R.I.P.: L-A Radio News Broadcaster Lyle Kilgore

Lyle Kilgore

Lyle Kilgore, who wrote and read the news on radio stations in Southern California for nearly 50 years, interviewed presidents, movie stars and serial killers, and occasionally acted in movies and television, died on Feb. 22, according to the Orange County Register.

Known for his dramatic old-school style of delivering the news, he sounded imposing on the airwaves but away from the microphone was a shy personality, said Eva Kilgore, his wife of 38 years.

“He had an authoritative voice but he was a gentle spirit,” said Kilgore, taking a break from planning a memorial expected to bring 300 or more to Seal Beach to celebrate Lyle Kilgore’s life on Monday, March 12.

Kilgore was born in Orange County and grew up in Riverside, starting his radio career at KFXM in San Bernardino the late 1950s. At first he worked as a disc jockey, with a show the station billed as Music Galore with Lyle Kilgore, but after moving across town to KMEN, Kilgore switched to news which he continued to do until he retired in 2005 after 15 years with KFWB.


“Lyle was recruited in the early ’60s to KHJ (at the) beginning of Boss Radio,” Eva Kilgore said. “He jumped right in as news director, overseeing a news staff of more than 20.

circa mid-70s

At those stations, as well as during stints at KDAY and KLAC after leaving KHJ in 1975, he interviewed four different presidents, hundreds of celebrities, including one of the most infamous of all time, Charles Manson.

“He was also the first in the United States to introduce the Rolling Stones on stage,” Kilgore, describing how her late husband had done the honors when the Rolling Stones made their American debut on June 5, 1964 at the Swing Auditorium in a concert presented by KMEN.

As a news broadcaster in Los Angeles, where he won a pair of Golden Mike awards in his career, Lyle Kilgore came to know many in Hollywood, and occasionally acted in film and television.