The Forgotten Shock Jock Who Paved the Way for Rush Limbaugh

This week, we're airing part two of a documentary series, courtesy of Radio Diaries, about three radio personalities who had huge audiences in their time, but today, are largely forgotten.

These days, we’re used to media that thrives on conflict, that amplifies the most outrageous voices in the room. It’s something we often trace back to shock jocks like Howard Stern, and in-your-face talk show hosts like Tucker Carlson and Rush Limbaugh. But long before all those guys, there was Joe Pyne. At the height of his career in the 1950s, the New York Times called him the “ranking nuisance of broadcasting.”

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