Parker Live News from the Parker Strip since 2009.
Keith Douglas and Juanita Learn, owners and hosts of the flagship morning show at KLPZ 1380am, have announced their retirement after more than 30 years on the air in Parker. The end of their tenure on December 31st marks the end of an era for listeners.
Keith first came to Parker after being offered the job at KLPZ just before Thanksgiving in 1992. He had been working at KDSR in North Dakota and various other stations. He’d never been to Parker before and didn’t know anything about it when he arrived. But he took to it, not only as a town and a place to call home, but as an employee who liked working at KLPZ enough that he later bought the station from its owner, Chuck Scofield, who died last month at a reported 99 years old.
Keith was originally going to be one of two co-hosts of the morning show, but in a matter of months began to host the show alone. He had several sidekicks at the start, but the one who lasted was his girlfriend – later wife – Juanita. Juanita quit what she was doing in Phoenix and moved to Parker to co-host the show, which has aired live on weekdays since then.
KLPZ started life at 11 am on September 7th, 1974 as KZUL (‘Kazual’) with a license to broadcast on 1380am. After La Paz County was formed out of Yuma County, the station was renamed KLPZ (‘K-La Paz’) to match. The first song played was Dreamweaver by Gary Wright. The station was one of the first affiliates of the nationally syndicated Rush Limbaugh Show, which KLPZ had a regional exclusive on right up until Limbaugh’s death in 2021. It also aired Paul Harvey until Harvey’s death in 2009.
Stations are typically programmed with a single radio format, whether rock, or country, or news/talk, or something else. But KLPZ seemed to defy definition, with elements of many things happening on air depending on the time of day. Keith felt that the station, and his show especially, was too ‘wild’ for a traditional format, so when he bought the station, he named the format ‘Country and a Little More’. The ‘little more’ included non-country songs from time to time, news, talk, opinion, and random other elements that kept things interesting and fit the local appetite more.
Keith and Juanita’s show has been a constant in Parker, with generations now having heard their voices in the mornings. They’ve done almost everything in that time. Interviewing U.S. senators, Arizona governors and local politicians, artists and media personalities; giving away cash frozen in blocks of ice; blowing objects up in a microwave to see what happened; experimenting with eating a single food for a week; hosting political debates with candidates for office; protecting La Paz County from alien invasion; wagering on the weather; covering the annual off-road races live; competing with guests for most marshmallows stuffed in one’s mouth; ‘tasing’ volunteers in studio… and the list goes on.
As Keith met more local people in the first years on air, he met some members of the Colorado River Indian Tribes who had anglicized tribal names based on animals, so he decided to name himself the Black-Footed Ferret, and Juanita the Luscious Lizard. From there, everybody around them got similar nicknames at the station, including listeners and friends. This led to Keith’s daily self-introduction: “I am one of the wooded battlefield, the original black-footed ferret. Do not be fooled by others, they are mere weasels in disguise. And much like Batman I am also a crimefighter, minus the tights, better known as Amazing Man.” After this, the Luscious Lizard would roll her eyes and give her own special intro: “I’m Juanita.”
Long-running segments included You-Call-It Friday (in which listeners could call to win prizes from local sponsors), the Trading Post (“Buy, trade or sell”), the Dog-Gone Show (pet-related), the Wild West Experience (stories of the old west), the Ultimate Sacrifice (stories of service members who gave their lives for their country), the Sheriff’s Department Roundup (daily arrest report read by visiting Sheriff’s deputies), News You Can’t Use and many more. Callers to the studio are put on air with no call screeners or delay buttons common in talk radio. They just go on live with no safety net.
Over the years KLPZ evolved with the times, adding more and more complex systems for automating tasks like producing recorded segments like radio ads, getting live feeds for nationally syndicated content, getting live news updates as an affiliate of the Associated Press, reporting Parker weather to the National Weather Service in daily paper reports that go back decades, and adding a live web stream of the station. In 2004, KLPZ hired John Wright who had just arrived from Northern Ireland. John hosted the afternoon show for 14 years and, in 2009, started the Parker Live website, which quickly became a leading source for local information throughout the following decade.
Keith and Juanita also started the annual FLOG tournament (‘golf’ spelled backwards) in which a round of golf is played at Emerald Canyon Golf Course in wacky costumes using baseball bats.
“It’s been a great run,” Keith told listeners on Wednesday. “Many of our local sponsors have been with us since Day One and they literally make this whole thing possible. We couldn’t even be sitting here without them. Literally they are amazing.”
The future of the station is uncertain, with no plans having been announced for the 1380am frequency after Keith and Juanita’s last show, which is slated for December 31st, 2024 and can be heard from 6 am until 10 am at klpz1380.com.
Keith said that he and Juanita plan to stay in the Parker area after their retirement and engage with the community outside of radio, with plans including raising horses at their property in Bouse and traveling. Keith’s family is in North Dakota, and they plan to spend summers there.
