Goood Day.

Paul Harvey passed away at the age of 90 after 58 years on the radio.
There are somethings that make me seem old to my classmates co-workers... but I'll just embrace that today. I am 45 and as recently as two weeks ago I can recall driving in my car listening to a Paul Harvey News and Commentary on the radio. Not XM... AM.
He sounded older, it had been a couple years since I had heard him. The voice was a bit more gravely and strained, but unmistakably Paul Harvey.

I can recall moments from early childhood in California when my dad would listen to a radio (transistor... with knobs and an antennae) and hearing that Paul Harvey optimism and energy. I was with my 13 year old daughter a few months ago and happened to catch a Paul Harvey "Rest of the Story" on my way back from western Pennsylvania and I made her listen. We learned something -- I think the story was about Reggie Jackson and his upbringing. I watched Reggie play for the Oakland A's when I was a kid... and I recall listening to Paul Harvey on an San Francisco AM station back then as well.

Perhaps my daughter will have similar memories of me, as I do of my father listening to Paul Harvey. Maybe Paul will just be someone her dad used to listen to... but all this, to me, is an indication of Paul Harvey's place in American culture. I've seen Simpson's episodes reference Paul Harvey... and we've all heard him at some point, if only bits and pieces of sound in the background at a construction site, a garage or a diner where the radio plays all day long (on AM... not XM). He's been on radios coast to coast since Truman was in the white house.

I felt a genuine sense of loss when Johnny Cash died, and Ray Charles. Both icons with feature length struggles and triumphs. But there does not seem to be a low spot in Harvey's history. Maybe his star never shined as brightly as those musical legends, but he provided unparalleled continuity. I've heard his voice age over the course of 45 years, but I've never heard it waiver.

Perhaps what I sense is something really unusual... that he was a role model. While we all heard him, almost daily for 58 years, he had a much quieter message that we'd all do well to hear now.

I'll miss Paul Harvey for the rest of my life.