Legendary broadcaster Art Bell died. If you're not a huge fan of talk radio, we don't expect you to know the name, but he's kind of a big deal.
Art Bell is one of the original conspiracy theorist talk radio shows. Way before Alex Jones was on the air, Art Bell was the original host of a show called Coast to Coast AM, a late night talk radio show that tried to answer the mysteries of the universe.
Art Bell semi-retired in 2003, but he still dabbled with talk radio, occasionally filling in as host for his hold show, or pursuing other radio projects.
Art Bell had a lot of interesting radio segments over the years, but perhaps his most famous came in 1997.
On September 11, 1997, Bell took a call from a "frantic man", as he's often described on the Internet. The "Frantic man" claimed to be an ex-Area 51 employee. As the call wore on, the "Frantic Man" kept becoming more and more upset.
Suddenly the the show temporarily went off the air because of a satellite failure. This caused Art Bell's audience to lose their minds - after all, why would the satellite go out if this wasn't a real person with real information about Area 51?
The same gentleman allegedly called back again on April 28, 1998, admitting that the original call was fraudulent, however the second caller's voice, tone and mannerisms have called into question whether this was the same person. Many believe this was a cover up from the government as the original call was cut off.
Audio from the phone call has been used in many music recordings, the most famous bing progressive metal band Tool who used audio from the phone call in their song "Faaip de Oiad".
Again, I'm not one for conspiracy theories. I have no idea if anything Art Bell ever covered on his show was real or a hoax and I'm not trying to disprove or prove any of these theories on this blog. My only intent in posting this famous phone call is to pay tribute to a broadcast legend - a man who helped make talk radio into a fascinating and engaging medium.
Rest in peace, Art Bell.