Harold Baron "Hal" Jackson (November 3, 1914 – May 23, 2012) was an American disc jockey and radio personality who broke a number of color barriers in American radio broadcasting.
Jackson was born in Charleston, South Carolina and grew up in Washington, D.C. where he was educated at Howard University.
Jackson began his broadcasting career as the first African-American radio sports announcer, broadcasting Howard’s home baseball games and local Negro league baseball games.
In 1939, he became the first African American host at WINX/Washington with The Bronze Review, a nightly interview program. He later hosted talk show, a program of jazz and blues on WOOK-TV.
Jackson moved to New York City in 1954 and became the first radio personality to broadcast three daily shows on three different New York stations. Four million listeners tuned in nightly to hear Jackson’s mix of music and conversations with jazz and show business celebrities. In 1971, Jackson and Percy Sutton, a former Manhattan borough president, co-founded the Inner City Broadcasting Corporation (ICBC), which acquired WLIB — becoming the first African-American owned-and-operated station in New York. The following year, ICBC acquired WLIB-FM, changing its call letters to WBLS ("the total BLack experience in Sound"). As of the late 2000s ICBC, of which Jackson was group chairman, owns and operates stations in New York, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Fort Lauderdale, Columbia, South Carolina, and Jackson, Mississippi. The flagship station was hampered by its frequency, sharing it with WOWO of Fort Wayne, IN. After being turned down by the FCC to change frequencies, Inner City Broadcasting, in an industry un-precedented move, purchased WOWO solely to reduce its output and upped the power of the NYC transmitters to 50,000 watts daytime/30,000 watts night, and subsequently be heard full-time across the entire New York market.
As of February 2011, nonagenarian Jackson continued to host Sunday Classics on WBLS each Sunday from 3 to 6 p.m., with Clay Berry and Deborah Bolling Jackson, known professionally as Debi B., his wife of 25 years.
In 1990, Hal Jackson was the first minority inducted into the National Association of Broadcaster's Hall of Fame. In 1995, he became the first African-American inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame. He was given a Pioneer Award by the Rhythm and Blues Foundation in 2003. In October 2010 he was named a "Giant in Broadcasting" by the Library of American Broadcasting. Jackson was also inducted into the Guinness Book of World Records as being the oldest broadcaster with a record 73 year-career.
Jackson was the founder of the Hal Jackson Talented Teens International Competition.
Jackson died of natural causes in New York City on May 23, 2012 with his three children and wife at his bed side at the age of 96.
Candace Award, National Coalition of 100 Black Women, 1992.
