Robert Hyland, Jr. (1920–1992) was CBS regional vice president and general manager of

radio station Radio broadcasting is the broadcasting of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based rad ...

KMOX KMOX (1120 AM broadcasting, AM) is a commercial radio station in St. Louis, Missouri, owned by Audacy, Inc. The station is a 50,000 watt List of North American broadcast station classes, Class A clear-channel station with a omnidirectional ante ...

St. Louis, Missouri St. Louis ( , sometimes referred to as St. Louis City, Saint Louis or STL) is an Independent city (United States), independent city in the U.S. state of Missouri. It lies near the confluence of the Mississippi River, Mississippi and the Miss ...

for four decades.

Personal life

He was born in St. Louis, Missouri in 1920. He attended both St. Louis University High School and

Saint Louis University Saint Louis University (SLU) is a private university, private Society of Jesus, Jesuit research university in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. Founded in 1818 by Louis William Valentine DuBourg, it is the oldest university west of the Missi ...

. Before going into radio he embraced the idea of becoming a professional baseball player and even an actor, but these ideas were shot down by his father or other reasons. Hyland was the son of the longtime Cardinals team physician, Robert F. Hyland.

Contributions/Career

Hyland emphasized and leveraged KMOX's relationship with the

St. Louis Cardinals The St. Louis Cardinals are an American professional baseball team based in St. Louis. The Cardinals compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (baseball), National League (NL) National League Central, Centra ...

; he also made the decision in 1960 to eliminate the station's afternoon music programming in favor of

talk radio Talk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues and consisting entirely or almost entirely of original spoken word content rather than outside music. They may feature monologues, dialogues between the hosts, Interview (jo ...

, a critical change which led to the station's subsequent dominance of the St. Louis radio market. He also introduced the first listener call-in programs at KMOX in 1960. Hyland was very much involved in civic ventures. He founded the drug and alcohol treatment center at St. Anthony's Hospital (St. Anthony's Medical Center), which was named after his father. He served on the boards of the St. Louis Zoo, the St. Louis Symphony, and the Municipal Opera, and received many honorary degrees and awards. In 1988 he was chosen as the St. Louis Man of the Year. inal Resting Place, p. 145 Hyland was the man who brought the Big Red Line Cheerleaders to the St Louis Football Cardinals Organization.

Death

Hyland died in 1992 due to cancer.

References

External links

www.stlradio.com
The hall of fame section contains a biography of Hyland.
stlcin.missouri.orgKMOX Radio Special on Robert Hyland
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hyland, Robert 1920 births 1992 deaths American radio executives Saint Louis Zoo people 20th-century American businesspeople Saint Louis University alumni