The Making of Glenn Beck part 1

Salon.com is doing a 3 part series on Glenn Beck. I read the first one and I'm going to link it here. It's pretty interesting so far, and I plan to link all 3 when they're published. 
From Zaitchik's piece - part 1:

Beck rolled into Texas in 1983 driving a blue two-seater Datsun 280Z sports coupe. On the bumper, a Reagan-Bush '84 reelection sticker. At his side, his wife, Claire. And taking form in Beck's mind, an invisible character named Clydie Clyde who would define the next 10 years of his career as a Top 40 morning DJ.

Beck's arrival in Corpus Christi coincided with a sea change in morning radio. It was known as the morning zoo revolution, and it is the key to understanding Glenn Beck's career, both in Top 40 radio and beyond. Before the X-rated in-studio antics of the shock jocks, there were the skit-writing shlock jocks of the zoo. In it purest form, the wacky, zany, fast-paced zoo formula consisted of an ensemble cast employing fake voices, loosely scripted skits, adolescent pranks, short topical rants, and spoof songs, backed by a Top 40 soundtrack and peppered with news and traffic reports. Beck was not a pioneer of zoo radio, but he was a member of the founding generation. The influence on his approach to broadcasting endures.

Read part 1 of 3 here.

Commercial of Beck's early radio career here.

Photo credit AP Photo/Mike Mergen