LARRY THE ENGINEER

EMAIL LARRY: lhoskins@wvradio.com

I have lived all of my life in and around the Kanawha Valley, with the exception of four years in the Air Force way back in the 70's(see the “way-back” picture). I grew up in eastern Kanawha County with a love of music. I was always listening to music, and at night I would lay in bed and listen either to distant stations on my portable am radio, or to the local jocks on WKAZ, WXIT and WCHS.

My fondest memory of that time was listening to Paul Harvey(who I considered old then), followed by Pappa Jay Jarrell on WKAZ. Somewhere around 1970, he moved to evenings on WXIT, and I tuned my AM radio on up the dial to hear him weeknights. He is still, in my mind, the greatest local jock of all time (sorry Mike!).  Man, the voice.... the style... the coolness that he possessed!.... too bad I don't possess those qualities.

There were also many other great jocks back in the late 60's and early 70's around Charleston... Lovell Webb, Jimmy Little, Al Sahley Rick Steele, Jerry Waters, Mike Hammer, Ric Robinson, Larry Stevens, Bill Blake and Charlie Cooper, just to name a few. At that early age, I decided that I was either going to be a rock and roll star or a DJ..... well the rock and roll star thing didn't work out that well, so here I am! I feel blessed to be a part of WKAZ, because of how much WKAZ had influenced my life over the last 40 years.

My main job at West Virginia Radio is as an engineer, helping to keep all seven of our stations on the air with the rest of the engineering staff, but I enjoy most being able to bring the music to you on the weekend overnights and Sunday afternoons(on sister station WKAZ-AM 680).

I am happily married. I have five children and one grandchild: four girls and one boy ranging in age from 26 to 8 and one grandchild, age 9. My family is the only thing more important than radio to me.

As for the picture of me.... it's really hard to explain a fuzzy blue hat and a Hanna Montana wig, isn't it? I will say that it was Halloween of 2007, and I was trying to embarrass my eight year old daughter.  The hat was given to me by my 14 year old son, after a band trip to King's Island, and the Hanna Montana wig was what my eight year old was suppose to be wearing, before she decided that she was going as Miley, instead of Hanna.

I suppose that I should thank my lovely wife for providing such pictures of me to the station.....remember paybacks, ok Dear?