It’s a story as old as the mountains. Boy meets city. Boy falls in love with the city. Boy returns to pretty much spend the rest of his life working in the city. That’s the story of Eric Hansen.
“I first came to New York when I was about 15 years-old,” Hansen, operations manager for The Mike Gallagher Show.
Once Hansen dipped his toe into the fantastical pond called New York, he said he knew that’s where he wanted to be. “I felt it the first time I came here,” Hansen explained. “There was something about it.”
His first trip to New York was organized by Hansen’s school and they stayed at the YMCA on 42nd Street. The school had arranged for the kids to see plays in the city, among other outings.
“I came back again when I was about 16 years old,” Hansen explained. “A friend of mine played his saxophone in Central Park. One time he asked me if I wanted to go with him.” I did.
The third trip to the city put Hansen over the top. Hansen was 18, and it was New Year’s Eve. What could go wrong with that combination?
“Needless to say it was a wild experience in Times Square,” Hansen said. “Today Times Square is positively genteel compared to those days. I knew I never wanted to leave.”
He grew up in New Jersey, where his mother was a secretary, and his father sold pneumatic components to factories.
“I do remember a kind of solenoid valve. It was assembled from five pieces and he had an order for 1,000 of them.”
One afternoon Hansen’s father asked if he wanted to make some money. Of course, the kid said yes. He paid his son $300 to put all the parts together.
“I was in there with my needle nose pliers making 1,000 of whatever they were.”
Hansen has served as operations director for The Mike Gallagher Show and has been since 1999. At work, he’s called up to do essentially everything and anything. Before that, Hansen was an account executive and studio manager for ABC Radio Networks, as well as a morning and evening air personality at several radio stations around the country. In regards to his current boss, Hansen said Gallagher is genuine.
“I’ve known Mike for 25 years. He was a client when I was at ABC. That’s how I eventually started working on his show.”
As operations director, Hansen said his job is simple. If anything needs to be done at the station or in this hemisphere, he’s probably the guy that has to do it, no matter what that might be.
“You need promo copy? I’ll write it,” Hansen said. “You need to install some broadcasting equipment? I’m on it. Need someone to keep track of the live reads? That’s me. I’ll work on commercial logs, voice some liners. I have to make sure all trains are running on time. I literally never know on any given day what I might be doing, other than the show. One day I might be running wires on the floor, then cracking the mic.”
Hansen said Gallagher was first syndicated in 1998. He wasn’t working for him at the time but was in the studio during Gallagher’s first show.
“I can’t think of another syndicated show that has gone on this long. I’m grateful, but not surprised. I’ve heard so many shows at ABC where I thought to myself, ‘This isn’t going to last.’ When I heard Mike’s show I remember thinking, ‘this is pretty good’. He was always funny, entertaining, and informative.”
Hansen was flagged down in a hallway at the station and Gallagher asked if he’d like to work for him.
“He offered me double the amount ABC was paying me,” Hansen said. “I went into my boss’s office and said, ‘they want to pay me double.’ He said I should take it.”
Hansen said so many people around the country have moved host chairs, but Gallagher performs well, he makes money for his boss.
“The sad truth is a market will drop your show and go with the new flavor of the month. When that doesn’t work out, they bring our show back. Mike’s show works.”
He said Gallagher truly understands the financial and business sides of the industry.
Hansen explained how some talent he’s known in the industry didn’t want to be hassled with business stuff.
“As a friend of mine said, a lot of talent just wants to play in the boom-boom room,” Hansen said. “Howard Stern is a master at live reads. He knows what to do in order to sell the product.”
Hansen said Gallagher uses the products he endorses and lets his audience know that. If he doesn’t use the product, he won’t say that he does. Honesty is a big part of the show.
Gallagher said Hansen is the kind of team member every broadcaster dreams of having. For over 24 years, he has been the steady hand that holds the show together.
“Eric has the ultimate ‘can-do’ spirit, is constantly positive and enthusiastic, and genuinely loves what he does,” Gallagher said. “I’ve been blessed to have been surrounded by great people over the years; Eric is, far and away, the single best hire I’ve ever made.”
Gallagher’s show is now on TV on the Salem News Channel.
“Mike is probably most comfortable with TV with all the Salem hosts,” Hansen said. “Mike had done a lot with Fox. It’s a challenge dealing with all the cameras, lighting, things we took for granted in radio. I’m experimenting with boom microphones, lavalier microphones.”
He’s seen so much during his years in New York. Hansen was in town when the Twin Towers fell.
“We were doing our show live,” Hansen explained. “Our studio at that point was in the Empire State Building. Someone came to the door and told us, ‘You have to leave.’ We said, ‘we can’t, we’re doing a show.’ They said, ‘no, you have to leave.’ So we did.”
Hansen said never before in his career did he leave a live radio show.
“They took us out on Fifth Avenue,” he said. “When we looked toward the Towers, we could only see smoke. My wife and I used to walk in the neighborhood quite a bit for years. We are very familiar with the area. I didn’t go back down there for a long time. Just didn’t want to see it.”
The horror continued. Hansen said they were driving out to Long Island to a studio where they could resume and finish the show, and they stopped at the entrance ramp to the highway and they could see Manhattan from there.
“We watched the towers fall,” he said. “It was terrifying.”
Hansen said all of the cell towers were on top of the Trade Center, and after they fell there was no cell reception. That proved to be a huge problem.
“My wife somehow managed to get home, but we were not able to contact each other. I wasn’t even able to get in touch with her until late that night.”
Hansen recalled an interview he conducted with a woman who was married to one of his wife’s cousins. The woman was extremely traumatized.
“She was exiting a Tower after the first plane hit the other tower. The woman was pregnant at the time. She was told she could go back to her office, but she wasn’t going to deal with the stairs at that point being pregnant.”
Hansen said the woman decided to get some coffee and return to the building later.
“As she was walking across the plaza the second plane hit the tower. The woman witnessed the explosions, saw falling body parts, and debris from the buildings.”
Never Forget.
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.
