When I was seventeen years old instead of going to school I went to the radio station. My father was a disc jockey and his name is Tom Donahue. The radio station was KMPX in San Francisco in 1967. Up until then I hadn’t hung out with my father when he did radio in AM but the family was aware of Top 40, music hops and concerts as Tom was always was putting on some show. My favorites were the Cow Palace shows he and his partner Bob Mitchell and KYA radio put on in San Francisco in the early 60’s.
At KMPX I was the receptionist, the music librarian, an engineer and then when we moved to KSAN; a disc jockey. And now 50 years later I am a disc jockey once again at my local community radio station and loving it. I didn’t think I ever wanted to be a dj after I “retired” from radio and moved to Maui in 1973 to “work on my tan.” There were enough disc jockeys in the family; my father, my brother Sean Donahue and my step mother Raechel. I wanted to find my own path.
