Biography of Rush Limbaugh provides insight to Cape Girardeau native

A new book hitting shelves Tuesday promises an intimate look at the private life of Cape Girardeau native and conservative talk radio icon Rush Limbaugh.

While it's not an authorized biography, Limbaugh cooperated with author and frequent New York Times contributor Zev Chafets.

"Rush Limbaugh: An Army of One" is already an Amazon.com best seller.

Limbaugh gave Chafets lengthy interviews at his estate in Palm Beach, Fla., and exchanged more than 100 e-mails with him as he researched the book. Chafets also interviewed those who know Limbaugh best, including his brother, David Limbaugh, a Cape Girardeau lawyer, his fiancee and his psychologist.

Chafets even spent time visiting Cape Girardeau, a place he calls "ground zero" for Limbaugh.

"At the end of the day, if you dig down into Rush you hit Cape Girardeau very fast," Chafets said.

While in town to interview David Limbaugh, several of Rush Limbaugh's former classmates at Cape Girardeau Central High School, and Convention and Visitors Bureau executive director Chuck Martin, Chafets visited the home where Limbaugh grew up, the Varsity Barbershop and the Missouri Wall of Fame Mural among other sites.

"One of my memories is driving up Broadway and listening to Rush on the radio," Chafets said. "Seeing the neighborhood where he grew up, it fit."

Chafets described Limbaugh as Cape Girardeau's messenger to the world.

"The values of Cape Girardeau in the 1950s are the values that Rush has and what his policy ideas are based on," Chafets said. "He's an ambassador for that way of thinking and that kind of life."

Limbaugh talked with Chafets about the influence his parents had on his own values.

"His mom influenced him more in the show business way, having been a singer herself," Chafets said. "She was his first audience."

While Limbaugh told Chafets his father, Rush Limbaugh Jr., is "the smartest man I've ever met," he disapproved of his son's early disc jockeying. His father served as a pilot in World War II and practiced law. He expected his son to be a professional, but went on to embrace his son's success in the political area.

Rush "talked a lot about what it was like working essentially full-time by the time he was 16," Chafets said. "He thought his radio show would make him popular with girls, but he says it didn't work."

In those days Rush went by the name Rusty Sharpe on KGMO and later was known as Jeff Christy. Only much later did he go back to using his real name when he started doing talk radio.

Chafets recalls first hearing Rush Limbaugh's radio show in 1989 when he was in Detroit working on a book on racial politics.

"I couldn't believe what I was hearing," Chafets said. "I thought, 'nobody's going to let somebody who is that outspoken and is that satirical ever stay on the radio.'"

Limbaugh's radio show has been on the air now for more than 20 years.

"He stays fresh because it's spontaneous," Chafets said. "His ideas haven't changed at all from his books published in the early '90s. He's contrived to talk about the same issues to the same people for 20 years without boring his audience."

While enjoying a successful career, Limbaugh's personal life has been plagued with struggles including three failed marriages, hearing loss requiring a cochlear implant and a stint in drug rehab.

Chafets, who interviewed Limbaugh's court-appointed psychologist, said Limbaugh was dramatically changed by his experiences in rehab.

Limbaugh, 59, plans to get married for the fourth time to fiancee Kathryn Rogers, a West Palm Beach, Fla., event planner in her early 30s, in about two weeks, Chafets said.

"He's a hopeless romantic," he added.

Despite his multiple marriages, Limbaugh has no children.

"It's one of the first things I asked him. He said to me at that time that he wasn't so sure he was father material," Chafets said.

However, Chafets said, Limbaugh is devoted to his nieces and nephews.

"He flies into Cape Girardeau every Christmas in a plane full of presents like Santa Claus," Chafets said.

Getting to know Limbaugh was a gradual process over more than two years, said Chafets, who was the first journalist invited inside Limbaugh's Florida home.

This book is Chafets 12th and his first biography. He doesn't have plans for a book signing in Cape Girardeau, but said he would love to come if he is invited.

Some other stories in the book include:

* Limbaugh feared for his life after President Barack Obama laughed at jokes about Limbaugh's death on national television.

* When Limbaugh met Bill Clinton for the first time, Clinton tried to hit on Limbaugh's date.

* Limbaugh likes watching some prominent liberal pundits including Larry David and Christopher Hutchens, but not Bill Maher.

* Limbaugh's father got into a barroom brawl with supporters of Franklin Roosevelt.

* Limbaugh privately supports gay civil unions.

* Limbaugh doesn't have a strong opinion on capital punishment.

mmiller@semissourian.com

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