Delilah is the most listened-to woman on U.S. radio. Syndicated by Premiere Networks, she is heard on 140 stations, her channel on iHeartRadio, and her podcast, “Love Someone with Delilah.”
She has won nearly every industry award and is a member of the National Radio Hall of Fame and the NAB Broadcasting Hall of Fame. Delilah is the mother of 15, 11 of whom are adopted.
When the show began in 1997, did Delilah have any idea that it would be such a success?
“Yes and no. Yes, in that I know how determined I was to make it. My biggest dream was to be on three stations simultaneously. That, to me, was going to be freaking amazing. Everything has undoubtedly surpassed my dreams times a million, but I knew I wasn’t going to give up.”
Delilah knows the winning formula.
“The callers and the music – that’s what makes the magic. Unfortunately, a lot of powers that be want to control every second of the show and think they know better than I do, or the listeners do what they want to hear, so that is a constant struggle. It is a constant struggle to say, ‘ No, I’m not playing to a meter; I’m interacting with my audience.”
Audience interaction can make a listener feel involved and, in some cases, comforted by what they are hearing.
“That’s what I want to do every night. I want, when you listen to my show, when you interact with my show, whether it’s calling or going on my Facebook page or just silently listening in your car while you’re driving to and from work, I want you to feel better about yourself, about life, about opportunities when you turn the radio off or walk away than you felt before you turned it on. That’s my goal.”
I asked if it was even possible to remember a specific call that had a lasting impact on her.
“There are millions, but I’ll tell you about a call I took last night. I’d been working all day in my greenhouse. I recently got custody of three more kids. So, I have five kids. Four of them are under the age of 10. I was pretty beat when I went into the studio, and I was working, taking calls, great calls, great stories. I was just about to say, okay, I’m done for the night.”
“We have plenty of calls for the rest of tonight’s show. I’ve got calls to start the show tomorrow. I’m done. And something said, pick up the line. I picked up the line, and the woman could barely talk. She was hurting so bad.”
“She told me about her marriage. She’d been married for over 30 years. He was the love of her life. Last year, he was super healthy and super fit, going to visit their grown kids and their grandkids. And he didn’t feel well. He went to the hospital, and literally a few weeks later, he was gone.”
“The day before he retired, he died. All their dreams for retirement, all their trips they planned, everything gone. She couldn’t even breathe. She said, ‘I don’t want to be here. I want to go be with him.’ I knew she wasn’t kidding. She wasn’t looking for sympathy. She was stating her truth to someone she knew would listen.”
“I said, you don’t have that option until God tells you it’s time. I asked, do you guys have children? She said we were going to be with them when all this unfolded. I asked did you carry them? Did you want to know what they looked like before they were born? She said, of course, every mother does.”
Could you imagine if, in your first trimester, in your fourth month, you walked into your doctor’s office and said, I can’t take it?” I got to hold them. I have to kiss my baby. Schedule me for a C-section tomorrow.”
“What would happen? She said I would lose the baby. Exactly. You were able to be patient until the time was right. You are going to have to be patient until the time is right and God calls you to be with your husband. Just like a baby has work to do growing in the womb. You still have work to do here. Your job is to finish the story.”
Delilah’s desire to give back established Point Hope as a voice for forgotten children everywhere.
“Point Hope began in Philadelphia when I met a woman and her children who were homeless, and I thought, this is not okay. She was in a domestic, violent, abusive situation. She fled and ended up living in cardboard boxes in an alley with beautiful children. And so I started learning about those who are unhoused and what the real core issue is.
From that beginning came a trip to Africa that would further change her life.
“In 2004, I got a letter from a woman who was asking me to adopt her children. It turns out she was someone who lived in a refugee camp in Ghana, West Africa and had heard about me on the internet in a Christian chat room.
“She was begging for money, and somebody said, hey, there’s this lady in America that adopts black kids. You should contact her. That led me to contact World Vision, which agreed to sponsor her if I donated the money. That led to them challenging me to go to Africa. And that led to me thinking they were crazy. But eventually, seeing that that made sense, I went to Africa, and my world was changed.”
I asked about the many awards and honors she has accumulated over the years.
“You know what the awards did the first time I won. I did the I told you so dance. When you’re a kid, and you’re told something won’t work or that it’ll never work that way. And it does. You wiggle your tush, and you say, I told you so. That’s such a satisfying feeling to be validated when things turn out right. The awards are my I told you so dance. And that’s all they are. They don’t make me any smarter or better.”
Delilah has no plans to slow down and still loves being on the radio.
“I love being on the air. Last night, taking calls, I heard from a little girl whose best friend had betrayed her by sharing a secret that she had asked her to keep in confidence. I was able to laugh out loud at myself because I’m the worst secret keeper in the world.”
“You cannot tell me anything in confidence because I will not only forget and violate that confidence. I’ll do it on the air. My daughter didn’t tell me when she was pregnant because she said I was the last person to know.”
“I said, honey, why? She goes because you would blab it to everybody. I said, no, I wouldn’t. She said you would say it on the air. You’re right, I would. I have no boundaries, but I love, love, love my medium, and talking to and connecting with people.”
“I love the power of radio. You can paint pictures, create scenes, and draw people in, and they’re with you. You can be describing the banks of a river.”
“I got the name Point Hope from Point Hope, Alaska, because I did a broadcast on the hottest day in Philadelphia in my 20 years from Point Hope. I did the whole broadcast using sound effects. And my best friend thought I had flown to Point Hope. You can create amazing stories. It’s such a powerful medium. I love that there are still incredibly talented people who see that power and that beauty and don’t waste it.”
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Jeff Lynn serves as Editor of Barrett Media’s Music Radio coverage. Prior to joining Barrett Media, Jeff spent time programming in Milwaukee, Omaha, Cleveland, Des Moines, and Madison for multiple radio groups, including iHeartMedia, Townsquare Media, NRG Media, and Entercom (now Audacy). He also worked as a Country Format Editor for All Access until the outlet shut down in August 2023.
To get in touch with Jeff by email, reach him at Jeff@BarrettMedia.com.
