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The John Bonsignor Interview (Part 2 — Special Edition)

A Rebroadcast of Big Talk with Paul Gable and Guest: Former Congressman John Jenrette

In Part 2 of our John Bonsignor interview series, we present a special edition — a rebroadcast of Big Talk, featuring a memorable conversation with former South Carolina Congressman John Jenrette.

This episode offers a rare window into the style and substance that made Big Talk a cornerstone of political dialogue along the Grand Strand. Hosted by John Bonsignor, the program brought together candid discussion, sharp questioning, and a willingness to engage complex and often controversial topics head-on.

Joining Bonsignor is cohost Paul Gable, a respected Myrtle Beach journalist whose thoughtful, measured approach helped elevate the conversation. Gable’s ability to ask incisive questions while maintaining a sense of balance and professionalism is on full display here — a reminder of the important role strong journalism plays in local media.

Together, Bonsignor and Gable guide a revealing discussion with Congressman Jenrette, touching on politics, public service, and the realities of life in elected office.

This special rebroadcast is more than a look back at a single episode — it’s a snapshot of an era when local television provided a vital forum for political discourse, driven by voices deeply connected to their community.

Part 2 continues our journey into the life and legacy of John Bonsignor — by revisiting the work that made him a defining figure in Grand Strand broadcasting.

Theme song is  Produced by Danya Vodovoz, link to my song   https://youtu.be/NRxduUMZcdw 

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The John Bonsignor Interview (Part 1)

Big Talk, Politics, and The Grand Strand Opera Workshop

In this first installment of our eight-part interview series, we sit down with a true pioneer of local media and civic life in the Grand Strand — John Bonsignor, longtime host of Big Talk and Talking Politics, and a voice that helped shape political conversation in Myrtle Beach for decades.

At 94 years old, Bonsignor reflects on a remarkable life spent at the intersection of broadcasting, public service, and community leadership. Often described as the “grandfather” of local political talk television in the Grand Strand, he created a platform where ideas, candidates, and debates could reach everyday citizens long before the rise of modern digital media.

In Part 1, we begin at the heart of his legacy:

• The origins and evolution of Big Talk and Talking Politics
• What it meant to host political television at the local level
• The role of media in shaping informed communities
• His involvement in the Grand Strand Opera Workshop and its cultural impact

This episode sets the stage for a deeper exploration of Bonsignor’s life — from politics to the arts, from local activism to national campaigns — and the enduring influence he’s had on the civic fabric of the Myrtle Beach area.

A broadcaster. A community builder. A witness to history.

This is where the story begins.

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In our final episode in this special series we will listen in as Mayor Hirsch talks about his wife of many years, Ethel Hirsch. Her many contributions to his successful life, and career, and the raising of 10 children.  The real keys to happy life are right here to be learned in this special story. 

We will also listen , in its entirety, to the speech that inspired this special series in the first place. When Mayor Bob Hirsch addressed the ceremony at the Grand opening of the Myrtle Beach World War 2 Memorial. It was an extraordinary  address that captured all the high points, emotions, and the sense of adventure that came from the generation that fought this horrific War. 

We then switch gears to hear some advice for the future leaders  who are now taking their seats at the table of government and for the next generation of young people who are just starting out in life too. 

It is an episode of sound advice from our local example of all the great lessons of leadership we should be learning from the example set by the Greatest Generation. 

It has been an honor to produce these seven episodes. 

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In this episode, in our special series, looking at the career of former Mayor Robert Hirsch, we look back at his arrival in Myrtle Beach and his single term as Mayor. It was a term of extraordinary accomplishment, much of which may not be as well known by the public in general today.  Myrtle Beach today is the fastest growing region in America, a far cry from where it was in the early 1970s.

When Mayor Hirsch was elected in 1973 , the City of Myrtle Beach was operated under an entirely different form of government than it is today.  In that time the Mayor ran the city and each council member ran a separate department of the city government.  That system was the first thing Mayor Hirsch worked to change, leading a movement that changed the form of government to the type of city government structure we have today, a Council-Manager form of Government. Where a professional Manager runs the day to day operations of the city and the Mayor and Council are a policy setting body.  When that referendum was held in the early 1970's the citizens of Myrtle Beach voted for it overwhelmingly. 

Mayor Hirsch also led the way to adopting the zoning and building code document that has served as the foundation for the way the city operates to this day. He worked with Senator Strom Thurmond and Congressman John Jenrette to get joint runway use for commercial flights to begin coming to the City of Myrtle Beach, opening up an entirely new way to bring tourists into our community.  It is hard to imagine the city of Myrtle Beach even functioning without those three major initiatives, that Mayor Bob Hirsch spearheaded, not being in place. They are so integral to how the city functions that they are often today taken for granted as a given. 

When Mayor Hirsch left office he was immediately recruited by the new Republican Governor in the State, James Edwards, to head up the Energy Department for South Carolina and later to join his staff. His work in that realm actually contributed greatly  to Jim Edwards being selected to go to Washington D.C. to lead the Energy Department under President Ronald Reagan. For a brief time there were even calls for Bob Hirsch to run for Governor of South Carolina.  However, Bob Hirsch decided to come home to Myrtle Beach where he would serve another term as a city councilmember here a decade after leaving Columbia.

Bob Hirsch would also through out the next half century serve as the Chairman, and as a  Board Member of the South Carolina Hall of Fame, and under his leadership it became one of the highest honors available for any citizen to achieve in our state, to be inducted into the South Carolina Hall of Fame. 

In this episode we will listen in as Mayor Hirsch recalls the moments in those years that made all of that possible. 

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In this special Edition within our special series I thought it was important to introduce you to three of the names you have heard or will hear in our series.  As a person in my 50s who has worked in or around politics my entire life these names are familiar to me.  That may not be the case for so many of our listeners who are either younger or not from South Carolina. 

Strom Thurmond, the former Senator from South Carolina, was as dominate a political figure in my home state for decades as any name you will ever know. He literally served in political office for 72 years and up to the age of 100.  Governor Jim Edwards, the first Republican Governor in South Carolina since Reconstruction, was also a well known figure for many years. Both men have also been out of public office for more than 20 years or longer. I thought it would be important to introduce you to both men so that our younger listeners can grasp how important they were in their time. 

I also have learned  in the three years and 12 seasons we have been producing these documentary podcasts that you end up with great materials that don't actually fit into your narrative. In the case of General George Patton we had that issue. Mayor Hirsch met Patton while he was fighting in the war but he headed home before the General died in a car accident near Christmas of 1945.  

We found an extraordinary documentary short on Patton's life from the time of his death and it was narrated by Ronald Reagan. We wanted to share that short audio with our audience but could not find a place where it would fit. So we thought we would share it here. The same for another interesting story told by Mayor Hirsch that involved the star of our current long series , President George H. W. Bush. We thought that would be a great story to share here in this episode as well. 

We hope you will enjoy this episode of what we like to call our "DVD Extras" 

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As the War came to its end it brought about the confirmation that up to that point had been known but not confirmed. That the horrific genocide of a people had gone on throughout Europe. The Deathcamps that were discovered , one by one , by the Allied troops as they moved closer to Germany, from all directions, had practiced such organized, horrific, cruelty, that even these most hardened of war veterans could barely talk about it over 80 years later. Which we will hear when we ask about it. The short answer given by Mr. Hirsch is as powerful a moment as we will hear in these interviews. 

We will also hear the radio broadcasts marking the deaths of Franklin Roosevelt,  Adolf Hitler, and finally the surrender of Germany itself.  We will then hear the stories of how pilot Bob Hirsch flew the displaced persons to the new places that they were to go to be housed in, having lost everything, from their homes, and businesses, to their entire families. 

Then, just as Bob Hirsch is sent to Paris, France, to pick up his plane to be flown around the World to the Pacific Theater. His orders are suddenly changed, and he and his fellow troops are left to wonder,  why? 

Then we will focus in on the Potsdam Conference, the bluff to the Japanese Government, and the decision to drop an atomic bomb on Japan, that will finally bring this horrifically, bloody war, to its end. 

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Operation Market Garden was an enormous effort led by General Montgomery that included 41,268 troops from Allied countries. It was designed to capture several bridges so that the Army could cross over into Germany and , with any luck, end the war by Christmas of 1944.  The overall effort failed because the German forces fought hard to defend the bridges and they had help from the weather. 

This operation  was where Bob Hirsch was extremely active throughout and his stories will hold you spellbound as you hear about his return with a plane with 85 bullet holes, or death of a  jumpmaster killed by bullets that hit him as soon as the jump door opened, or the need to slowdown to allow two paratroopers with parachute problems to jump, to late for their targets, but still over enemy territory.  

This is a fascinating look at Operation Market Garden that was the inspiration for the movie " A Bridge to Far". Then we will follow our troops as they head into the Battle of the Bulge and on to the final days of the War.  

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Operation Overlord, known to the world as D-Day, was the beginning of the end for the Nazi Regime of Adolf Hitler.  It was the start of the Allied march across the European Continent.  Bob Hirsch had not yet arrived in England in time to take part in the invasion.  However, a decade ago he sat down with Rod Gragg of Coastal Carolina University and participated in several interviews about his experiences as a pilot that carried paratroopers over enemy lines.  Those interviews were a part of two videos we are using in this series :  "Military Memoirs" and "A Salute to American Veterans : Death Drop and the 82nd Airborne in the D-Day Battle of Normandy"

The latter video, "Death Drop" ,  is an extraordinary look at the air campaign that was such a major part of the success of D-Day. In this episode we have attempted to take our former Mayor's extraordinary insights of the air and paratrooper campaign and combine it with a fascinating look at D-Day Veterans and their account of those events from  a documentary titled "D-Day, Omaha Beach, June 6, 1944 Volume One" by Voices of History and documentarian Larry Cappetto.
{ Documentary Filmmaker Larry Cappetto
Voices of History YouTube Channel
Voices of History Radio Station, (KVOH)}

These veterans were on the ground or in the boats who came ashore on the beach's of France.  We also found several radio broadcasts recorded live in the middle of the night on June 6, as the folks on the Homefront were trying to find out for sure if the invasion had actually begun. 

I hope to give you a feel for how everyone felt, and what they dealt with as this historic day unfolded, be it from the air, ground, or back home, worrying about the boys so far from home. 

This episode also sets the stage for the situations to come for our former Mayor, Bob Hirsch, as he arrived on the seen to take part in the final crusade to liberate the enslaved people of Europe. 

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This is a quick announcement about the recent book release titled "The Blonde Bombshell: The Life of Robert J. Hirsch" available now on Amazon. We can highly recommend this book and we hope you will join us over the next few episodes as we look back at our documentary on the former Mayor of Myrtle Beach. 

Robert Hirsch is an amazing man, still going strong at 102 years of age. 

Here is the link to the book on Amazon

https://www.amazon.com/Blonde-Bombshell-greatest-Greatest-Generation/dp/B0FKH632G2/ref=sr_1_1?crid=ARX62VL0VY4N&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.g0EsF4gT93gSE_1WWgudkY02rtftj14mFstu-QLNJTBZ_QFIdgda82-WU2kCeZ_K_nOC2CATrSgMqV60yZ0P0ZiVn6s0R0tHP5klRWKVt7c.zg_tYEa95Cz-AveeGZrBv1hD32wpfDyJoV226A9UMJU&dib_tag=se&keywords=The+Blonde+Bombshell+Robert+Hirsch&qid=1769700373&sprefix=the+blonde+bombshell+robert+hirsch%2Caps%2C226&sr=8-1

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February 2026 on the Wallace Podcast Network — One Month. Three Podcasts. A Shared Journey Through History.

This February, all three shows across the Wallace Podcast Network come together for a powerful month of storytelling that connects world history with hometown legacy.

On Grand Strand Politics, we revisit our acclaimed January 2024 special series, “Robert Hirsch: Our Mayor.” This special rebroadcast honors Mayor Robert Hirsch — a World War II pilot who flew soldiers over enemy lines before returning home to help guide Myrtle Beach through a defining era of growth and change. It’s a story of courage in war and leadership in peace, right here on the Grand Strand.

And there’s even more exciting news tied to this story — a brand-new book about Mayor Hirsch’s remarkable life, The Blonde Bombshell by Colonel Daniel Hunter Wilson, is available now on Amazon. The book dives deeper into the wartime heroism and civic leadership that made Hirsch such an unforgettable figure in local history.

Meanwhile, Randal Wallace Presents: “Bob Dole – The Life That Brought Him There” and The Richard Nixon Experience will simulcast episodes exploring two of the most consequential political relationships of the 20th century:
the partnership between Dwight Eisenhower and Richard Nixon… and later, the bond between Nixon and Bob Dole.

Across these episodes, listeners will travel from the battlefields of World War II to the shifting political landscape of the late 1960s and early 1970s — discovering how shared wartime experiences shaped a generation of American leadership, both on the national stage and in communities like Myrtle Beach.

It’s a month of intertwined stories — of service, sacrifice, ambition, and legacy — told across three distinct shows with one shared historical thread.

We invite you to tune in all February long to all three podcasts across the Wallace Podcast Network for a unique, connected listening experience that brings history to life from the global stage to the local shoreline.