The talk radio format hits the half-century mark in 2010, fifty years after KABC/Los Angeles and KMOX/St. Louis dropped music in favor of the spoken word.  Yes, there were talk shows before 1960, but never any all-talk stations — at least none that left a mark on the industry.

It’s no surprise this significant milestone has gone largely unnoticed.  Radio is all about forward motion, we tend to focus on what’s next, not what just happened.  KABC.com does have a dated but interesting history video that traces the stations early days as a talk outlet.  Funny how some things never change: In that video Ben Hoberman, the GM who oversaw KABC’s move to talk, recalls that while listeners were fascinated with the new sound, advertisers were slow to embrace a radio format that was so, well, different.  (Former KABC GM George Green once told me that revenue from Dodgers play-by-play kept KABC in the black during the first few years of the talk format.

So take a moment to drink a toast to Ben Hoberman, KMOX’s Robert Hyland, and the bosses who backed their play — sometimes grudgingly, I suspect.  These were courageous guys who saw opportunity in something entirely new, and stuck with it until it paid off.

We owe them our careers, and more.