Forgive me folks, I have one more story to tell and then I’ll shut up about the Iowa State Fair.
About a month ago I was given the opportunity to take over the annual Yo-Yo contest for the Iowa State Fair. It’s a small contest which traditionally has only a few contestants. This year we actually only had seven contenders but they were all very good. In hopes of increasing attendance as well as participation I sent a request to Saturday Morning Live with Dick and Cheryl at Iowa’s largest radio station, WHO radio in Des Moines, Iowa to see if they would allow me to talk about the contest on their program. They said they would be thrilled to do just that, it sounded like a lot of fun. For two weeks in a row they promoted the contest. Last Saturday I showed up outside their studio just as they were talking about yo-yos and the contest. I started throwing to get their attention and Dick says, “Hey, there’s a guy throwing yo-yos out there now!” Cheryl asks on the air if I was the guy running the contest, I shook my head yes. She said, “Well get in here!” So there I was, on the clear channel voice of the middle west, the radio station where President Ronald Reagan got his start so many years ago as the sports director, talking about yo-yos. Dick asked me how do you even throw those things, that when ever he tried they would get all tangled up. We talked about using your wrist as well as your arm and different kinds of string and stuff. He marveled anyone would be willing to pay the kind of money I had for yo-yos. Cheryl said; “Well, there’s a sucker born every minute.” Dick and Cheryl were both very nice to me and treated me like I was actually a somebody. With their help we had a great turn out for our contest.
Dick Layman passed away suddenly this afternoon at the age of 59. I had only met him six days ago but I feel I lost a friend today. They had sent me an email this week promising to stay in touch.
Goodbye Dick and thanks again for letting me be on your radio program.