“Everything happens for the best,”my mother said whenever I faced disappointment.“If you can carry on, one day something good will happen. And you’ll realize that it wouldn’t have happened if not for that previous disappointment.”
Mother was right, as I discovered after graduating from college in 1932, I had decided to try for a job in radio, then work my way up to sports announcer. I hitchhiked to Chicago and knocked on the door of every station—and got turned down every time.
In one studio, a kind lady told me that big stations couldn’t risk hiring an inexperienced person—“Go out in the sticks and find a small station that’ll give you a chance.”she said.
I thumbed home to Dixon, Illinois. While there was no radio-announcing jobs in Dixon, my father said Montgomery Ward had opened a store and wanted a local athlete to manage its sports department. Since Dixon was where I had played high school football, I applied. The job sounded just right for me. But I wasn’t hired.
My disappointment must have shown.“Everything happens for the best.”Mom reminded me. Dad offered me the car to job hunt. I tried WOC Radio in Davenport, Iowa. The program director, a wonderful Scotsman named Peter MacArthur, told me they had already hired an announcer.
As I left his office, my frustration boiled over. I asked aloud,“How can a fellow get to be a sport announcer if he can’t get a job in a radio station?”
I was waiting for the elevator when I heard MacArthur calling,“What was that you said about sports? Do you know anything about football?”Then he stood me before a microphone and asked me to broadcast an imaginary game.
The preceding autumn, my team had won a game in the last 20 seconds with a 65-yard run. I did a 15-minute buildup to that play, and Peter told me I would be broadcasting Saturday’s game!
On my way home, as I have many times since, I thought of my mother’s words,“If you carry on, one day something good will happen. Something wouldn’t have happened if not for that previous disappointment.”I often wonder what direction my life might have taken if I’d gotten the job at Montgomery Ward.