Art Laboe has been on the radio in Southern California more or less constantly in a broadcasting career that reaches back to the ’40s. From the early days of rock ‘n’ roll in the ’50s when he’d lug bulky radio gear to a drive-in restaurant in Hollywood to broadcast whatever fresh songs the kids wanted to hear, to his eventual recognition as the guy who created the phrase “oldies but goodies” in reference to classic hits of yesteryear.

But the city of El Monte has always been a special place for the 92-year-old disc jockey, so its fitting that the leaders of that San Gabriel Valley community decided to give him the key to the city and declare Saturday, March 10 as Art Laboe Day, too.

“Back in 1956, 1957 I did some of first rock and roll shows there,” Laboe said this week, before describing the reason he moved east from Los Angeles to set up shop at El Monte Legion Stadium.

In Los Angeles at the time, Laboe explained, you couldn’t host a public dance for teens under 18 if wasn’t sanctioned by the board of education.

“That’s why El Monte was picked,” he said. “It’s a different city and there was no such law.”

Those early shows were a combination of live performances and record-spinning, Laboe said.

“It was kind of in the old-fashioned way where we’d have a group come up, and then we’d go, ‘OK, now it’s time to dance.'”

There were acts from the Los Angeles world of doo-wop such as the Penguins, whose big hit was “Earth Angel,” and the Rosie & the Originals. Tickets were usually $3, Laboe said, though if he’d booked a bigger out-of-town act such as Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley or Jerry Lee Lewis he’d have to add another 50 cents to the entry fee.

“A lot of times the young girls would show up at the box office and they knew our regular price was $3 and they didn’t have $3.50,” he said. “I’d see them digging through their purses for enough change.”

At their peak, Laboe’s shows at Legion Stadium might get as many as 3,000 into the building, he said.

“Which was little over the limit for the place,” Laboe said. “We used to have to shut the door because they were like sardines in there.”

Laboe had already established himself as the preeminent rock ‘n’ roll DJ in Southern California, thanks to his eagerness to find out from the young listeners themselves what songs were rising in popularity.

“My source of music came from the kids themselves,” he said. “They’d bring in the records. I had turntables there at (Scrivner’s Drive-In) where we could play new records and participate with the kids more or less.

“I was supplying it from them, which most of them didn’t really realize,” Laboe said. “I was the pied piper. Not to brag, but I kind of became their hero, the hero of rock ‘n’ roll in Los Angeles.”

The move to El Monte only added sparkle to his crown. The city’s large Latino population loved the music he played and the shows he put on, and from the ’50s on Laboe’s popularity with that demographic – especially the classic car crowd which loved the music of that era – stayed rock solid.

El Monte also got regular shouts out on the radio when Laboe worked KXLA and later KRLA, which had its transmitter in South El Monte.

The Art Laboe Day ceremony will take place at 10:30 a.m. Saturday at Union Walk, 11127 Ramona Blvd., a new 62-unit townhouse development built on part of the site of the former Legion Stadium.

In addition to Laboe receiving the key to the city, he and fans can check out the Memories of El Monte fountain built at the site of the old stadium, the name a reference to Laboe’s shows there and the CD compilation that adopted that name from the title of a song by Frank Zappa.

As for Laboe, he’ll leave the event and head home to prep for his next syndicated radio broadcast, which airs locally from 6 p.m. to midnight Sundays on 93.5 KDAY, as well as stations from Fresno to Santa Barbara, Barstow to Phoenix.

“I believe I’m the oldest disc jockey, the oldest music presenter that exists today that’s alive,” Laboe said. “I’m 92 years, I’ll be 93 in August and my union card it says member since 1943. I still have a lot of fun, and I’m only doing it because its fun at this age.”

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