U.S. Maritime Service. Stationed in Port Arthur, Texas, Walt Bodine still managed to stay busy in radio during off duty hours by working part-time at KPAC. Returning home to Kansas City after the war, he resumed his career at KCKN before receiving an offer for another station in town, WDAF. Walt Bodine spent nearly twenty years at WDAF, working on both the radio and television station (WDAF-TV), as a news anchor, host, and eventually news director. He left WDAF in 1965, moving to WHB radio, hosting the popular "Night Beat" call-in and interview program from 1965 to 1974, and also becoming news director at television station KCIT from 1969 until 1971. In the 1970s Bodine moved into the advertising business for a short time, working in sales for the Fremerman-Papin agency. He soon returned to his first love, broadcasting. On KBMA television, he was host of "Bodine's Beat" and "41 Thirty" from the mid-1970s until the mid-1980s. The first incarnation of the long-running Walt Bodine Show began on KMBZ radio in 1978 and remained there through 1982. Bodine began working for KMBC-TV in 1982 and remained there as a commentator through 2001. Kansas City's National Public Radio station, KCUR, became Walt's final radio home in 1983 as he broadcast there until his retirement on April 27, 2012. Walt Bodine was an eyewitness to and voice of information through many notable events in Kansas City history. Among them the 1951 Kansas City flood, the 1957 Ruskin Heights tornado, the race riot of 1968, and the 1981 Hyatt Regency skywalk collapse. Many Kansas Citians remember how on the night of the Hyatt Skywalk disaster Bodine stayed on the air all night providing news updates and taking calls from grief-stricken citizens. Given several chances to move on to larger broadcasting markets like St. Louis, Missouri and Los Angeles, California he always eschewed them in favor of remaining in his hometown. In addition to broadcasting, Walt Bodine wrote frequent newspaper columns or Op-Ed piece for The Squire newspaper through the years on a multitude of subjects. He also authored or co-wrote several books including Right Here in River City: A portrait of Kansas City with Tracy Thomas in 1976(), What Do You Say To That?, published in 1989, and 2003's My Times, My Town.(). In My Times, My Town Bodine commented on the philosophy behind the stories he has covered during his career: For