Scott Fybush [1]is reporting the death of Hy Lit, one of the very first Rock and Roll DJ’s in the country.
Hy Lit died Saturday, almost two weeks after undergoing what was supposed to have been routine knee surgery for an injury he suffered when he fell Nov. 4, followed by what his son Sam tells the Philadelphia Inquirer was a series of “bizarre complications.”
Lit was one of Philadelphia’s first rock-and-roll DJs, starting his career at age 20 in 1955 at WHAT (1340), where he quickly made a name for himself before moving first to NBC-owned WRCV (1060) and then, by late 1957, to top-40 giant WIBG (990), where his achievements included introducing the city to the Rolling Stones and the Beatles – and an amazing 73 rating for his evening show, likely an all-time ratings record for any DJ. Lit quickly became a TV star as well, hosting a dance show on WKBS-TV (Channel 48) that was syndicated to other Kaiser TV stations around the country.
Frankly, “amazing ” is an understatement for those kind of numbers. And the voice,. and the personality… and later on, the hot board hand, was why he was able to do as well as he did. WIBG used to come in up here at night, years ago, before WNYR (Now WLGZ) went to high power on 990. Never heard Lit live on air, but. I still have some tape around here somewhere. His style was actually one I studied when I was training for the job, years ago.