KPAN Radio, Hereford Texas Radio Station

KPAN is Texas Country

KPAN's Old Philosopher lost his battle with cancer early Saturday morning, July 31. Clint Formby passed away at the age of 86, after an exciting and rewarding life.

Johnny Clinton Formby was born December 6, 1923 in McAdoo, Texas to John and Willie Formby. He attended schools in Plainview and McAdoo and graduated from McAdoo High School in 1942, where he played basketball, tennis and was quarterback on the 6-man football team. Clint picked cotton on the family farm through the Dust Bowl and Great Depression, and also worked at a drug store as a soda jerk. He turned 18 the day before the attack on Pearl Harbor.

He began college at Texas Tech upon high school graduation, but then enlisted in the US Army and served his country in World War II. He served as staff sergeant and medic in US Army, attached to the 235^th General Hospital in Marseille, France. Clint remained in Switzerland after the end of the war in April, 1945 and attended University of Switzerland in Basel .

He returned stateside and re-enrolled at Texas Technological College, where he was a member of Socii fraternity. He was elected president of the Texas Tech student body his senior year, and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in journalism in 1949. While at college, he worked during the summer of 1948 to help his uncle Marshall Formby construct KPAN AM in Hereford, working as a carpenter and painter. His was the first voice on the new radio station when it went on the air August 4, 1948. Marshall, 12 years older than Clint, was a former county judge and former state senator who went on to serve on the Texas Highway Commission and ran for governor in 1962, with Clint as his campaign manager.

While in college, he met Margaret Clark, who was the first Miss Texas Tech. They courted and were married September 16, 1950 in Van Horn, Margaret’s hometown. The young couple moved to Colorado City, where they rented a garage apartment from Mr. and Ms. George Mahon, the future US Congressman. He also helped put a radio station in Snyder on the air. They then moved to Hereford August 22, 1951, where Clint went to work at KPAN and Margaret taught high school English and speech. Clint was the news reporter, advertising salesman, sometimes sports announcer and tornado chaser, soon becoming manager of the little station. Clint eventually replaced Marshall Formby’s original partner and the two men charted a radio path across Texas, eventually being involved in radio stations in Floydada, Tulia, Levelland, Andrews, Seminole, Tyler, Huntsville, Temple and Marshall. They operated each station with the same formula - community involvement, aggressive advertising sales, a strong role for broadcast journalism and fun for listeners. In the 1950s he would ride the train from Hereford to Chicago to attend the yearly convention of the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB).

Clint also began a daily radio commentary in October, 1955 on KPAN called the “Day-by-Day Philosopher”, which was broadcast at 7:45am six days a week. “My little program”, as he called it, continued for nearly 55 years until the day before his death, with 17,160 consecutive broadcasts. Clint believed it is the longest-running radio broadcast by an individual in the United States. KPAN has twice received the Texas Association of Broadcasters' (TAB) Outstanding Radio Station award. During the period 1962-1972, KPAN received more TAB awards than any Texas radio or TV station. It is one of two Texas radio stations retained by same family ownership for over 60 years.

Clint became involved in the growing community of Hereford. He was a member of Jaycees and a past-president of the Kiwanis Club, where he also served as district lieutenant governor and was involved in chartering two new clubs in West Texas. He served as president of Deaf Smith Chamber of Commerce and received the group’s Citizen of the Year award in 1964.Clint was a recipient of the coveted Hereford Bull Chip Award. He received the West Texas Chamber of Commerce Good Neighbor Award. He was a member of First Baptist Church since 1952, where he taught the boys’ high school Sunday School class for several years. He also attended Fellowship of Believers Church. He received the Texas Communicator of the Year from the Southern Baptist Convention. He brought cable TV to Hereford in 1972, first only a few satellite channels but eventually the full spectrum, and was managing partner of Hereford Cablevision until 2006. He was named Hereford's Pioneer of the Year in 2006.

Clint served his alma mater in a number of capacities. He was a member of the University’s Board of Regents for 12 years and served as chairman. He was involved in the work and lobbying of the legislature to establish a medical school and school of law at Texas Tech. He served for years as a board member and then president of Texas Tech Ex-Students Association, now Texas Tech Alumni. He was named a Distinguished Alumnus of Texas Tech University. He served as a board member and then chairman of the Ranching Heritage Center in Lubbock. He was a member of and then chairman of the Mass Communications Advisory Committee, and worked long and hard to have Mass Communications established as a separate school at Texas Tech. He was honored by being inducted into the Mass Communications Hall of Fame, received the Lifetime Support Award in 2001 and has a classroom named in his honor at the school.

Clint was a leader in the broadcast industry at the state and national level. He was one of dozens of small-market radio owners who made the Texas Association of Broadcasters viable in the 1960s, and went on to serve on the board of directors and as president of TAB. He has been named both Broadcaster of the Year (1994) and Pioneer Broadcaster (1979) by that state organization. He also served as the small-market radio representative on the board of the National Association of Broadcasts, and was chairman of the NAB Radio Board. He served six years as a member of the corporate board of the Associated Press, and was president of Associated Press Broadcasters. He served 16 years as a board member for Broadcast Music Incorporated (BMI), one of three major music-licensing firms in the United States. He also served for several years on the executive committee of BMI. He served as president of the Broadcast Education Foundation and as a board member of Texas Broadcast Education Foundation. He was an original board member of Texas Telecommunications Infrastructure board. Clint served on the KACV-TV Advisory Committee at the Amarillo College PBS station.

Clint and Margaret made many close friends on those various boards, and also had the opportunity to travel across the globe. Trips included an AP trip to Castro’s Cuba and other trips to China, Japan, Canada, Hawaii, Mexico, the Caribbean and virtually every major city in the United States. He loved to report those travels to his hometown audience on his daily program, which he taped in advance of any trip out-of-town. He especially enjoyed holiday visits to New York with Brenda, Scott and Kathy.

Clint was unique in several ways, a few of which can be quantified. He was the only person to ever appear on the cover of Texas Highways magazine, which set off a minor furor that Clint very much enjoyed. He was the only single person to have held the offices of Texas Tech student body president, Board of Regents chairman, and president of the Ex-Students Association.

Clint was a dedicated Texas Tech sports fan and held season football tickets since the 1950s, first in section 106 then in section 6 at Jones Stadium. He actually lived and believed in the line from the Matador Song…..”Strive for honor, evermore, long live the Matador.” He loved everything red and black.

Clint had insatiable curiosity and was a voracious reader, subscribing to five daily newspapers and numerous magazines and periodicals. He watched TV well into the night, and many of his daily radio programs were based on something he had seen or read or heard that deserved further discussion.

Clint was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 1998, but underwent radiation therapy and recovered and gave a running account of the disease and treatment on his radio show. His frank and open dialog resulted in two Texas Media Awards from the American Cancer Society in 1999. Ultimately another incurable cancer, multiple myeloma, was detected in 2005.

Clint loved people and loved to hear their story and had a way of making anyone feel as if he were really, truly interested in their conversation – which he was. His daily trips to the local banks and post office highlighted his days in Hereford, when he could tell his latest travel story and catch up on the latest local gossip. He tirelessly promoted Hereford and West Texas to anyone and everyone he encountered in his travels.

Clint’s wife Margaret was mother to their children and Clint’s main cheerleader. After the kids were grown, Margaret was instrumental in establishing the National Cowgirl Hall of Fame and Western Heritage Center in Hereford, and served as its executive director until it moved to Fort Worth.

Clint’s son Chip has worked at KPAN since 1978 and became general manager in 1994. Since 2003, Clint, Chip and Chip’s sons Jonathan and Lane all worked at the Hereford station.

Survivors are his four children, Chip Formby of Hereford and wife Lisa, Ben Formby of New York City, Marshall Formby of San Antonio and wife Betty, and Scott Formby of New York City and wife Kathy; four grandchildren, Jonathan and Lane Formby of Hereford and Alison and Lauren Formby of San Antonio, and his aunt Sharleen Formby Rhodes of Plainview. He was preceded in death by his wife, his parents, and a daughter, Linda Kay.

The family suggests memorial to Texas Tech College of Mass Communication, Texas Tech Ranching Heritage Center, or to a favorite charity.

Bartley Dowell is Hereford's 44th Pioneer of the Year. He is a retired accountant, a former mayor of Hereford and a 1940 graduate of Hereford High. Chip Formby presented the award at the 87th Mid-Plains Pioneer Reunion.

Josh Abbott and the KPAN Krew

To see photos of the KPAN wind machine build, click here. To read the July 2008 Radio magazine article, click here. To read the February 2009 Radio magazine article, click here.

Welcome to an on-line visit to the Texas Panhandle, where the people are genuine, the ground meets the sky in an unbroken line and the wind is called Mariah Carey. Or on some days there are other names for the wind. Where cows outnumber people 10 to 1. Where malcontents and ne'er-do-wells are still allowed daily access to loaded sidearms and live microphones. Where you can still be home on the range. Where the land is flat and the deck is stacked and the ladies.....are angels. Where money talks and men are real men and the livestock are.....real nervous.

Cruise around this old-timey website to learn more about Hereford and the complex inner workings of a powerhouse broadcasting giant like KPAN. Peek behind the curtain at The Old Philosopher, Clint Formby. Visit the websites of KPAN Sponsors. Check out the Hereford Whitefaces at Sports. Catch up on the latest stuff on the KPAN TableGram, shop the Trading Post, or check precip at Weather.

When the little radio station went on the air in 1948, the army barracks you see at the left was home to a simple studio and a handful of folks who were excited about bringing the latest technology to Hereford. Now, with the fourth generation of the Formby family clicking keyboards to put KPAN on the Internet, we are still excited about the latest technology to bring radio's one-to-one communication to you, our on-line listener. KPAN still has much of the original vision of 1948, a full-service radio station for a community, daily providing music, sports, advertising, journalism, weather, ag info, opinion, markets and fun for Hereford -- and now for you, wherever you choose to log on.

Click on the logos below for links to these websites.

Bootleg Weather Site Hereford Weather Site

Hereford Airport Weather Site

Contact: Check Current Info page, or individual staff e-mail addresses in the KPAN Krew section, or mail to kpan@kpanradio.com.