Bob Liggett Dies At Age 76

3

Liggett owned the Liggett Broadcast Group for over 30 years. He also owned and operated The Grosse Pointe News, Big Boy Restaurants, Speed Connect before recently selling all of  companies. He passed away of complications from pancreatic cancer.

3 COMMENTS

  1. I worked for Bob from 1984 to 1986. My years under Bob were formative for me, and I am grateful to him for making me a better broadcaster. After I left WFMK in Williamston, I had the pleasure of having Bob in my studio to voice simple commercial copy with that velvety voice that always reminded me of the early years at Specs Howard School of Broadcast Arts. In those days diction, pure English, clarity and relatability were keys of being a voiceover artist or a good broadcaster. Nowadays anyone can pop out a podcast, and no one really much cares how they sound anymore. I don’t begrudge time marching on. But Bob’s death makes me happy that I lived in a time when “announcing” was an important position, and how you performed it mattered.

    • I just noticed how “…Bob’s death makes me happy…” looks in a sentence.

      Sorry about that.

      Another thing that’s changed is that we hit the publish button without enough proof reading apparently.

  2. I never knew Liggett, personally, but certainly knew ‘of’ him.

    In the very early 2000s, he came in and consolidated all but one of the radio stations in the Port Huron, Michigan market, including the 2 AM-1 FM cluster that was owned by Lee Hanson, whom I worked for. With the additional purchase of an FM-AM pair owned by our major competitor, Liggett and First Broadcasting ended up with all of the U.S. stations in the Port Huron market except for a standalone FM belonging to a local pastor, but operated as a secular, AC station.

    I say the ‘U.S. stations’, because Sarnia, Ontario, Canada was right across the St. Clair River from Port Huron. The Sarnia community had about three or four stations of its own, all of which easily broadcast into the Port Huron area, and represented fierce competition to the U.S. stations.

    But, I did very well in Port Huron, as a newly minted Account Exec.

    Finally, Liggett also had the reputation as the savior of the Big Boy restaurant chain, which fell on hard times due to changing consumer restaurant habits and choices. His rescue of Big Boy had special significance to me, because Big Boy was my first ‘real’ job when I turned 16 years old.

    Rest in peace, Bob Liggett…

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here