NC Radio: After 49-Year Career, Ralph Shaw Retires

Ralph Shaw

Just about anyone who has listened to the radio in the Piedmont Triad, the voice of Ralph Shaw has most likely fallen in their ears.

“Radio to me is fun,” said Shaw, who plans to retire from WTOB 980 AM in Winston-Salem Thursday after 49 years behind the mic. “I had planned to go into pharmacy.”

But a love for broadcasting bit him early, reports The Elkin Tribune.

“When I was young I got bronchitis and when my voice came back my dad said, ‘What’s that?’” Shaw said. “I said, ‘I hope it’s something I can make some money with.’”

“In so many instances that radio voice is the only person that many people have contact with,” he said. “I’m proud of what I’ve done I hope that I’ve entertained and informed and maybe made a difference.”

“What I do, I do because I love it,” said Shaw, who is 66. “I got into radio because of a love for the business, a love for music. I got into news back in ‘74 because I loved finding out things and being able to report them.”

Shaw’s radio career launched in 1972 during his junior year at high school in Dobson. .

During his early years at WIFM in Elkin, he was encouraged to do some work as a news reporter rather than spinning records. 

He has been employed by or his work has broadcast on radio and television stations in Sparta, Mount Airy, North Wilkesboro, Winston-Salem, High Point, Greensboro, Charlotte, Burlington, Sylva, Eden, Asheboro, Lexington, Roxboro, Chapel Hill and Raleigh. Either through wire service transmission or stringer gigs, his voice or words have reached people across the country through ABC, the Associated Press, CBS, Mutual News, NBC, North Carolina News Network, NPR and United Press International.

During his career, he has held nearly every job title in the industry: disc jockey, program director, reporter, traffic reporter, news anchor, assignment editor, assignment manager, news director, account representative and station manager.

Shaw has earned more than 30 awards for his work, including several honors for North Carolina Journalist of the Year.