Dale Sommers

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Bruce Dale Sommers^[1], better known as "The Truckin' Bozo," is an American radio personality, best known for his long-running country music show geared toward truck drivers. Sommers is credited with being the first Truck Show Host who discontinued playing music on his nightly show and commenced focusing all his energies on truck news, news and talk from his listeners.

Sommers' radio career began in 1959 at Cincinnati's WAEF-FM where he aired music of the big bands nightly from 7 till Midnight. He then jumped over to Country when Ray Pennington hired him as the afternoon drive time host at WCNW in suburban Cincinnati. Sommers used the name, Jim Young at the stint due largely to Pennington's insistence that the name "just sounded country." He left WCNW after a year and then pulled stints at WJPS-Evansville, Ind, WCKY and WUBE in Cincinnati, WLAC in Nashville and according to Sommers own comments,"I worked at a total of 48 radio stations between 1959 and 1984. "I was known as a journeyman broadcaster and as a hard act to work with." Sommers apparently found a Program Director who was able to keep Sommers happy and performing at his best when he went to work for Randy Michaels at 700WLW in 1984. Their relationship lasted despite the flambouyant egos of both men all the way until the time Michaels was pushed out of the CEO slot at Clear Channel. Sommers stuck around WLW after Michaels departure "although it was never the same" until poor health got the best of him in 2004. "I was only 15 days into a 5 year, no cut, guaranteed contract with WLW and I had to call it quits. The doctors had ordered him to stop work or his life would only last a couple of more years. "I sat around the house for several months and then one day I got a phone call from Kevin Straley at XM Satellite Radio. Several of the doctors had stated that if I confined my work to the daylight hours and limited it to no more than 3 hours, then they would sign off on a release to allow me to return to work. Kevin offered me the 4 till 7pm shift on XM and my life had meaning again, says Sommers. Although 2007 was a very bad year health wise for Sommers, his doctors are trying some innovative new tricks to try and keep the Addisons Disease under control. During October and November 2007, Sommers spent most of the two months in the hospital and fought with the Devil to stay alive. At one point, the Doctors were ready to send Hospice to his home and care for him as they felt he was only going to last a few more days. One of his trucking listeners, upon hearing of Sommers plight, took off two weeks from work and went to Florida to help out his friend. Sommers wife had to go away on an essential business trip and while she was gone Sommers health turned for the worse. "I told Rusty Wade that if Hospice came to the door to tell them that they weren't needed because the coroner had already taken my body to the morgue." When asked if Hospice did show up, Wade and Sommers both laugh out loud but won't answer the question.

LOOKING BACK IN TIME: Sommers' show was first heard on WLW-AM in his hometown of Cincinnati, Ohio, where his overnight show was a fixture for the clear channel powerhouse for two decades. WLW's powerful nighttime signal covered most of the eastern and central parts of the country and much of eastern Canada, and his show consistently pulled in high ratings against his main competition (primarily Art Bell's Coast to Coast AM and Bill Mack's Midnight Cowboy Radio Network).

In 2004, after celebrating 20 years at WLW, Sommers stepped down from the show due to health concerns, handing the microphone over to his son Steve, who had been doing the weekend version of the show for some time. The elder Sommers' retirement was short-lived, though. After a five month break to recuperate, he signed on with XM Satellite Radio, and he now broadcasts a three-hour daily show on XM's Open Road channel 171 from a studio in his Citrus Hills, Florida home. Ironically, almost all of his former rivals are also on XM: Dave Nemo and Bill Mack, who hosted rival trucking shows, are now both on channel 171 with Sommers, as is the Midnight Radio Network (the show Mack formerly hosted). Coast to Coast AM is heard on XM 165. Dale's son, Steve, is also heard on XM 173 through the WLW simulcast.

Sommers is adamant when asked if XM is his last job and he answers that question by asking in return, "who the hell is going to hire a 64 year old man who is in poor health and misses a few days off from time to time. I have converted over to a talk show host and don't play music any longer but I still sound like I am only in my 30's, so thank God my voice hasn't been affected, but it I have any say in the matter....This is my last stop in a long career.

Fellow XM Personality, Bill Mack makes jokes about Sommers having "bags of money" hidden in his attic & Sommers replies that he has his money hidden somewhere else besides in his home. It is rumored that Sommers doesn't need to work due to wise investments in the markets and a healthy inheritance from his parents. Sommers replies, "yes, it's true that I don't have to work to keep body and soul together but XM provides me with Medical insurance which is very important and secondly I love my job and if I quit working I'd probably die from boredom in a matter of months."

Sommers' youngest son, Sean Compton, is Vice President of Programming for Clear Channel Radio and was fill-in host for Sommers program on WLW from 1992-1996. Sommers says, "I guess radio is in the blood. I started out in my early teens, Steve started out at the age of 15 and Sean (who is Clear Channel's biggest deal maker with people like Donald Trump, Rush Limbaugh, and others) started calling Randy Michaels when he was just 17 and fresh out of high school. He would call me and tell me that Randy wouldn't call him back, so I told him to call Randy 12 times the next day and it worked. Randy called me at home and I simply told him that if he didn't hire Sean that Sean would simply drive him crazy and I would give him lessons on how to do it. Sean worked with Michaels until he was pushed out by the Mays family as CEO of radio and Sean decided to stick with the company and his immediate boss, Tom Owens. Sean was appointed as Vice President of Radio Programming and Network Operations at Clear Channel before he was 30 years old."

1 Catching a robber
2 Health problems
3 References
4 See also
5 External links

[edit] Catching a robber

"The Bozo" made national headlines when he helped to catch a robber at a convenience store in Camilla, Georgia. Sommers was talking live on the air with regular caller Linda Driskill, known as "Mississippi Lady" to listeners, when he heard Driskill admonish someone not to come behind her counter. She then hung up the phone. Sommers was concerned for her safety, so he called the Camilla police (who knew Driskill from Sommers' show). The police responded to Driskill's store and quickly apprehended the robber.^[2]

[edit] Health problems

Sommers suffers from severe Addisons Disease, for which there is no cure and is treated by ever increasing doses of steroids that help to keep the disease under control.Sommers is considered by those who are close to him to be a virtual recluse and is rarely seen out of his Florida or Cincinnati homes. He says, "I can't afford to get around someone who may have a bad cold or flu and then wind up catching what they have, I can see it on my tombstone, "The Bozo went outside to play and died from a bad cold." He ends that statement with a hearty laugh.