Les Crane
| Les Crane | |
|---|---|
Crane on the set of his television talk show, 1964
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| Born |
Lesley Stein December 3, 1933 New York, New York, U.S. |
| Died | July 13, 2008 (aged 74) Greenbrae, California, U.S. |
| Alma mater | Tulane University |
| Known for | Talk-show host |
| Spouse(s) |
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| Children | Caprice Crane |
Les Crane (born Lesley Stein; December 3, 1933 – July 13, 2008) was a radio announcer and television talk show host, a pioneer in interactive broadcasting who also scored a spoken word hit with his 1971 recording of the poem Desiderata, winning a "Best Spoken Word" Grammy.
Born in New York, Crane graduated from Tulane University, where he was an English major. He spent four years in the United States Air Force, as a jet pilot and helicopter flight instructor.
He began his radio career in 1958 at KONO in San Antonio and later worked at WPEN (now WKDN) in Philadelphia. In 1961, he became a popular and controversial host for the radio powerhouse KGO in San Francisco. With KGO's strong nighttime 50,000 Watt signal reaching as far north as Seattle, Washington, and as far south as Los Angeles, he attracted a regional audience in the West.Variety described him as "the popular, confrontational and sometimes controversial host of San Francisco's KGO. Helping to pioneer talk radio, he was outspoken and outraged some callers by hanging up on them."
A late-night program airing weekdays from 11pm to 2am, Crane at the hungry i (1962–63) found Crane interacting with owner and impresario Enrico Banducci and interviewing such talents as Barbra Streisand and Professor Irwin Corey.
Crane, along with KRLA general manager John Barrett, were the original people "responsible for creating the Top 40 (list of the most requested pop songs)," said Casey Kasem in a 1990 interview.
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