Tom Donahue

Tom "Big Daddy" Donahue was born Thomas Coman in South Bend, Indiana on May 21, 1928. His career started in 1949 on the East Coast of the U.S. at WTIP in West Virginia and continued at WIBG in Philadelphia and WINX in Maryland.

He moved to San Francisco in 1961 during the payola scandal involving Alan Freed, Dick Clark and several other East Coast DJs. He was brought to San Francisco by Les Crane, former Program Director at WIBG who had been hired to make a winner out of loser station, KYA. Crane also brought in Peter Tripp from WMGM, New York and "Bobby Mitchell" from WIBG.

c.1962 [ LISTEN ]

From 1961 through 1965 Tom Donahue was not a San Francisco rock scene-maker, he was the scene. He and Bobby Mitchell took over the Cow Palace on occasional weekends and put together 20-act, two-song-apiece (some singers didn’t know more than two) package shows that constituted the be-all and end-all of live rock ‘n’ roll.

The sense of being leveled with and not being talked down to was present when Tom didn't like something. Donahue on a dance fad: "Of the 300 or so records we get here at the station every week, I'd say 250 of them are Twist...most of them bad." (December 1962)

Mad River (band), hanging out with Tom and some friends in San Francisco.

Donahue was among the first to see talent in local kid Sly Stone, whom he hired as producer for his Autumn and North Beach labels. Together, they produced hits out of the Beau Brummells and non-hits from the Great Society, the Tikis, the Vejtables, the Mojo Men, and the Knight Riders.

Listeners got the chance to know Donahue on KMPX, and later on KSAN. He took care with his shows, working carefully to build a set of three to six songs toward some pleasing resolution. Always, Donahue was open to new music, and never was he forgetful of the old.

With Phil Spector and Bill Medley of The Righteous Brothers in 1965

KQED News report from 1969 featuring a press conference by Tom Donahue, who discusses the Wild West Rock Festival that was to have taken place in Golden Gate Park but was cancelled due to protests by locals [ WATCH }

While a disc jockey at Top Forty station KYA in San Francisco, Donahue and Mitchell formed a record label.

Autumn Records had subsequent hits with Bobby Freeman and The Mojo Men, and Sly Stone was a staff producer. But Autumn's biggest act was one that Donahue discovered, produced, recorded, and managed, The Beau Brummels, which he later sold to Warner Bros. Records.

Donahue at his best working at KSAN in 1968-69. [ LISTEN ] (1:01:28) Tom is talking about the beginning of KMPX on this 1972 broadcast.
[ LISTEN ] (45:43)

Played recordings from WMPX days include some marijuana talk, a conversation with Dusty Street and Katie Johnson. A Blue Cheer album (Vincebus Eruptum) commercial. An (allegedly) stoned Larry Miller plays "White Rabbit" and talks about Grace Slick. Larry asks his listeners to stop requesting Eric Burdon and The Animals records. He "doesn't like The Animals and Burdon is a phoney!", and he tosses an Animals' LP over his shoulder. Bob McClay recalls being the first to play Jimi Hendrix in 1967.

Donahue is behind a KSAN microphone in 1968-69 (starts with Cream). [ LISTEN ] (49:47)

Buckle up and prepare for a Ginger Baker solo that is mind-blowing. Tom pitches a Lafayette Radio Electronics offer that includes a reminder to pick up a KSAN station poster for only 25¢.

He also opened a psychedelic nightclub (Mothers on Broadway in San Francisco), and produced concerts at the Cow Palace and Candlestick Park with his partner Mitchell (later known as Bobby Tripp in L.A. radio; real name Michael Guerra). Together, they produced the last public appearance of The Beatles on August 29, 1966 at Candlestick Park.

In 1967, Donahue and his young wife Raechel were listening to the Doors first album, while rearranging their brain cells via Dr. Tim's magic snake oil.

The playing cards were starting to melt, and it became increasingly difficult to tell the hearts from the diamonds, when through the haze of incense and acid, Donahue shifted his enormous bulk and posed the question, "Why in the hell aren't we hearing any of this on the radio?"

Donahue wrote a 1967 Rolling Stone article titled "AM Radio Is Dead and Its Rotting Corpse Is Stinking Up the Airwaves", which also lambasted the Top Forty format. He subsequently took over programming for a foreign-language station KMPX and changed it into what is considered to be America's first alternative "free-form" radio station. Playing album tracks chosen by the DJs on the largely ignored FM band, this one move introduced progressive radio to the U.S.

In 1969, besides his roles as a DJ, station manager, and live show producer, he also managed Leigh Stephens (former lead guitarist of the San Francisco psychedelic rock group Blue Cheer), Micky Waller (a British drummer who played in the Steampacket, Brian Auger, Julie Driscoll & The Trinity, the Jeff Beck Group 1968-69), and Pete Sears in the band Silver Metre, and in 1970 Stoneground.

Donahue and his DJ wife Raechel also took over programming of free-form radio stations KMET and KPPC-FM in Los Angeles. In 1972, he moved to the role of general manager at KSAN, where he encouraged DJs to play music from different eras and genres interspersed with interesting commentary.

On April 28, 1975 Donahue died from a heart attack. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996 as a non-performer, one of only three disc jockeys to receive that honor. In 2006, Donahue was inducted into the Bay Area Radio Hall of Fame as a member of the first class of broadcasters enshrined.

Donahue was inducted into the Rock Radio Hall of Fame in the "Legends of Rock Radio-Programming" category in 2014 for his work at KSAN and KMPX.

WHERE DID TOM WORK? Here is the list: WTIP (1949), WIBG (1951), KYA (1961-1965), KMPX/KPPC (1967-1968), KMET (1968-69), and KSAN (1968-72).

Some materials found on this page were originally published by the following: Bay Area Radio Hall of Fame, Jive 95.

Tom Donahue’s approach was very straightfor­ward. “I’m here to clean up your face and mess up your mind,” he announced every night.

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