Chicago Radio Spotlight's<\/a> Rick Kaempfer. \"It seemed a little unusual at the time. I drove a Jaguar, which I still do by the way, and I dressed like an Englishman. [The program director] said, 'Well let's go with Britain, like the country,' and from that point on it was my name.\"<\/p>\nIn addition to two stints at WCFL, Britain also worked in Chicago at WIND, WLS-FM, WJMK, WTMX and Satellite Music Network.<\/p>\n
In 2003 he came out of retirement to help launch Real Oldies WRLL. After only four months he stormed out in a dispute with program director Tommy Edwards, who was pressuring Britain to keep his comedy bits under one minute.<\/p>\n
\"In clear terms to help you understand, can you imagine what the world would have missed had Picasso's creative expressions been restricted to painting on postage-sized canvases only?\" Britain wrote in a letter to Edwards that he shared with me. \"I may lack the acclaim given to Picasso, but I do relate as an artist, and my mind does not respond to writing within a 60-second time frame.\"<\/p>\n
Even after moving back to Louisville, the Britains kept their apartment at Marina City \u2014 above the former studios of WCFL. It's where they stayed on their visits to Chicago.\u00a0Over long lunches at Smith & Wollensky next door, Britain would regale friends with hilarious stories of his radio adventures and observations about the absurdities of life.<\/p>\n
\"I've always been a lot harder on myself than other people,\" he once told me. \"A lot of people have said, 'You're your own worst enemy.' I've gone through just about every bad experience in radio. But you live through it. You survive. And you understand it's not the end of the world.<\/p>\n
\"People probably think I'm too sensitive. Of course, sensitivity can be construed as thoughtful or as weak. I think of it as being thoughtful \u2014 sensitive to other people and their feelings. Going through some depressing times does make you appreciate the good times when they're there.\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Ron Britain, a gifted radio performer with a brilliantly creative mind and a sensitive soul, left a legacy of laughter for generations of Chicago listeners. \"King B,\" as he was known to fans around the world, died Sunday at home in Louisville, Kentucky, according to his son, Mark Magel, who confirmed that Britain took his... Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27378"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27378"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27378\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27402,"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27378\/revisions\/27402"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27378"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27378"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27378"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}