by Jim Boyle
Editor
Dave Ryan, host of the Dave Ryan in the Morning Show, spoke to Spectrum High School’s Class of 2024 at the graduation ceremony on May 23.
His job on the radio is to get people’s attention and to hold it. He sized up his job as the keynote speaker was to dispense some words of wisdom — to a group whose sole thought was “How long is this going to take.”
“‘We got plans, Dave,’” he said, imagining the mindset of the soon-to-be graduates sitting before him. “‘We’re going to Raising Cane’s. We’re going to Starbucks. We’ve got things to do. Let’s move this along.’”
He told them not to worry. When writing the speech he asked Chat GPT to keep it short! He promised that — like most moments in life — it would go by quickly.
“These moments are here and then they’re gone,” he said. “And so I want you to do something a little bit weird, graduates. Take a mental snapshot of this moment. Think about this moment, because you’ll remember only a little bit of tonight.
“Look around at some of your friends. Take a mental snapshot, because it’s here and it’s gone.”
Ryan went on to share a series of stories, all with one common denominator. At no point did he ever think to himself what could go wrong. One led to disaster. One fueled decades of success. And the last one landed him in the hospital.
“I just did it,” he said to the 102 students, who will spread to the four winds, and their families who crammed into the gym. “And that’s what I want to impart to you. Sometimes there is a risk, but you gotta do it anyway. Even if you’re not guaranteed success, you have to try.”
Ryan’s first story happened when he was about 12 years old. He tied a parachute to the back of his bicycle and rode it down a hill at full speed — before bike helmets were a thing.
“It didn’t go exactly as I wanted it to,” Ryan said. “Somehow this parachute got tangled up in the rear tire and it went down. I didn’t land on my head, thankfully, but I landed on my side. I’ve still got scars on my side and here from sliding just like this down the road.”
He asked students to hang onto that story for a bit.
His second story was about the time when he was about 21 years of age, and he was working at a radio station in Colorado Springs when he got a job offer in Las Vegas — one of the world’s most exciting cities to do the morning show.
“The morning shows (are the) plum show everybody wants,” Ryan told the crowd. “It pays more and more people listen.”
So he went to Las Vegas without any morning show experience.
“I really didn’t know what I was doing, but I didn’t care,” he said. “I went, I did it. And by some miracle, it worked out that I’ve been doing a morning show ever since then.”
He’s now considered a radio legend and Minnesota sweetheart, according to a bio on the KDWB website. He can be heard weekday mornings on 101.3 KDWB in the Twin Cities. This year he is celebrating 29 years as host of the Dave Ryan in the Morning Show!
Ryan was suggested to be the keynote speaker by Emilia Guse, a 2024 graduate who knows him as a family friend. Dan DeBruyn, the executive director at Spectrum High School, noted in his introduction of Ryan that his show is known as one of the most original and inventive shows in the radio industry.
“He’s interviewed presidents, astronauts and countless entertainers; they enjoy getting on the show,” DeBruyn said. “He enjoys giving back to the community with Dave Ryan’s Christmas Wish (that helps) families in need.”
DeBruyn also noted he is a member of Mensa and a two-time winner of the radio’s biggest award in the Marconi Award, and he was also honored with the Kidd Kraddick Award for Excellence and Innovation.
He’s written two bestselling books, “Take a Shower, Show Up On Time, and Don’t Steal Anything,” and the children’s book, “Little Dave’s Amazing Day.”
Dave enjoys motorcycling, flying airplanes, magic, playing a ukulele, and spending time with his family, DeBruyn said.
Ryan’s third story was about a morning show segment in which he decided he was going to see how much weight he could gain in 24 hours. His friend had the idea of eating peanut butter.
After eating a jar of peanut butter the size of a human head and chasing it down with a bottle of Coca-Cola, Ryan found himself not feeling too well later in the day. Eventually, he was in the hospital to rectify the situation. He realized that had not been a good idea.
But what if he had never taken a risk, like accepting the job in Las Vegas even though he never had done a morning show?
Ryan pulled a quote from Henry David Thoreau, who once said in a graduation speech, to “go confidently in the direction of your dreams.”
Ryan asked the Class of 2024 to do just that and to never give up and know that no hill goes up forever before relating one final story about going to New Mexico as a Boy Scout leader. He and a troop hiked 100 miles in 10 days and 10 nights. He said when you hike 10 or so miles each day for more than a week, you have a lot of time to think.
“I noticed that sometimes there’s a hill, it just seems to go on and on and on forever, and you get to what you think is the top and, no, that’s not the top. There’s more, or you get to the top, and it goes around the corner and there’s more.
“But what I learned during those 10 days is that no hill goes up forever. There’s always gonna be a plateau or the other side of the hill where you get to coast down. And sometimes that trail can be rocky, and you gotta watch your step, ... and other times ... there’s birds singing, and there’s a river over here, mountains all around you and it’s beautiful. When you come to those hills (in life), remember this: No hill goes up forever.”
Ryan concluded telling the students as long as his speech may have seemed, it was “here and gone.”
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