If the name Joe Pyne rings no bells with you, all you have to know is the current state of Talk Radio got started with him.
Joe Pyne (December 22, 1924 – March 23, 1970) was an American radio and television talk show host, who pioneered the confrontational style in which the host advocates a viewpoint and argues with guests and audience members. He was an influence on other major talk show hosts such as Rush Limbaugh, Morton Downey Jr., Bob Grant, and Michael Savage.
Now does he ring any bells?
Joe Pyne was often verbally confrontational with his guests. If a discussion got too heated, the guest would often walk off or sometimes Pyne would himself throw the guest off the show with a parting comment like “take a hike” or “get lost.” On occasion, conflicts would escalate and became physical. One guest threw a telephone at Pyne, and another punched his producer in the mouth. One especially noteworthy brawl, allegedly started by a guest, resulted in the audience charging the stage and knocking down the entire set.
In 1965, during the Watts Riots in Los Angeles, Pyne was interviewing a black militant on his TV show. At one point, Pyne opened his coat to reveal that he was carrying a handgun. His guest did likewise. The station suspended Pyne for one week as a result.
Few things were off limits on The Joe Pyne Show, and the unpredictability of never knowing what might happen next was a major perk for both viewers and guests alike. One of the only things considered taboo was talking about Pyne’s wooden leg. For the most part, guests obeyed this unspoken rule, but there are unconfirmed rumors of two people who violated it. Paul Krassner, editor of The Realist, appeared on the show on July 16, 1967. According to Krassner, Pyne made insulting remarks about his acne scars. Krassner then asked Pyne if his wooden leg caused any difficulty in having sex with his wife. The audience supposedly gasped and the show’s producers “averted their eyes” as “the atmosphere became surrealistic.” A similar exchange allegedly occurred with Frank Zappa. Pyne is reported to have said something like …I guess your long hair makes you a woman…, to which it is claimed that Zappa responded …so I guess your wooden leg makes you a table… The stories about Zappa and Krassner have been oft-repeated in numerous online and print sources as a fact, but their authenticity is unknown. Although video clips of portions of Krassner’s appearance on the show have been archived, none of them contain video of the incident. Krassner insists that it occurred, but was edited out of the broadcast.
To give you some idea what Joe Pyne was like on the air, here is one of his syndicated programs, distributed around the country in the early 1960s. This one features Cosmopolitan Magazine Editor Helen Gurley Brown discussing her new book “Sex And The Office’ in 1964.
She’s followed by an interview with David Keave-Leavitt over the issue of Black Market Babies.
Now you know a little about Joe Pyne.
