The 2024 Steak Soiree, dually sponsored by Arbor Oaks Healthcare & Rehabilitation Center and Encore Healthcare & Rehab in Malvern and held annually to benefit the Baptist Heath Foundation, took place Thursday evening at Family Farm. Keynote speaker Craig O’Neill kept attendees laughing throughout his favorite recollections and career highlights from his 55 unforgettable years in broadcasting, with 31 of those years spent in radio and 24 in television. O’Neill is the on-air name used by Randy Hankins, who was born in October 1950 in Little Rock to Earnest and Judy Merritt Hankins.
He graduated high school in 1968 and received a degree in Radio/TV Journalism from ASU at Jonesboro in 1972. Hankins married his wife of 53 years, talented artist Ruth Jane Fryer, in 1971 and began his journey into broadcasting while still in Jonesboro when he was hired on at the local KBTM radio station. “I was 18 years old, my first job in radio was in this little station in Jonesboro,” he said.
Hankins started his second on-air adventure in 1972 at KARN in Little Rock, where Hankins would adopt the on-air moniker of Craig O’Neill O’Neill would go on to work at KLAZ, KKYK and KURB, entertaining radio listeners for decades before transitioning to television. He was already known across the state for his radio antics and then became a nightly household favorite as part of the THV11 team until his retirement in December 2023. “Almost 55 years in broadcasting.
Can you believe I was a news man?” O’Neill said “I can’t believe it, either!” O’Neill reflected on some of the highest points of his career, including when he had the privilege of interviewing Dolly Parton about her Imagination Library program, and when Darren McFadden rushed for over 300 yards during a 2007 matchup between the Razorbacks and the South Carolina Gamecocks. He also recalled an after-game interview with McFadden and a Fayetteville reporter that inadvertently turned into an on-air debacle when producers realized they had shown a fellow player in the background toweling off fresh from the shower. O’Neill revisited the fun he had performing his now-famous impressions and sharing funny characters over the Arkansas radio waves and crowd laughing throughout his lively speech but ended with an important tidbit of history that tied directly back to Malvern, sharing that an assignment he was sent on when he first started at KLAZ in 1978 gave him renewed confidence and appreciation for the career path he’d chosen.
“Quite frankly, I was terrible, awful, on the verge of getting fired, but I got a job at KLAZ. And those first few months [were] hit or miss, kind of like my speech tonight,” he quipped. “I enjoyed it, but I wasn’t building up any confidence at all.
” O’Neill said an Arkansas high school called the station around this time and asked him to come do a dance in their campus parking lot after a football game. “And that night in September was so good, so hot, so energetic, so fun, so full of joy, and after it was over, I had so many compliments and so many encouraging words, that from that point on, when I drove home I went, ‘You made the right decision, you stick with it, and you go be with people and you enjoy their presence, and that’s how you make it in this broadcasting. Don’t worry about the ratings, just love the people,” O’Neill said.
“That high school was Malvern High School.” Attendees at Thursday’s event enjoyed a phenomenal steak dinner from world-champion grillmaster David Nelson and his culinary team and the opportunity to claim one or more prizes, including a beautiful Kendra Scott jewelry set, an ‘Ultimate Fishing Adventure’ gift set and a gift card package for a dining tour of several of the best restaurants in Little Rock. O’Neill graciously and hilariously offered dental floss to anyone in the room who may need it after the meal and donned a Razorback hat and church robe to introduce a most enthusiast Hog-loving character, the Razorback evangelist, who led the eager audience in Calling the Hogs with a rousing chant of “Wooo Pig Sooie”.
Other Baptist associates and healthcare professionals who took turns at the podium at Thursday’s event include Shannon Fleming, VP of Business Development. Southern Administrative Services; Doug Weeks, Exec. VP and Chief of Strategy & Innovation; Lena Hayes, Chief Development Officer for the Foundation; and Jay Quebedeaux, President of Baptist Health Medical Center - Hot Spring County.
This “enjoyable event with purpose” raised funds that will be used “to enhance services and the compassionate care we provide to patients at Baptist Health Medical Center-Hot Spring County.” For more information about Baptist Health, visit www.baptist-health.
com ..
