the Journal Inquirer capture what Ray has meant to the citizens of the state of Connecticut. I look forward to tuning in to his last show tomorrow morning on Christmas Eve. We wish him well in retirement and know his voice will always be missed.
``Veteran Radio Voice Dunaway To Sign Off''
(By Kenneth R. Gosselin)
Ray Dunaway, the morning radio personality who followed the legendary Bob Steele on WTIC-AM and won over listeners with a relaxed but informed conversational style, will retire from the radio station next month after 29 years.
``You just get tired of waking up,'' Dunaway said. ``You just do. I love the morning. I do. I wouldn't do any other shift, but the thing is, after a period of time, it's kind of like you've been there, done that. And I think it's time for somebody fresh to take a look at it.''
Dunaway, 72, said the decision to retire from the morning show, which airs weekdays from 5:30 a.m. to 9 a.m., was entirely his own. His last show will be on Dec. 24.
His co-host, Brian Shactman, will continue to host the morning show, the station's parent company, Audacy, said.
Dunaway was hired to replace Steele in 1992, bringing with him more than two decades of radio experience elsewhere in the country. Steele had a storied local broadcasting career spanning more than five decades, and Dunaway would be Steele's second replacement. Steele's immediate successor lasted just a year.
``The fact of the matter is, it was nerve-wracking because I had gone to Trinity [College] and my roommate used to listen to Bob religiously,'' Dunaway said. ``He was really good. It was a great responsibility taking over that job.''
Quick acceptance wasn't a sure thing for Dunaway with the memory of Steele still fresh and dissatisfaction among some viewers about a move by WTIC to talk radio.
``Connecticut-ites weren't necessarily going to make that easy,'' recalled Gary Zenobi, then general manager of WTIC, who hired Dunaway. ``But he filled Bob Steele's shoes in a different way. Formats were changing. Ray was just perfect for that because he could hold a conversation not just about anything but with anyone.''
Dunaway's arrival also coincided with rapid changes in AM radio. WTIC's daytime music listeners were moving to FM radio, leaving AM stations like WTIC to carve out a different niche, which turned out to be talk radio.
Dunaway's popularity with listeners survived four ownership changes at WTIC and a relocation from One Financial Plaza, the ``Gold Building'' in downtown Hartford, to Farmington in the early 2000s. The tone of talk radio has turned more contentious and far less civil since Dunaway joined WTIC.
``It is polarizing, no doubt, but the good ones try to make it as fair as they possibly can,'' Dunaway said. ``You can have your point of view. There's nothing wrong with that, and you are able to share it.'' Dunaway said he worked earlier in his career with conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh, who died in February. Dunaway said he considered Limbaugh someone who thought things through before expressing his opinions. Limbaugh would also become part of the weekday lineup on WTIC.
Dunaway said there now is pressure to mix it up whether it be on radio or television.
``The whole thing is fight-sell,'' Dunaway said. ``People like fights. It doesn't help anything. [Conservative intellectual] William F. Buckley wouldn't have survived today.''
Dunaway said he has strived to keep the morning show on the lighter side.
One of this favorite interviews came in 1994 when then-First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton came on the air to push her husband's plan for health care reform.
Clinton jolted local listeners with the frank assessment that the plan might cost some jobs--paper-pushing jobs, as she called them--in Hartford. Some of those jobs, Dunaway said, were in buildings he could see from his studio on the 19th floor of the Gold Building.
Dunaway, according to a report in The Courant, observed the government didn't have a great track record of containing costs, asking, ``How can we trust you this time?''
Return to Hartford
When Dunaway arrived in downtown Hartford in 1992, he found a city changed vastly in appearance from when he attended Trinity two decades earlier. The 1980s building boom had given rise to skyscrapers like CityPlace and Goodwin Square.
But the early 1990s also was marked by economic recession and a bad after-taste from the Colonial Realty Co. collapse that cost ``Mom & Pop'' investors their life savings in a bigger-than-life fraud scheme.
Dunaway said the election of Hartford Mayor Michael P. Peters, the wisecracking firefighter, in 1993, started to tum things around. The two quickly became good friends and often ran into each other at the old Chuck's steakhouse in downtown Hartford. Peters, who died in 2009, was a frequent guest on Dunaway's show.
``Mike Peters got things done . . . . He had no real political power, but through the force of his personality managed to get things done,'' Dunaway said. ``He changed the attitude, let's put it that way.'' That set the stage for big-ticket Hartford investments like the Connecticut Convention Center, Front Street--and more recently, the addition of thousands of apartments downtown, Dunaway said.
Dunaway started in radio at age 17 on a Topeka, Kansas, station before attending Trinity. It was at this station where Dunaway--born Goldsich--would get his professional name.
``I wanted to be J. Michael Wilson or Ray Michael Wilson,'' Dunaway said. ``The guy at the station said, `Nah, I don't like that name. Let's find another one.' So, he got the phone book and he said, `Ray Rodriguez? How about Ray Dunaway?' I said, `Sure.' I wanted the job.''
Later, Dunaway worked in Detroit, Dallas and Los Angeles before spending 15 years at KMBZAM in Kansas City, Missouri, as a morning show host.
In Greater Hartford, Dunaway's popularity has drawn attention to philanthropic causes, one of the largest being the annual Salvation Army Holiday Store. Dunaway got involved soon after arriving in Hartford, broadcasting his shows daily from holiday-store locations each December.
The holiday store first started on Pratt Street in downtown Hartford and later moved to Avon and Glastonbury.
Salvation Army Major Migdalia Lavenbein, area coordinator for Greater Hartford, said the holiday store has raised millions since Dunaway became involved.
``Even beyond the money, he has helped transform lives; we're not just talking about toys and food and monetary gifts,'' Lavenbein said. ``He has been in the business of helping people who were at the bottom. They've hit rock bottom, and he's helped lift people up and place them in a position where they have hope. You can't say that about everyone.''
Dunaway's last day at WTIC will be when the holiday store wraps up for the season on Christmas Eve.
And after that? Well, Dunaway said he has to figure out what retirement will be. He plans to stay in the area but do some traveling--and read. ``I love to read,'' he said.
One thing he is absolutely sure about, though is this: ``I just don't want to see another sunrise,'' Dunaway said, quickly adding, ``Now don't take that the wrong way.''
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``Dunaway Reflects on 29 Years Behind the WTIC Microphone''
(By Matt Buckler)
Ray Dunaway doesn't sound like a man who has had an important job for the past 29 years. He sounds more as a person who has been on a 29-year joyride. Dunaway, 72, who announced his retirement Monday from his job as morning host at WTIC-AM 1080, remembers the good times in a job that he started in 1992.
``I love it, it's been fun,'' Dunaway said. ``The station has been good to me. They have taken care of me. I love the city. I love the area. I've worked in Dallas, I've worked in Detroit, I've worked in Los Angeles and I've worked in Kansas City, but at this radio station, WTIC, you can become a key part of the community, and I like that. You feel like you're doing something useful.''
When Dunaway arrived at WTIC, replacing Tom McCarthy, who replaced the legendary Bob Steele, he said he never expected to last for 29 years.
``I hoped,'' Dunaway said. ``But you have to be somewhat existential. You live in the minute, and if you do well enough, you'll get another minute. Don't forget, I replaced Tom McCarthy and the management told him that Bob Steele was here for 60 years and you'll be around for that long. A year later, he was gone. So this can be a cruel business. You have to live in the minute.''
There have been 29 years, however, of great minutes for Dunaway, a Trinity College graduate who has been working in radio since he was 17. When Dunaway came to Hartford from Kansas City, AM radio was in a transition period, moving from a music format to a talk format. Dunaway said he was on board with it.
``The transition had already started with Tom McCarthy and I know there was some resistance to it,'' Dunaway said. ``But the way I look at it, there are so many sources for music, especially with the Internet. We try to provide local information--local, local, local, local. And I worked very hard at it, trying to get local people on the show--local lawmakers, local town officials. Keep the show local. And that's the one thing that you can't do on the Internet.''
It turned out to be a successful format. Dunaway said his program has been an ensemble show, with contributions from many people. His co-hosts have included Robin King, Diane Smith, Scott Gray, Joe D'Ambrosio and Brian Shactman,
``I just like to work with people,'' Dunaway said. ``It's far easier for me than to keep my yap going all the time. I like to bounce off other people. It's always been a team thing and I wouldn't have it any other way. I wasn't born to be a star.''
Dunaway was a star as far as many state charities and organizations are concerned. ``I had the opportunity to do some incredible things,'' Dunaway said. ``I've done a lot of fundraisers. This station is such a key part of the community.''
Dunaway puts at the top of his achievement list his association with the WTIC-AM holiday store, which collects donations for the Salvation Army. He will be involved with the store one more time this December before he retires.
``I dread it, but I also love it,'' Dunaway said. ``I dread it because there is so much pressure on us to do well. So many people are counting on us. But it usually turns out well. That's why I love it.''He also loves his association with the Manchester Road Race, hanging out for the past several years at Highland Park Market, a job that started
``as a lark.''
``It's great to meet so many people,'' Dunaway said. ``You have to be a little crazy to run a race on Thanksgiving morning. And there is a lot of craziness that day.''
Dunaway is also crazy about the city of Hartford and doesn't hide his enthusiasm.
``I have enjoyed watching this city grow, and I think I've been a part of that,'' Dunaway said. ``Front Street, the Convention Center, there have been some drastic improvements. I want people to be proud of this place because it's a pretty darn good place.
``There was a scene in `Midnight Cowboy' where Joe Buck turns on his little radio and it's on WABC and he says,
`That's New York talking.' That's kind of what I tried to do here. When someone is listening to us, they'll say, `That's Hartford talking.' I am trying to create a positive image.''
Dunaway said it's been 29 years of positivity.
``The No. 1 thing I'm going to miss are the people, I've met so many great people,'' Dunaway said. ``I know it sounds like crap, but it's true.''
The one thing he won't miss is the early morning wakeup call.
``I plan on sleeping in,'' Dunaway said. ``I really don't have any retirement goals. I plan to read the paper, write angry letters to the editor and be a crank in general. General Douglas MacArthur said that old soldiers don't die, they just fade away. Well, I'm planning on just fading away.''
His final morning show will take place on Friday, Dec. 24.
``Things will be OK for a week, and then it will hit me,'' Dunaway said. ``I'm not here anymore. And I'm really going to miss this place. It's been fun.''
For Dunaway, it wasn't a job, it was a pleasure.
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SOURCE: Congressional Record Vol. 167, No. 220
The Congressional Record is a unique source of public documentation. It started in 1873, documenting nearly all the major and minor policies being discussed and debated.
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