Tom Latto

Back in the late 60’s, Tom began his broadcast career at WTCX-FM, 99.5 FM, a tiny classical station located across the street from Wedding’s Nursery on Haines Road in St. Petersburg. The Murray Carpenter family owned the station at the time. Later Tom responded to the call of WQXM, 97.9 FM, where he weathered through 3 format changes and stayed on for 2 years. WQXM began as the dream of Bob Westhead, John Pringle and others, who tried once again to bring classical music to commercial radio. When Tom joined them, the station featured some long time radio folks such as Sheila Stewart, George Butler, and Doug Pidgeon. Before long, their dream of a financially viable classical station collapsed. John Rutledge and another partner from West Palm Beach bought the station and switched it to an MOR format, giving their announcers a little bit more variety for their listeners. Although Tom hoped to convince Rutledge to break into FM rock (Yes, at the time, there were no rock stations on FM in the Tampa Bay area) the owners feared alienating the advertisers and listeners with yet another format change. 98 wouldn’t go rock until several years later. Tom left radio to serve in the Army as a Medic. Upon his return from duty, he returned to WQXM for another year. During that year MOR still reigned supreme with “Stereo 98” pulling some of the highest ratings among listeners aged 25-50 during the mid-morning time slot. Tom left after about a year and ventured into a sales career. He now is Manager of the Seminole Post Office.

One of Tom’s most memorable moments was when two young darlings ventured into the studios in Largo one January evening in 1971. One of those ladies, Leslie Williams, eventually became Tom’s wife and partner for life. Tom and his bride of 31 years make their home in Seminole and have raised 3 sons: Andrew, who has already ventured into broadcasting as a meteorology intern on WFTS; Phil who sells water softeners and Tom 4, who owns a “webb” page hosting company. Tom says hello to Tedd, Billy Jay, Charlie Champion, Bob Westhead, John Pringle, Carr Mc Cormick, Jerry Reeves, Marshall Moore, Johnny Sutton, Frank Goodson, Cameron Harper, Art Williams and belated wishes to John Burke and Doug Pidgeon. Apologies to those names omitted or misspelled. Radio waves can ruin a young person’s brain.

Or you could just say: Tom ran tapes and signed on one summer at WTCX (99.5) in 1969. In the fall he moved on to WQXM (98) spinning the platters, doing the news and PSA’s, writing commercials and handling minor transmitter mishaps for 3 years, long before these stations went to C&W and Rock respectively. One of Tom’s most memorable moments was when two young darlings ventured into the studios in Largo one January evening in 1971. One of these ladies, Leslie Williams, eventually became Tom’s wife and partner for life. Tom and his bride of 31 years make their home in Seminole and have raised 3 sons.