Category
Tampa Bay
(In 1993, I wrote my first book, Stadium For Rent: Tampa Bay’s Quest for Major League Baseball. In 2015, I updated the backstory of the original Tampa Bay Devil Rays, adding interviews with founder Vincent J. Naimoli and his eventually… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman October 17, 1984 By a combination of popular acclaim and default, pianist Al Downing is Pinellas County’s father of Jazz. “You live by your reputation,” he joked. It’s getting so people call and say, ‘We want you… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman December 16, 1982 CLEARWATER — After 6 p.m., downtown Clearwater pulls in its sidewalks and goes to sleep. It is a time when it would be easier to find a Scientologist than a policeman. There is very… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman August 29, 1986 Culture Roots is emblemalic of where reggae music is in America today: Standing still at any speed. Culture Roots is the most popular act of its kind around this area and the group can’t… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman May 3, 1985 Frank Zaccaro, new events coordinator for the Florida State Fairgrounds Expo Hall in Tampa, says promoters and patrons can look for the facility to actively pursue major rock music concerts in the immediate future…. Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman May 1985 “Up until tonight, my career was going beautifully… I remember my mother said to me, ‘Michael, don’t go to law school! Go down to St. Petersburg and entertain in a bar!’” Michael Fetcher, a young… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman (I used to write a bi-weekly column, RadioRadio, for Players magazine in the Tampa Bay area. The following story appeared in 1991.) D.J. Prior is one of those jocks who gets around. KQKS in Denver, KSON in… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman I swear I only worked at the old Tampa Tribune for six months but I met so many great and talented people there whose influences on me continued for decades that it’s hard to believe it was… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman Published June 2008 Hold that thought a moment. Judy Genshaft is collecting hers – well, not her thoughts, but her bulls. Dozens of variations on the University of South Florida mascot that she has collected from all… Continue Reading →
(NOTE — Even when I knew he was ailing these last few years, I somehow expected my friend Barry Cohen to live forever. So when word came on Saturday, September 22, that he had succumbed to leukemia at age 79,… Continue Reading →
Bob Andelman August 6, 2004 The hardest working word on radio these days is “The.” Have you caught “The Buzz”? How about “The Beat”? Do you get “The Point”? Or fly with “The Eagle?” Will the boss let you play… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman (Originally published in Players Magazine, 1991) Mason “Lee Roy Pee Wee Bodine Moonpie, et al.” Dixon is once again a restricted free agent. The former Q105 afternoon personality and operations manager was taken off the air last… Continue Reading →
(NOTE–We heard the sad news tonight that legendary Tampa businessman, baker, boxing promoter and entrepreneur Phil Alessi died today, Sunday, May 6, 2018. I dug into my archive for this extensive profile I wrote about Phil, published in Tampa Bay… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman (Originally published in Tampa Bay Life, 1990) Don Mains is a little edgy. Not that he doesn’t have good cause. Waiting by the phone for the White House to call would be enough, and that’s precisely Mains’… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman October 4, 1986 Diana Ross hits are getting shorter as the years grow longer. Songs such as “I’m Coming Out,” “Rescue Me,” “Why Do Fools Fall in Love?” “Swept Away” and a few others have been… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman September 23, 1986 With each encore, the audience waited. And waited. And waited. (There were three encores. That’s a lotta waiting.) When is he going to do it? they wondered. When is Elton John going to… Continue Reading →
Wayne Huizenga’s World: Excerpt from “Stadium for Rent: Tampa Bay’s Quest for Major League Baseball”
(AUTHOR’S NOTE: What follows is an excerpt from my very first book “STADIUM FOR RENT: Tampa Bay’s Quest For Major League Baseball,” which was originally published in May 1993 by McFarland & Company. An updated, expanded 2nd edition of the… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman (NOTE: This story, written in May, 1990 for the Maddux Report, was the first of three times–so far–that I have had the pleasure to work with legendary civil rights leader Andrew Young. More recently, I have worked… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman Originally published in Tampa Bay Monthly, May 1987 It was a Sunday afternoon in late 1973, near what was then the African People’s Market on Central Avenue in Tampa. “Somebody got shot in a bar or something,… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman (Originally published in The Sun-Times of Canada, January 11, 1993) Maybe the Tampa Bay Lightning has turned out better than any of the jokes about how ridiculous it would be to play ice hockey in Florida. But… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman (Originally published in Sports Arena, October 1987) Got a question about sports? Tedd Webb is the answer. There are days when it seems like this familiar face and radio voice knows every sports player, team, scouting report and… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman (Originally published May 9, 1986.) Bob Andelman is the Tribune’s new radio columnist, and he will report weekly in this space news about Bay area and national radio. But in his first column, he reminisces about radio… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman (Originally written in December 2007; the story is no longer on Biz941’s website archive so I am re-posting it here.) Gemologist Tina Taylor Little discovered up-and-coming jeweler Michael Beaudry at the 1996 New York Jewelry Show, and… Continue Reading →
(I used to write a bi-weekly column, RadioRadio, for Players magazine in the Tampa Bay area. The following story appeared in 1990.) By Bob Andelman They bid him farewell with a medley of Neil Diamond/Air Supply/Johnny Mathis and then “Fast”… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman Originally published October 16, 1985 Fred Johnson wears Klompen – Dutch shoes. “I know they’re weird,” he said, “but I don’t care.” The St. Petersburg-based jazz singer also has a distinctive tattoo on his left forearm…. Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman Originally published March 14, 1986 The fans started waiting around the parking lot at 5:30 p.m. Most never got to see more than the back of Jimmy Page’s head, but it didn’t matter. They were there, and… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman Originally published July 1, 1985 Three summertime faces of Joan Baez: Singing in a recent episode of the syndicated TV show Fame, helping the students of a performing arts school understand the importance of speaking up for… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman Originally published March 8, 1986 Mike Reno, the lead singer, gave her a big hug and a kiss. So did the other four members of the rock ‘n’ roll band. They also signed her handmade, blue Loverboy… Continue Reading →
By Bob Andelman August 4, 1986 There were three times Saturday night when a person in the more than half-empty Ruth Eckerd Hall could have forgotten that Jermaine -Jackson was you-Know-Who-With-the-Gloves older brother. The first was during a handsome… Continue Reading →
(The following story first appeared in Tampa Bay Life Magazine in 1990 and was reprinted in the book Navigating the Yellow Stream.) By Bob Andelman First things first: I don’t smoke, drink or do drugs. Never have. So, why did… Continue Reading →
Profile By Bob Andelman (Originally published in Tampa Bay Life, 1990) “This is like the guy next door that you grew up with,” says Russ Albums. “If you wanted to have a best friend, this would be the guy. He’s… Continue Reading →
(Originally written in November 1989 for Florida Business/Tampa Bay; also published the same year in the Orlando Sentinel Sunday magazine. Merkle died at the age of 58 on May 6, 2003.) The man who stared down Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega,… Continue Reading →
(This story originally appeared in Music magazine, May 17, 1984.) By Bob Andelman The name refers to a military state of readiness, the highest level of nuclear war anticipation. DEFCON-1, a term made familiar to millions in last summer’s film… Continue Reading →
(Originally published in Tampa Bay Life in 1989) By Bob Andelman “If I had any respect left for Elizabeth Kovachevich, that disappeared when she locked me up. She had a good public image, but I discovered firsthand that she was… Continue Reading →
Story by Bob Andelman, Photographs by Bill Serne As outdoor murals have multiplied across St. Petersburg, it seems everyone has a favorite. Science fiction fan? Get a picture of you and your friends running from the city’s former landmark –… Continue Reading →
Story by Bob Andelman; Photographs by Bill Serne The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art in Sarasota is anything but a circus, despite its familiar name. Found in a remarkably gorgeous, serene setting on the Intracoastal Waterway amidst banyan… Continue Reading →
(Originally published in Tampa Bay Life in 1991) By Bob Andelman Call her the reluctant anchor. She’s knock-down beautiful, a blonde-haired, blue-eyed stunner, the kind of woman the television camera loves and the home viewing audience can’t seem to resist…. Continue Reading →
(Originally published in Pinellas County Review, September 1994) They call it the Oba Chandler Room. In it, more than 75,000 documents and 300 pieces of evidence are stored, helter-skelter, in thick blue binders and floor-to-ceiling metal cabinets, all relating to… Continue Reading →
(Lance Ringhaver, a prominent Tampa Bay businessman and once a member of the Tampa Bay Baseball Group, died in a car accident on Tuesday, April 5, 2016. I profiled him in my 1993 book, Stadium For Rent: Tampa Bay’s Quest… Continue Reading →
By BOB ANDELMAN Written September 17, 2005 Maddux Business Report Thomas Huggins knows people. Construction people, engineers, environmental consultants, accountants, attorneys and all kinds of professional, small business people. He’s made an entire business of knowing people, knowing people who… Continue Reading →
(Originally published in Florida Business/Tampa Bay, 1989) Before her, Cornelia Corbett’s team, the Tampa Bay Rowdies. Behind her, a few thousand exuberant soccer fans who haven’t given up the dream. There isn’t much to cheer on this overcast Sunday night… Continue Reading →
(UPDATE: This story, originally written in May 2009 and published in the Maddux Business Report in July 2009, became worth posting online for the first time when the Tampa Bay Times reported on August 28, 2015 that Dalian Wanda Group of… Continue Reading →
(This interview with Tampa Mayor Sandy Freedman was recorded in March 1991 for the Maddux Report.) Sandy Freedman’s fingerprints are all over her city. In typical big city fashion, nothing of any significance happens in Tampa these days without the… Continue Reading →
When the Tampa Bay Times published the obituary of Sam Hall on September 4, 2014 (he died August 11, 2014), I was reminded of a Q&A interview that Connie May Fowler–then still going by her pre-best-selling novelist name, Constance May–wrote… Continue Reading →
(The following story appeared in Tampa Bay Life in 1989.) Rosie Owen just wanted to cash a check. What she got that clear November morning was a few minutes of sheer terror that will last a lifetime. “I had just… Continue Reading →
(“The Snell Isle Murder of Joan Amos” was originally published in Tampa Bay Life, Spring 1991) Sgt. William T. “Bud” Blackmon Jr. broadcast the second BOLO on the alleged fleeing murderer of a wealthy St. Petersburg socialite at 1 a.m…. Continue Reading →
THUMBING THEIR NOSES AT THE PROSPECT OF CONTRACTING AIDS, A SURPRISING NUMBER OF MARRIED PEOPLE UNABASHEDLY PURSUE SEX WITH OTHER COUPLES. IT’S A LIFESTYLE, THEY INSIST, THEY’RE NOT ABOUT TO FORSAKE. By Bob Andelman and Linda Gibson (Originally published in… Continue Reading →
(This story was written in June 1989. I believe it appeared in Tampa Bay Life later that year. I also believe that some of the original text was lost due to computer incompatibility.) By Bob Andelman It’s 4:30 p.m. and… Continue Reading →
Tampa Bay Weekly cover story on Wrap That Rascal written by Bob Andelman
By Bob Andelman (Originally published in Players, August 1991) The green blinking light is pressed. “Bobby from St. Pete, you’re at bat. Take a swing!” “Okay! I was at the airport the other day and Phil was there. He’s getting… Continue Reading →