Dave Robinson was a king of the airwaves, entertaining radio listeners in Los Angeles and other cities with his mellifluous voice for nearly 40 years.
After his radio broadcasting career, he moved to Sacramento, where he became a senior peer counselor who with that same, resonant voice, helped other retirees overcome loneliness.
Mr. Robinson died in his Sacramento home Aug. 20, after an illness, his family said last week. He was 78.
"He was extremely caring of other people's feelings," daughter Megan Cambridge said. "Everyone found him very interesting."
Mr. Robinson retired from broadcasting in 1986, after a 15-year stint as an announcer for KBIG-FM in Los Angeles. He then became admissions director for a Los Angeles broadcasting school.
He left that job in 1992. Soon afterward, he moved to California's capital to be near his daughter Megan, who had lived here since 1988.
Mr. Robinson, who had amicably separated from his second wife before arriving here, found himself depressed in his "sunset years."
He felt so lonely that he contemplated suicide, Mr. Robinson told The Bee in 2004.
In another interview five years earlier, he said that as a retiree, he felt ignored.
"I hated the way no one seemed to notice people like me as we'd walk down a street," he said. "So I decided to learn something about our condition."
The condition, he explained, was aging.
He enrolled at American River College to study gerontology, the scientific study of old age.
After obtaining his gerontologist's credential in 2000, he went to work part time for Senior Peer Counseling, a nonprofit that is part of the Mental Health Association in the Sacramento area.
As a senior peer counselor, Mr. Robinson met on a regular basis with lonely seniors to put smiles on their faces.
"He was a friendly face who shared stories and made them laugh," Cambridge said. "He acted like family with them.
"My pops said he lost his identity when he no longer was going to his job every day," she said. "He was searching for himself, as a lot of seniors do when they no longer have a job.
"He worked as a senior peer counselor until the day he died," she said.
William David Robinson was born in Baltimore in 1930.
He was first exposed to broadcasting in 1947, as an airborne radio operator for the Air Force.
His broadcasting career took off in the middle of the century with the Armed Forces Radio Services.
"His voice was very deep, eloquent and entertaining," Cambridge said.
As a civilian, he became an on-air personality for several radio stations, the biggest ones being in Baltimore, Kansas City and Los Angeles.
At one point, he also worked for a TV station in Huntington, W.Va.
Her father, Cambridge said, disdained dead air, or silent gaps when he was behind the mike.
"He was trained never to have dead air, so he loved to talk," she said.
Mr. Robinson, a licensed pilot, flew his own Cessna until he was about 60.
Call The Bee's Edgar Sanchez, (916) 321-1088.
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