Hi, folks,

Thanks for all the sweet comments about Walt.

Walt's partner, Dianne Marie Anderson, tells us the rebroadcast of Walt Fraser on the Other Side deeply touched four people this week.  (We ran Walt's interview 2-4pm Monday after Jimmi had car problems.):

First of all, her.  Second, a neighbor who was just beginning to know Walt better and who called it a "transforming experience." Third, a great German friend of Walt's, practically "a surrogate son," heard it online. And, lastly, Walt's daughter, Joni, got to listen to it in her rental car all the way here from the airport as she drove here.

There will be private graveside services for Walt.  However, there will be a celebration of Walt's 90th birthday sometime next March because "Walt wanted his friends to sing, dance and eat well" that day, according to Dianne Marie.

Speaking of a man who keeps giving to us even after passing, the family asks that memorial gifts go to....the KVMR Capital Campaign to build a new state of the art facility in downtown Nevada City!

Here is Dianne Marie's address for cards, etc.:

Thanks, Walt.

Monday, September 10th, 2012

Longtime KVMR broadcaster Walt Fraser passed away over the weekend at age 89 from a heart attack at home after spending the day in his garden and making chicken soup.

Over the past 29 years, Fraser had hosted a variety of music shows, a weekly talk show and, in recent years, a vintage music series called "Afternoon Delight" on KVMR.  He also worked as an underwriting and advertising sales representative for the station for over a decade.   Walt -- whose recent shows featured music from the 1920s to the 1980s -- stepped down from KVMR earlier this year, saying he didn't want to have the obligation. "I'm going to be 90 next year and I said, 'Enough's enough'".  Pure Walt.

He was the second oldest broadcaster in the history of the 34-year-old community radio station, just behind the late Bill Tuttle, who broadcast into his early 90s.

The popular broadcaster was a German native, whose family fled to Shanghai, China, as Hitler came to power.  When Japan occupied China during Word War II, German officials pressured Japan to move the Jewish refugee families there into a one square mile enclave. After the War, Walt moved to the United States, attended college and worked as a risk manager at Safeway until his retirement to Grass Valley in the early '80s.

In his later years, Fraser enjoyed trips to dozens of places and countries.  Earlier this year, he had gone to Germany to see friends and took an Alaskan cruise this summer.

Walt's good friend and fellow KVMR broadcaster Len Gorsky says of him, "He was a kind and intelligent person, a great conversationalist, an excellent writer and a world traveler.  I rarely heard him utter a word in anger."

Services will be private, but his longtime companion, Dianne Marie Anderson, says there are plans for a 90th birthday party in his honor next March.

"Walt wanted his friends to sing, dance and eat well."

The family is asking memorials be made to the KVMR Capital Campaign to help the station build a state-of-the-art facility in downtown Nevada City.  The man keeps on giving to us, even after his passing. We're deeply honored and touched.

Among many wonderful traits, Walt's charming smile, distinctive voice and  odd segues will live in our hearts forever.