Tammy Veil-Drew

My brother and I grew up as poor ranch kids in North Modesto, having moved there in ‘62. We raised and hunted our food, learned to swim in the canals, and avoided the television because our imaginations allowed us to see the outdoors as great entertainment. Time was valuable in between the chores of caring for the animals and property, so we made the best of things by exploring the neighboring ranches and farms. Playing chicken with the Angus cattle next door was always a fun activity. However, being chased by the old gray goose was not. Our after school snacks usually came from the plentiful orchards in the area.

I loved the peace and serenity of the country life which led me to leave Modesto after living most of my life there. Progress soon came to our neighborhood in the form of Vintage Faire Mall, the various businesses, Kaiser Permanente, and the widening of Kiernan Avenue. I watched as the kids I grew up with were displaced by the development. Mom finally left the house on Kiernan right before Kaiser was built and when the road threatened to come into her living room.

I think my first career began in the late sixties when as a young child and became fascinated with audio after seeing my first sound meter. I was sitting at the Ceres Drive-In with my Uncle Carlo, the projectionist, when I spied the meter. I was so enthralled that the needle moved with the spoken word, that I gave up watching the movie to wonder at the marvel of this device. It was then that I was bitten by the audio bug and began to experiment with the radio dial on my parents’ console stereo. Soon after, I begged them to buy me a portable radio, so that I was never without the music. My first one was a great big shoe box looking thing with AM/FM/TV and short wave. I had to carry it around cradled like a baby. Luckily, the school officials didn’t mind me having it as long as I didn’t play it in class. Soon I had many radios, soon discovered 8 track and cassette recorders and put together a makeshift audio studio in my bedroom. My mom feared the speaker wiring running along the floor and walls, the many radios that I had disassembled, therefore she avoided my room. That makeshift studio gave a whole new meaning to being sent to your room for punishment.

At Beyer, I discovered Ron Underwood and his 10 watt radio station, KBHI. At that time, I had no clue that his class would shape the next 17 years of my adult life. I never cared for school and was anxious to get out into the world. I graduated mid semester in ’78 with straight A’s and never looked back. I was hired by KTRB/KHOP Rock 104 FM in March of ’78 as an audio technician (fancy name for computer babysitter) for the new stereo Rock 104 automated Album Oriented Rock station. It was quite boring to sit and change tapes on this thing, so I decided to read the equipment manuals and before I knew it, I was programming the computer. When that wasn’t enough amusement, I went to Modesto Junior College majoring in electronics so that I could repair and maintain the equipment. Luckily, MJC had a radio station also. We still spun vinyl at KRJC. Unfortunately after two semesters, I got bit by the love bug when I met this tall and handsome disc jockey/musician at KTRB, was married, and promptly dropped out of college. What followed was a whirlwind of broadcasting opportunities. I became a disc jockey and worked several stints at KTRB, KCEY, KMIX, KOSO as Tammy Lynn. I also became a broadcast engineer maintaining every radio station in Modesto, Manteca, one in Stockton, some in San Luis Obispo, Seattle, and San Francisco. I engineered the complete move and wired the new studios of KFIV AM/FM from the Orangeburg Road location to the Sisk Road location in the mid eighties. I worked at television stations in Modesto and Houston, Texas and also worked for a company manufacturing television transmitters installed on Mount Diablo, in Reno and Fresno. At one point during those 17 years, I started my own contracting business maintaining ten radio stations in Modesto and the surrounding areas, which also resulted in they end of my marriage from the infamous disc jockey/musician.

Age 30 was a turning point in my life when I woke up and realized that I had lived the vagabond life far too long. There were lots of fun times with musicians and coworkers, but now it was time to grow up and think about my future. I was chief engineer for KFIV and Sunny 102 FM at the time I realized this and started exploring alternative careers that would provide stability and a pension. I stumbled into the Cable TV industry working as an installer and technician for Post Newsweek Cable in Modesto. Having climbed radio towers to change light bulbs did not prepare me for the daily physical activity of climbing telephone poles, carrying a midspan ladder, and crawling under houses. Sure, I was a buff hard body for short time, but soon began to feel age creeping up on me. After a year of this I began to realize that I probably would not be able to do this job into my forties and fifties. The road to promotion to the chief technician job was paved with several long term employees, so I went looking elsewhere. It was then that I discovered law enforcement, starting my second career as a reserve deputy sheriff with the Stanislaus County Sheriff’s Department and re-entering Modesto Junior College intent on a Criminal Justice degree. I went back to part time disc jockey work just to keep my hand in the radio biz. I found the right guy this time, a cop, and we were married in ‘94. My reserve status turned into full-time in ’94 working in Modesto’s jail facilities where I began to experience the darker and seamy side of society. Things the average person would never see, smell, or experience. Luckily, that lasted all of about 3 years when then Sheriff Les Weidman discovered my broadcasting background and made me his Public Information Officer, essentially the Department Spokesperson for the media. Not a glamorous job in the least! Dead people, babies in trash cans, serial killers, and children being victimized wasn’t what I wanted to see for the next twenty years, so when my husband tired of commuting to the foothills, we moved there in 2000. I found work as a Deputy Probation Officer and continued to deal with the criminal element. This time from the rehabilitative side of things. I supervise the violent offenders. Sex offenses, domestic violence, child abuse, elder abuse, etc. Most of the time the job tests my spiritual well-being, but on occasion can be very rewarding when an offender breaks out of the criminal lifestyle. I dearly miss the broadcasting industry and my dream of station ownership, but now I am a property owner, am planted in one place, and have a stable and foreseeable future.

My husband Morgan and I enjoy life on twelve acres in the pine trees up around three thousand feet. He left the sheriff’s department and is now a District Attorney Investigator. We have been together seventeen years now and have no children other than rescue cats and dogs. We enjoy cowboy action shooting, are avid hunters and outdoors people. We rode motorcycles for many years until an oncoming pizza delivery person turned in front of us, totaling my husband’s bike, face, and wrist. Now, we enjoy sight-seeing and hunting on our ATVs and the Cowboy Action Shooting where you dress in 1800’s dress and get to play with old west guns. I never thought I would see myself swaggering around with two six guns on my hips, a repeater rifle and twelve gauge shotgun. We continue to be grateful and thankful for the life that God has provided for us.