Bob Horn

:"For the football player of the same name see Bob Horn (football player).":"For the political scientist and visual language author of the same name see Robert E. Horn."

Bob Horn, born Donald Loyd Horn in Pine Grove, Pennsylvania on February 20 1916 to a World War I veteran and eventually became a radio and television personality in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania best known for being the original host of Bandstand, which later became American Bandstand, on WFIL-TV which first aired on October 7, 1952.

On July 9, 1956, Horn, fired after a drunk driving conviction, was replaced by Dick Clark. The show was picked up by ABC (becoming "American Bandstand") on August 5, 1957 and went on to great success with Dick Clark as host.

He would change his name twice; some academic records from his youth showed that he appended an 'e' to his surname for a while, and replaced his first name with "Robert". Horn also changed his name after landing a DJ job on KILT in Houston. Programmer Buddy McGregor had a musical deejay ID with the name Bob Adams, and to avoid any connection to Horn's legal problems in Philadelphia, Horn assumed the musical jingle and became Bob Adams.

Horn was scheduled for the evning show from 9 to midnight on KILT,a station owned by the man who invented Top 40 radio, Gordon McLendon. McLendon knew of Horn's Philadelphia troubles but decided to give him a chance to get back on radio. Bob Horn had legal troubles with a DUI and after that a charge of statutory rape. Very good lawyers and other circumstances resulted in Horn being acquitted, but when he drove his Cadillac into Houston,Bob was a guy with very little money after paying off those very good lawyers. Buddy Mcgregor greeted Bob and the two reunited.

Horn relied on Tom Fallon (Buddy McGregor) to fill in on radio and ordered Fallon to... 'keep Clark out of the studio while I'm gone". So, five years later Bob Horn and Tom (Buddy McGregor)were together in Houston ready to put the ground-breaking Top 40 format on the air and set the trend in American radio to convert to this exciting new format. In Philadelphia, Horn had a staff of people helping him to keep Bandstand radio and TV in the top of the ratings. In Houston, Horn sat between two turntables and stared at 38 dials and switches in front of him and just could not adapt to his new surroundings.Horn was taken off the air at KILT and became a salesperson for the station.

Horn became the best salesperson on the staff and Houston advertisers took great delight in hearing Horn talk of his very successful career in Philadelphia. Horn eventually started his own advertising agency called Bob Adams advertising.It also was very successful. Horn reunited with his family and bought a small area ranch in the Houston suburbs.

Horn died of a heat stroke-induced heart attack on July 31 1966 at the age of 50. He was mowing his lawn in Houston, Texas at the time of the incident. His remains were interred at the Forest Park Cemetery in Houston, Texas with the epitaph, "Bandstand."

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