From Horsing Around to Radio News

From horsing around to WJON News Director... the story of Jim Maurice.

WJON News Director Jim Maurice grew up in Maynard, Minnesota, a small town in west Central Minnesota south of Willmar and north of Granite Falls.  His family lived in the town of approximately 500 people.  Jim's dad worked at the Grain Elevator in Maynard and his mom was a lunch lady at the school.  Jim had an older brother and older sister and a much younger brother, who's 9 years younger than Jim.  He is the 3rd of 4 in his family.

Jim's family lived on the edge of town and they have a stable with many horses.  He recalls really enjoying horse back riding.  Jim says he rode horses all summer, every summer while he was a kid in Maynard starting when he was in 6th grade.  His first horse was named Sue while his 2nd horse was named Star.  Jim says everyone in town knew his horses' names.  He says after graduation his horse was sold off because it wasn't receiving the attention it deserved.

At an early age Jim was involved in athletics in Maynard.  He played football, basketball and ran track.  Jim recalls when he became a sophomore Maynard paired athletics with Clara City and Raymond to eventually become MACCRAY and that lessoned his involvement.  Jim was the editor of his high school yearbook both his junior and senior year.  He did a lot of farm work for area farmers as a young person, like picking rocks and bailing hay before landing a job as a bag/stock boy at the grocery store in town.

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Jim at an early age wanted to explore the idea of going into radio.  Charlie Boone from WCCO Radio married a woman from Maynard.  He wrote a book and signed copies of it at the Maynard Library.  Jim went to the signing and decided that was the career path he wanted.  He started into the industry while in high school doing some part time board producing at a radio station in Montevideo.  After graduation Jim went to Brown College in Minneapolis to pursue a degree in radio broadcasting.  It was an 18-month course.

After getting his degree from Brown he moved back to Maynard and was hired part-time at the radio station in Montevideo.  After 3 months working part-time he took over working evenings at the radio station there.  The format involved classic country and lot of sports.  He stayed at the radio station for 7 years and eventually became the sports director.  Jim was offered the sports director job at a radio station in Redwood Falls and he took it.  He says it was quite a bit more money.  He was in Redwood Falls for 10 years and after a few years, he changed jobs there to become Program Director.  Jim was still doing lots of sports play-by-play despite the change.  He says the radio station did both Redwood Valley games and games from surrounding communities.  There were 2 stations in the market.

After 10 years at Redwood Falls Jim applied and was hired as a news reporter at WJON in St. Cloud.  He eventually became the News Director.  Jim liked the opportunity to simplify his life both working less in the evening and moving to a larger market.  Jim has been at WJON for 12 years and has covered many important stories in the community from how the area dealt with the pandemic, the mall stabbing, and the stand off at the Wells Fargo.  He has also participated in numerous community causes including some time on the Tanner's Team Foundation board and participating and winning the Dances With Our Stars event in 2024 for the Women's Fund.

If you'd like to listen to my 4-part conversation with Jim Maurice, it is available below.