Moda Fincher

Moda "Misty" Fincher (October 12, 1924 – December 27, 2006) was Texas radio's and American radio's first full-time female staff announcer. Her radio career spanned 51 years.

Biography She was born Moda Fincher in Bronte, Texas to William Allen and Moda (Miller) Fincher on October 12, 1924, but she was known on the air simply as "Misty." She graduated from Lubbock High School in Lubbock, Texas in 1941, and moved to Fort Worth, Texas. She started her career as a vocalist and self-taught drummer for the all-girl Billye Gale Band, and was with them for years.

Misty always wanted to be a radio deejay. As a youth, she would fashion an imaginary microphone with a tomato soup can and a sawed-off broom pole. She went to work at KXOL-AM in Fort Worth, where she filed albums and pulled wire reports for sports broadcasts. She let it be known that she'd like to be a deejay, which, she recalled, "was a real thigh-slapper to management." On March 5, 1955, she was abruptly handed the midnight-to-6 am shift - seven nights a week, no days off, for $40 a week. She could not use her name. Instead, she was known as "The Frontier Gal" and had to agree to wear a Lone Ranger-like mask when out in public. She was 29 years old. Few expected her to succeed in what was then a male-dominated field. "This little old lady..." (still wearing her trademark dark glasses) "...would shuffle in before 9pm, a tight double armed grasp on her albums held against her breast", proclaimed October 10 "Misty Day" in Lubbock.

On October 28, 2006, Misty was inducted into the Texas Radio Hall of Fame, placing her alongside radio personalities such as George Carlin (a fellow alumnus of KXOL), Sam Donaldson and Clint Formby.