Buddy Pittman Biography
WBJW-AM
WLOF WWNZ
Buddy
was born Robert Edgar Pittman
on May 1, 1952 in Waycross, Ga. The Buddy name came from his brother.
''He'd try to pull me through the bars of my crib,'' Pittman recalled.
''He'd say, 'I want to play with my little buddy." My parents picked up on
it. I was 'Little Buddy' until I outgrew the 'Little.' I've been
'Buddy' my whole life.'' He grew up in Manchester, Ga., before moving to
Orlando in 1971. He graduated from the Florida Technological University
(which became the University of Central Florida) in 1971. His
father was a foreman for Seaboard Coast Line, his mother, a
homemaker. Pittman worked summers assisting physical therapists at Warm
Springs, Ga., where FDR was treated for polio. After a year as a premed
student at the University of Georgia, he transferred to FTU
because his mother and father had moved to Orlando. Working construction
part-time, he got an urge to try his hand at broadcasting. He
got a third class radio license and went around to nine different
radio stations before WBJW-AM 1440
hired him in 1971. He was 19. At the time the station was automated
and had no disc jockeys; so Pittman worked in the technical end. While
still working weekdays at WBJW, Pittman got a second job as a
weekend disc jockey at WLOF-AM 950.
Then in 1972 he found work in the production department at WESH-TV Channel 2.
In 1975 a job broadcasting weekend sports came open at WESH. ''I
got up nerve enough to do an audition tape,'' Pittman said. ''They liked
it well enough to give me a chance.'' Buddy did a sports talk show on WWNZ-AM
740 which lasted three months. In 1984 Buddy went back to Channel
2 to do weekend sports. Buddy announced his retirement from WESH-TV 2 on
August 27, 2006. |
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