User:RadioKAOS/Howard Bradshaw

Howard C. "Brad" Bradshaw (November 7, 1908 – December 13, 1994) was an American broadcaster, businessman, fisherman, government official and politician. Bradshaw is best known for being a resident and community leader in Sitka, Alaska from the mid 1930s through the early 1980s, described by local newspaper the Daily Sitka Sentinel as "one of Sitka's most prominent and colorful public figures". Among a variety of roles in the community's business and political life, he is best known for representing Sitka and surrounding areas in the Alaska Senate during the first dozen years that Alaska was a state, and for being a co-owner and on-air personality of Sitka radio station KIFW.

Early life
Howard C. Bradshaw was born in Newark, New Jersey on November 7, 1908. He grew up in Newark and attended school there. After graduation, he enlisted in the United States Navy, serving in China and Panama among other places. In 1936, he visited Sitka, Alaska when his ship stopped there, where he "fell in love with the place". After leaving the service the following year, he married Edith Bassett in Seattle and they moved to Sitka. In his early years in the community, he worked a variety of jobs, fished commercially and was a steward of the local Elks Lodge.

Business career
In November 1948, he bought Silverman's Bar and Liquor Store on Katlian Street in downtown Sitka, which he renamed Brad's Place. In January 1954, he partnered with William W. "Bill" Knight, a native of London who moved to Sitka in 1919 and was an accountant for Sitka's leading cold storage plant, in opening the Sitka Men's Store on Lincoln Street.