Birmingham radio icon Shelly “The Playboy” Stewart is among the inductees for the national Radio Hall of Fame. The Alabama broadcaster’s contributions to the civil rights movement in the 1960’s were chronicled by Alabama Public Radio in its international award winning documentary “Civil Rights Radio.” Stewart is credited with using his radio program to signal the start of the so called “children’s march” where teenagers marched to protest unfair employment treatment of their parents. The demonstrators were met with fire hoses and police dogs in, now iconic, black and white TV coverage. Stewart explained why he played the original version of the song Shake, Rattle, and Roll (not Bill Haley and the Comets) to tell the young protesters to march…
“You had to have codes to get into the community. We said, made an announcement. ‘I want everybody to go to the park.’ You don't do that,” said Stewart. “You know, do that because, remember, there were mothers and fathers who were afraid would lock the doors, and the principals and teachers would lock the doors.”
The website “The History Makers” said of Stewart…
“…Stewart was born on September 24, 1934 in Birmingham, Alabama to Huell Stewart and Mattie C. Stewart. He graduated from Rosedale High School in Birmingham, Alabama and enlisted in the U.S. Air Force, where he served from 1952 to 1953.
After his military service, Stewart returned to Birmingham and was hired by WEDR-AM as a radio personality known as, “Shelley The Playboy.” By 1958, Stewart left Alabama to work for WOKJ-AM in Jackson, Mississippi. In the 1960s, Stewart worked for WENN-AM and served as the on-air voice of the Civil Rights Movement in Birmingham.”
During APR’s documentary “Civil Rights Radio,” Stewart recalled the morning he played the code song “Shake, Rattle, and Roll” to signal school students listening to their transistor radios in class.
“And when those kids heard that (song,) they told the teachers, we’re gone. And, the teachers tried to stop them. They were jumping out of windows at Parker High School. So that is really what took place, yes, and it escalated, and our police didn't know what to do about it.”
The “History Makers” website went onto to describe Stewart’s career in advertising.
“… he co-founded Steiner Advertising, now known as O2. In the 1970s, Stewart left WENN-AM and began working at WATV-FM with Dr. Erskine Fausch. He and Fausch went on to acquire WATV-AM, which became the most popular radio station in Birmingham. In 2002, Stewart and Fausch sold WATV-AM to Sheridan Broadcasting and Stewart retired from broadcasting the same year. He then founded the Mattie C. Stewart Foundation in 2007, in an effort to reduce the dropout rate and increase the graduation rate of high school students. In 2015, he sold his shares in O2 to four members of the company’s management team.”
Stewart joins other radio veterans, including NPR’s Scott Simon, in this year’s group of Hall of Fame inductees. Click below to hear APR’s international award-winning documentary and series “Civil Rights Radio.
