Longtime broadcaster Jim Dunbar dies at 89

Acknowledging many jobs in the radio world don’t last for long, Dunbar’s daughter Brooke Dunbar reflected on the length of her father’s career at KGO and his impact on countless listeners and viewers in his decadeslong career. Well known for his ability to improvise, Jim Dunbar was both capable of delivering news at a moment’s notice and apt to research a topic thoroughly to ensure both sides of every story were represented, said Brooke Dunbar.

“He had a very calming effect on the San Francisco Bay Area,” she said. “He had an inner calm given all of the cacophony and chaos when delivering news.”

Beginning with a morning KGO talk show the 1960s, Jim Dunbar’s broadcasts featuring national and local news started the days of many in the Bay Area. Expected to be on air at 5:05 a.m. each morning for a talk show he co-hosted with the late Ted Wygant, Jim Dunbar was always ready to start the day with humor, even when the day called for the pair to discuss weighty issues, said Brooke Dunbar, who added he had an ability to take one sentence written by producers and talk for 10 minutes on the topic.

Though much of his career was dedicated to radio, Brooke Dunbar said her father did a 5 a.m. television newscast on ABC for several years in the 1970s. Though he enjoyed both media equally, Brooke Dunbar said her father liked that he could arrive at the radio station in a sports jacket, jeans and loafers with no socks.

Brooke Dunbar said her father majored in journalism when he attended Michigan State University and got his first try at radio when he acted on a friend’s suggestion and tried out to be a broadcaster for the school’s basketball team. Though he had envisioned himself working for a newspaper, Brooke Dunbar said her father’s childhood hobby of reading the dictionary fueled his precise wording on air.

She said her father served for two years in the Army and was a broadcaster while stationed at Fort Riley, Kansas. In 1956, he moved to New Orleans and became a broadcaster for the WDSU radio station based in the French Quarter, where he replaced Dick Van Dyke after the actor moved to Broadway.

In the four years Jim Dunbar spent in New Orleans, he met his future wife Beth Monroe in her final year at Newcomb College and was immediately smitten with her, said Brooke Dunbar. The two were married within a year of meeting each other and moved to Chicago in 1960, where they lived for three years while Jim Dunbar was a disc jockey and broadcaster for the WLS radio station.

Beth Dunbar’s encouragement that the family, which at the time included the couple’s only daughter, leave Chicago and its harsh winters was behind Jim Dunbar’s pursuit of a job at KGO radio station in San Francisco, said Brooke Dunbar, who said he didn’t think the job would last long.

“He prepared my mother because that’s the nature of radio broadcast,” she said. “People don’t stay, they are transferred around and around.”

Brooke Dunbar remembered her father would be home at 9:30 a.m. most days and then take a nap, play tennis and eat lunch before tending his garden with her mother, with whom he celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary in December. She said he was very engaged with her activities while she was growing up, though he tried to get to sleep at a reasonable hour.

After years of waking up early, Jim Dunbar retired in 2000 and continued to do commentary until 2004, said Brooke Dunbar, who added her father also liked to visit senior centers to discuss current events. She said she attended some of the sessions and enjoyed seeing others so excited to engage with her father, who enjoyed fostering relationships with others in his community.

Brooke Dunbar, who lives in Foster City, said her father was often stopped at grocery stores and restaurants by appreciative listeners, and said the outpouring of support from the Bay Area community has been heartwarming. She noted it gave her hope his listeners are following his advice to “keep the faith,” a sign-off he liked to use for his evening newscast on ABC.

“The outpouring from the KGO family as well as the ABC family as well as friends and family has just been so heartwarming,” she said. “I’m not surprised.”

Jim Dunbar was born Oct. 9, 1929, in Dearborn, Michigan, and attended Michigan State University. He served in the U.S. Army between 1954 and 1956 in Fort Riley, Kansas, and moved to New Orleans, where he lived from 1956 to 1960, was a broadcaster for the WDSU radio station and met his wife, Beth Monroe. He was a disc jockey for the Chicago radio station WLS, where he was able to explore his passion for jazz music. His family moved to San Francisco in 1963 and he served as a broadcaster for KGO for 37 years before retiring in 2000. Dunbar was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame in 1999 and the Bay Area Radio Hall of Fame in 2006. He is survived by his wife Beth Dunbar and his daughter Brooke Dunbar.

anna@smdailyjournal.com

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