TheBuzz
TheBuzz
Hawaii export
in radio’s top tierOne of the voices country music fans in Chicago wake up to belongs to 1991 Waiakea High School graduate "Guitar" Gavin Todd. He's a morning show co-host and parody-song-singer with "Big John" Howell and Trish Biondo on WUSN FM.
During the holidays he visited family on Oahu as well as his parents on the Big Island, retired Hawaii County Assistant Police Chief Glenn Todd Sr. and County Real Property Tax Office staffer Winifred Todd.
He also supported the local economy.
While enjoying a sunset from the Hilton Waikoloa Village he presented girlfriend Loy Aguirre with a potentially life-changing question and "a handmade teddy bear dressed as an angel in a wedding dress with a haku on its head and a little purse which held the box for the two-carat ring," he said.
She said yes; the two plan a wedding next year.
Todd's radio experience started during his senior year at Waiakea doing a before-school wee-hours on-air shift at Hilo's KKBG FM and some off-air work at sister-station KHLO AM. He's since worked at KWXX FM/KPUA AM and KMPS FM following a move to Seattle in 1995.
He was later lured to WUSN in Chicago by his former KMPS Program Director Alan Sledge.
WUSN is a top-10 station in Chicago, the No. 3 radio market in the U.S. based on population.
Todd sends his "aloha" to the Todd and Pires (his mother's side) families in Hawaii, adding "please ask my family to send Hinode rice and Aloha shoyu!"
He likely stands out in the Windy City since he is encouraged by the station to wear "local-style clothes." Hence his aloha shirt in station publicity photos.
"The novelty of being from Hawaii hasn't worn off even after four and a half years," he said.
Speaking of being local
"Funny," AGI Capital Group Business Development Director Eric Tao said from California, "Up here, all the Punahou and Iolani grads wish they could speak pidgin like us pub-school guys. In a major cultural reversal, in a sea of relative uniformity here in the mainland, being able to actually speak pidgin is a strangely found distinction."He and Hawaii Chamber of Commerce of Northern California colleagues agree that Hawaii folks on the mainland need to wear T-shirts bearing the name of their high school, the year they "grad," and the question, "Do you know ... ?"
"Because any time you meet somebody from Hawaii there are always the same questions."
Erika Engle is a reporter with the Star-Bulletin.
Call 529-4302, fax 529-4750 or write to Erika Engle,
Honolulu Star-Bulletin, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., No. 7-210,
Honolulu, HI 96813. She can also be reached
at: eengle@starbulletin.com