John R. Kelso

John Russell Kelso (March 23, 1831 – January 26, 1891) was a nineteenth-century American politician, author, lecturer and school principal from Missouri.

Biography

Born in Franklin County, Ohio, Kelso received classical training and graduated from Pleasant Ridge College in Missouri in 1859. During the Civil War, he served in the Union Army as a private in the 24th Missouri Infantry and the 14th Missouri Volunteer Cavalry Regiment as well as captain of Company M of the 8th Missouri Volunteer Cavalry Regiment. Kelso was elected an Independent Republican to the United States House of Representatives in 1864, serving from 1865 to 1867, not being a candidate for renomination in 1866. Afterward, he was principal of Kelso Academy in Springfield, Missouri, from 1867 to 1869, moved to Modesto, California, in 1872 and moved again to Longmont, Colorado, in 1885. He was an author and lecturer until his death in Longmont on January 26, 1891.

Kelso was interred on his estate near Longmont and was later disinterred, cremated and scattered.

John R.

John R. (born John Richbourg, August 20, 1910, Manning, South Carolina; died February 15, 1986, Nashville, Tennessee) was an American radio disc jockey who attained fame in the 1950s and 1960s for playing rhythm and blues music on Nashville radio station WLAC. He was also a notable record producer and artist manager.

Richbourg was arguably the most popular and charismatic of the four announcers at WLAC who showcased popular African-American music in nightly programs from the late 1940s to the early 1970s. (The other three were Gene Nobles, Herman Grizzard, and Bill "Hoss" Allen.) Later rock music disc jockeys such as Alan Freed, Wolfman Jack, and others mimicked Richbourg's practice of using speech that simulated African-American street language of the mid-twentieth century.

Richbourg's highly stylized approach to on-air presentation of both music and advertising earned him popularity, but it also created identity confusion. Because Richbourg and fellow disc jockey Allen used African-American speech patterns, many listeners thought that both announcers were actually African-Americans. The disc jockeys used the mystique to their commercial and personal advantages until the mid-1960s, when their racial identities as Euro-Americans became public knowledge.