NEWSMAN ED NIX RETIRES AFTER 40 YEARS IN RADIO

Hardly a trace of emotion was audible in the crystal clear baritone voice on Friday, even though it was delivering for the last time the introduction that’s been heard on Orange County radio for more than three decades.

“Good afternoon Orange County--it’s noontime at KWIZ in Santa Ana. This is Ed Nix reporting,” said the booming voice of the veteran newscaster as he put in his last day behind a microphone in KWIZ’s Santa Ana studios.

“I’ve decided it’s time I stop talking and start listening,” Nix, 67, said of his decision to retire this month and end a career in radio that began in 1946 at a 5,000-watt radio station in Kankakee, Ill.

During his 40 years as a newscaster and on-air personality--most of which were spent at KWIZ and KEZY in Anaheim--Nix has watched radio give way to television as the nation’s primary source of mass communication, entertainment and information.

In the 1940s and ‘50s, radio newscasters typically were responsible for several 15-minute broadcasts each day. In the 1980s, however, Nix said five minutes is more typical and “3 1/2 minutes is becoming the standard.”

As the white-haired, soft-spoken newsman told his listeners during his final on-air remarks, “I’ve seen a lot of changes and not all of them were for the better.”

Earlier, during an interview at the station between newscasts, Nix’s ever-present sense of humor was displayed in numerous jokes about his career and in banter with other station employees.

When KWIZ-FM morning drive deejay Ronni Richards completed her shift at 10 a.m., she offered her goodbys to Nix and asked him to open a gift she’d brought for him. When Richards unleashed sound effects simulating a nuclear explosion, Nix said straight-faced, “Gee, I’ve gone all to pieces.”

But he was only half-joking when he suggested that the decline of radio “all began with instant coffee.

“The problem today, especially with the kids, is that people want instant gratification,” he said. “They want everything right now. That has trickled up into the broadcasting business. What is it (Los Angeles all-news radio station) KFWB says? ‘Give us 22 minutes and we’ll give you the world.’ Who ever thought you could summarize the complexities of the world in 22 minutes.”

One of his biggest complaints about the evolution of radio--and television--is the life-or-death importance given to ratings, and the lengths to which most stations will go to bolster those numbers.

“When you get into a rating system, you also get into people who will cheat to improve their ratings,” Nix said. “One of the big cop-outs in television and radio is that when the ratings period starts, the stations start all their promotions, giving away cars, diamond rings, whatever. I think that’s dishonest. They’re buying listeners for the time being, after which they’ll go back to what they were listening to before.

“But I guess it works,” he said, shaking his head. “Listeners go where they can get something for free.”

Nix came to Orange County from Illinois--after a stint at Fresno station KGST--in 1950, when he landed a job at KVOE in Santa Ana. A few years later KVOE became KWIZ. “It was pronounced ‘quiz’ because we had three quizzes an hour and all these great slogans like ‘KWIZ--Where the action is.’ ” he said. In 1959, Nix moved to KEZY, where he worked until 1974, when he returned to KWIZ.

The dean of Orange County radio, Nix predates even fellow KWIZ newscaster Spider McLean, a 30-year veteran whom Nix hired in the mid-’50s. Of the awards he’s picked up over the years, Nix said he is most proud of his Golden Mike award in 1964 and a Sky Dunlap Award for community involvement from the Orange County Press Club.

Recalling the most memorable stories he’s covered, he cited Harry Truman’s victory over Thomas E. Dewey in 1948 while he was still in Chicago, an exclusive interview he obtained in 1962 with then-California gubernatorial candidate Richard M. Nixon, and the 1969 floods in Southern California. “We had something like 30 or 35 days of rain. At the time I said, ‘When it gets to 40 days, we’re in trouble.’ ”

Just as radio has changed dramatically during his long career, Nix has also watched the county develop from a small rural outpost of Los Angeles into an affluent community of more than 2 million people.

“When I came to Orange County, I was working in Santa Ana, which had 65,000 people and that was too many. Anaheim had 48,000, so I moved there. Then Walt Disney built Disneyland. When Disneyland opened, I made one of my more profound statements: ‘Just another big amusement park.’ ”

Although Anaheim is now one of the tourist capitals of the country, Nix said, “I remember when Anaheim had three restaurants and at least three motels. And State college Boulevard was a two-lane road.”

With the spare time he’ll have beginning today, Nix plans to do some traveling with his wife of 42 years, Grace. Beyond that general game plan, he said the only thing he knows for sure is that he’ll continue the community involvement he’s had most of his life. That will include an appearance in an April 21 celebrity golf tournament benefiting the Olive Crest Home for Abused Children. And though he departs the station where he spent so many years, Nix said he’ll likely have a radio at home tuned to KWIZ to hear the familiar voices of his former studio partners.

“I’ve always felt sorry for people who go to a job every day that they hate. I read recently that only 15% of all people enjoy going to work in the morning. That means that 85% of the people out there on the freeway don’t care if they get where they’re going,” he said with a chuckle. “And I’m facing them every day.”

“I feel fortunate,” he added, “because this is a job I’ve always enjoyed.”