If there was ever any doubt what Doug Moulds wanted to be when he grew up, it would have been before he learned to read.
“His mother told me he was always sitting around listening to the radio,” said his daughter, Patricia “Peti” Madigan. “She said he had an old 45 record player, and he would play a record, and when it ended he would pick up the newspaper and read a story, then play another record. That was his dream, to be a star on the radio.”
Dan Douglas Moulds Sr., passed away Thursday at his home in Columbus, his adopted hometown. He was 90.
In a radio career that began in 1955 New Orleans as a 20-year-old, Moulds spent the next half-century in the profession as a disc jockey, play-by-play announcer, radio show host, sales representative, manager and station owner. He is best known in Columbus as the radio voice of the Lee High Generals football team during its peak years in the 1960s and 1970s and as the host of The Swap Shop, which aired Mondays through Fridays.
He also became the play-by-play voice of the Mississippi University for Women basketball team when the program began in 1982. He also called games on the radio for Ole Miss, Arkansas-Little Rock, Memphis State and Arkansas State.
He owned two radio stations in Arkansas and one in Mississippi.
Moulds will be inducted to the second class of the Lowndes County Sports Hall of Fame in April and will also be recognized with the Henry G. Matuszak Founders Award. He is the second broadcaster to be inducted, joining legendary baseball announcer and Columbus native Red Barber.
Most young, ambitious broadcasters used youth sports and high school sports as a path to more prestigious assignments.
That was never the case with Moulds, who decided to broadcast a Little League baseball “game of the week” from Propst Park. For years, he called the baseball exploits of 10-year-olds with the same preparation and enthusiasm he devoted to his college broadcast.
“He really connected with young people,” Madigan said. “He coached my brothers’ basketball and baseball team and treated (team members) all like family. Sometimes after a basketball game was over, the team would come to spend the night at his little clubhouse, and he’d get up early the next morning and make them breakfast. He … spent time with me and my friends, too. When he was doing Lee High football broadcasts, the cheerleaders rode with him to and from away games.”
Joe Dillon met Moulds at Propst Park where Dillon was a scorekeeper.
“I would help him set up his radio equipment,” Dillon said. “Later on, he brought me into the WCBI radio station on Saturdays to help with his college scoreboard show. The Associated Press sent live updates via teletype. My job was to rip them off the machine and take them to Doug. Listeners could call in and request a score. We had three tables covered with the teletype scores.”
Moulds was famous for his happy demeanor and sense of humor, even when the joke was on him.
“Just about every week, somebody would call in and ask for the score of a made-up team,” Dillon said. “He was so smart, he caught on most times, but every once in a while he would be fooled. Somebody could call and ask, “How did the Grasscutters do?’ And Doug would look through all the scores until he realized he’d been pranked. He would just say, ‘Hey, you got me this time,’ and laugh about it.”
He was probably as well known for hosting Swap Shop as he was for his sports broadcasts.
“It was an actual show where somebody would call in and say, ‘I want to trade six chickens for a truck tire’ or whatever,” Dillon said. “Doug made the show fun. There would be times where nobody called in, but Doug filled the time talking about what was going on around town, almost like he was having a conversation with a friend.”
Madigan, who often tagged along to the radio station with her dad, followed his footsteps.
“When I was at Ole Miss, I would come home on weekends and work as a DJ,” she said. “He told me he was going to teach me everything I needed to know about the radio business, because no matter what profession I would end up in, radio was always something I could fall back on.”
Madigan is now in her 44th year in the radio field, mostly sales.
“Doug was just one of those happy people,” Dillon said. “He was always in a good mood and optimistic. He was funny and a pleasure to be around. There will never be another Doug Moulds and never be another radio era like the one he worked in.”
Madigan said her father made a habit of helping people.
“He was as generous to a stranger as he was to a friend and quick to take a dollar out of his own pocket when he saw somebody in need,” she said. “Dad was never a stranger to a stranger.”
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
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