It could have gone either way. Veteran newscaster Jennifer Jones Lee figures she could have been a domicile assistant or a meal delivery technician.
“If it weren’t for radio, my resume would only show me working some babysitting gigs or as a waitress at a Mexican restaurant,” Lee said. Her entire life has been radio.
Lee is a woman who would be as comfortable at a rodeo as she would a news conference. She joined the KFI news department in 2016 and previously worked at KGO in San Francisco for more than 17 years. This works out to more than 29 years in radio, primarily at two of the biggest dogs in the industry.
She was raised in northern California and her grandparents were her closest neighbors. We’re talking about a very rural area.
“I’d ride my four-wheeler up to their house,” Lee said. “I refer to myself as a Redneck Diva. I don’t mind getting my hands dirty as long as my nails are done. I’ll go fishing with you, but my pole has to be pink and have some bling on it somewhere.”
Lee didn’t grow up with an abundance of news and politics in the house.
“Grandpa had cows and chickens, we had horses,” she said. “Pretty much the opposites of each other. I was surprised how much I learned to love southern California. There is a rural life down here.”
She likes being part of people’s days.
“I like to pick through the news, find stuff we can talk about.
As a former news person at KGO, she watched the format flip back in October of last year with great interest. KGO scrapped all of the news departments, which had been the bedrock of their existence.
“It had been rocky there long before the flip actually went down,” Lee explained. “I think all the talk show hosts were off the air in 2010, including Gene Burns. That’s when I started to see the implosion. They just weren’t willing to part with the money and got rid of all the expensive talent to create a new situation.”
You can’t pull all the heart out of a radio station and expect to keep listener loyalty.
“I think people have missed having those daily and nightly interactions with talk show hosts,” Lee explained. “Everybody was fired by 2016. I have the distinction of being the last person fired from KGO. I was on the air that morning of the mass firings.”
Lee said management must have trusted her on the air while talent was being picked-off one by one.
“I was not happy at the situation, but I wanted to work in the industry so I didn’t say anything,” Lee said. “They let the whole morning team go and half of the newsroom.”
Lee was later hired by KFI where management told her they would find the right spot for her in the rotation. The paychecks cleared and it took KFI about six months before they decided where they were going to utilize her. That speaks volumes about KFI’s interest in her as a talent and person.
That managerial decision turned out to be pairing Lee with Bill Handel on his hugely successful show. Lee said after a little back and forth, they hit it off.
“I think Bill thought I was too perky for him at first,” Lee recalled. “I remember thinking, who is this curmudgeon,’ she laughed. “But it turned out to be a great union.”
Lee says she’s been fortunate throughout her career.
“To say the majority of my career I’ve worked at two legendary stations is a remarkable feeling,” Lee explained. “KGO and KFI are two powerhouses at either end of the state. I’ve been lucky to have some great people around me. Robin Bertolucci and Chris Little are two of them.”
Lee handles duties solo for an hour each morning on Wake Up Call with Jennifer Lee Jones before Handel settles into his chair.
“On Wake Up Call I can give the news, but put a bit of my take on things. Find a different and more creative way to explore a story. On my show people are still getting their morning coffee and I don’t want to beat them over the head with all the negative stuff. Not the same on Bill’s show. When I’m on Bill’s show, I’m always wearing my news-hat. I’m all news.”
You can think of Handel as a tidal wave in a reflecting pond. Lee said when Handel plops into his chair at 7am, he approaches stories his own way.
“Of course, I knew about Bill’s show before I started at KFI,” she said. “He was top-notch, legendary in the building. I loved listening to Handel on the Law. When we met I knew he was the guy I expected. I kept my expectations lower.”
She kind of hoped Handel was the worst guy to fulfill her prophecy. She expected the snarkiest person. Someone who would poke the bear to see their reaction.
“When he started messing with me I knew he liked me,” Lee explained. “Every morning I have to make sure my game is at his level. He makes me raise my game. I like to work with somebody like him because I know I’m going to do my best.”
Much to the surprise of the free-world, Lee said Handel has a soft side, which can still surprise her at times.
“Bill doesn’t like to show that side often,” Lee said. “The kindness will come out for 40 seconds every once in a while. Don’t ever tell him I said that.”
Too late.
Lee described a very caring side of Handel. “I know in my heart if I really needed something in the middle of the night, he wouldn’t come to help. But I know he’d call someone to go and help me.”
The radio veteran has earned numerous awards for reporting and anchoring from Associated Prest, RTNDA, and Edward R. Murrow Award for sports reporting.
Her early career in radio includes working on remarkable stories. They say you can teach a baby how to swim by merely tossing them into the pool. With Lee’s early career it wasn’t much different. On 9/11 Lee was assigned the job of traveling across the country to New York to cover the tragedy. She rode a Greyhound bus across the continent to cover the tragedy because all air traffic had been grounded.
“I was just 24 years-old,” Lee said. “I was working in the San Jose office for KGO. I didn’t have the TV on when the first plane hit the towers. Then I turned it on and saw the second plane go into the building. The world had not experienced something like that before. I didn’t know what to do.”
It was just Lee and her two duffle bags on a road trip. She said the memory of crossing the bridge into Manhattan is clear in her mind.
“I was a mess,” Lee said. “I hadn’t showered in two days, hadn’t shaved my legs. Then it hit me how shallow I was being. These people lost their city, part of their identity. Watched a mushroom cloud come up from the collapse of the towers. Meanwhile, I was worried about how I looked.”
During her coverage of 9/11, Lee said with her press badge on she could go into areas most people could not go. Even families looking for loved ones were restricted to certain areas.
“One of the hardest parts was the people that still had loved ones missing,” she said. “They would hand me a picture and ask if I could look for their son inside. I’m sure many got the horrible news soon after, but I still get the chills right now thinking about it.”
A reporter being assigned a landmark story is rare enough in a career. Lee has two. While Lee was the lead morning reporter for KGO in San Francisco, her news director assigned her to cover the Scott Peterson trial. Scott Peterson was convicted of the murder of his pregnant wife Laci in 2003. Lee said morning news anchor Mary Ellen Geist had just retired and the station looked to Lee to play both roles.
“They asked if I could anchor and cover the trial,” Lee explained. “They wanted me to do both and I said ‘yes.’”
Looking back it was a pretty crazy decision. She was living in Oakland and working back and forth between San Francisco and Redwood City. She got a hotel room in Redwood City, would get up at 3am and drive to the city to anchor the news, then go back and cover the trial.
“I did that for months,” she said. “I guess I was a gutsy kid, or I just didn’t know any better.”
As with many radio personalities, when Lee was hired by KFI, management asked her what she was passionate about. For Lee it was a no-brainer. It’s all about animals. Since she started at KFI she’s worked extensively with the Pasadena Humane Society.
“Every year I participate in their biggest fundraiser, the Wiggle Waggle Walk & Run.”
One of her dogs is a Labradoodle she named Betty White.
“I’m addicted to The Golden Girls and try to watch an episode almost every night,” Lee said. “For me it’s The Golden Girls, Leave it to Beaver and The Andy Griffith Show. I know what I’m going to get when I watch those shows. I’m going to feel good. I often think about being born in the 50s or 60s. That is 100 percent my world.”
It was Ken Burns and his 1994 documentary that turned Lee into a baseball lover. Especially the Dodgers.
“As a kid, I really didn’t have a horse in the baseball race,” Lee said. “I went to a couple of A’s games as a kid, but it was that Burns documentary that changed my perceptions of baseball.”
Not a huge NFL gal, Lee follows college football. Specifically, the University of Tennessee. Even more specifically, she follows Peyton Manning.
“I’ve always loved him all the way back to his days at Tennessee. I always liked the way he played, and felt he was a good sport in the game. My husband was from the south. His granny lived in Oak Ridge, outside of Knoxville. We went to Tennessee games year after year.”
Lee said she’ll probably retire someday, but after signing a new contract, she doesn’t plan to stop anytime soon.
“Bill feels the same way,” Lee said. “He told me if I ever hear a loud thud, it would be him falling out of the chair onto the ground. That’s how long he plans on doing this.”
Jim Cryns writes features for Barrett News Media. He has spent time in radio as a reporter for WTMJ, and has served as an author and former writer for the Milwaukee Brewers. To touch base or pick up a copy of his new book: Talk To Me – Profiles on News Talkers and Media Leaders From Top 50 Markets, log on to Amazon or shoot Jim an email at jimcryns3_zhd@indeedemail.com.
