Pervis Spann was an American broadcaster, music promoter, and radio personality.
12 Facts About Pervis Spann
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Pervis Spann was a disc jockey on WVON and was influential in the development of blues music in Chicago, Illinois.
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Shortly after moving to Michigan, Pervis Spann left to work in Gary, Indiana, and spent a time in the forces in the Korean War.
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Pervis Spann subsequently returned to Chicago, Illinois, where he worked in a steel mill, drove a taxi, and repaired television sets.
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Bill, Pervis Spann attended the Midwestern Broadcasting School, before starting work on WOPA radio in 1959.
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Three years later, when Leonard and Phil Chess launched WVON, Pervis Spann was given a regular late-night blues slot, and won attention with an 87-hour "sleepless sit-in" on the station to raise money for Martin Luther King Jr.
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In 1962, at a show at the Regal Theater in Chicago, Pervis Spann became the first person to refer to Aretha Franklin as "the Queen of Soul".
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Pervis Spann continued to promote blues festivals, and ran station WXSS in Memphis, Tennessee, during the 1980s.
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Pervis Spann ran for mayor of Chicago as a Republican in 1991, but lost in the primary to George Gottlieb.
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Pervis Spann was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2012.
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Pervis Spann was married to Lovie for 67 years until his death.
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Pervis Spann died from Alzheimer's disease at his home in the South Side of Chicago, on March 14,2022, at the age of 89.