Rush Limbaugh

Rush Limbaugh
Rush Limbaugh in 2019
Born	Rush Hudson Limbaugh III January 12 1951(1951-01-12) Cape Girardeau, Missouri, U.S.
Died	February 17 2021 (aged 70) Palm Beach, Florida, U.S.
Resting place	Bellefontaine Cemetery, St. Louis, Missouri
Occupation	Radio host, political pundit
Years active	1967–2021
Spouse(s)	Roxy Maxine McNeely ​(m. 1977; div. 1980) Michelle Sixta (m. 1983; div. 1990) Marta Fitzgerald (m. 1994; div. 2004) Kathryn Rogers (m. 2010)​
Relatives	Limbaugh family
Website rushlimbaugh.com

Rush Hudson Limbaugh III (January 12, 1951 – February 17, 2021) was an American conservative political commentator who was the host of The Rush Limbaugh Show, which first aired in 1984 and was nationally syndicated on AM and FM radio stations from 1988 until his death in 2021. His radio show had one of the largest audiences in the United States, and he was among the most highly paid figures in American radio history.

Limbaugh became one of the most prominent conservative voices in the United States during the 1990s, hosting a national television show from 1992 to 1996. He garnered significant controversy for his statements on social and other contemporary issues.

In 1993, he was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame and in 1998 the National Association of Broadcasters Hall of Fame. He also received the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Biography

Early life

Limbaugh was born on January 12, 1951, in Cape Girardeau, Missouri, to parents Rush Hudson Limbaugh II and Mildred Carolyn (née Armstrong) Limbaugh. He and his younger brother David were born into the prominent political Limbaugh family; his father was a lawyer and a United States fighter pilot who served in the China Burma India Theater of World War II. His mother was from Searcy, Arkansas. The name "Rush" was originally chosen for his grandfather to honor the maiden name of a family member, Edna Rush.^[1] Limbaugh was raised and considered himself a Methodist.

Limbaugh was partly of German ancestry. The family includes many lawyers, including his grandfather, father, and brother; his uncle, Stephen N. Limbaugh Sr., was a federal judge in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri. Limbaugh's grandfather, Rush Limbaugh Sr., was a Missouri prosecutor, judge, special commissioner, member of the Missouri House of Representatives in the 1930s, and longtime president of the Missouri Historical Society.

In 1969, Limbaugh graduated from Cape Girardeau Central High School, where he played football and was a Boys State delegate.^[2] At age 16, he worked his first radio job at KGMO, a local radio station. He used the airname Rusty Sharpe having found "Sharpe" in a telephone book.^[1] Limbaugh later cited Chicago DJ Larry Lujack as a major influence on him, saying Lujack was "the only person I ever copied."^[3]

In deference to his parents' desire that he attend college, he enrolled at Southeast Missouri State University but dropped out after two semesters. According to his mother, "he flunked everything [...] he just didn't seem interested in anything except radio."^[1]

Marriages

Limbaugh was married four times and divorced three times. He did not have any children. He was first married at the age of 26 to Roxy Maxine McNeely, a sales secretary at radio station WHB in Kansas City, Missouri. The couple married at the Centenary United Methodist Church in Limbaugh's hometown of Cape Girardeau on September 24, 1977.^[4] McNeely filed for divorce in March 1980, citing "incompatibility." They were formally divorced on July 10, 1980.^[1]

In 1983, Limbaugh married Michelle Sixta, a college student and usherette at the Kansas City Royals Stadium Club. They divorced in 1990, and she remarried the following year.^[1]

On May 27, 1994, Limbaugh married Marta Fitzgerald, a 35-year-old aerobics instructor whom he met on the online service CompuServe in 1990. They married at the house of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, who officiated. The couple separated on June 11, 2004; the divorce was finalized in December 2004. Limbaugh became romantically involved with then-CNN news anchor Daryn Kagan; the relationship ended in February 2006.

Limbaugh dated Kathryn Rogers, a party planner from Florida, for three years; the couple married on June 5, 2010. At the wedding reception following the ceremony, Elton John entertained the wedding guests.^[5]

Health problems and death

Limbaugh lived in Palm Beach from 1996 until his death in 2021.

In 2001, Limbaugh announced that he had lost most of his ability to hear: "I cannot hear television. I cannot hear music. I am, for all practical purposes, deaf – and it's happened in three months." He said he would continue his show: "All I've lost is my ability to hear," he said, "but it doesn't mean I've lost my ability to communicate."^[6] On December 19, 2001, doctors were able to successfully restore a measure of his hearing through cochlear implant surgery on his left ear.

On April 8, 2014, on his radio program, Limbaugh announced his decision to 'go bilateral,' meaning to get an implant on the right side. After bilateral tuning, there was a 100% improvement: "Coming from total deafness, it is miraculous! How can you not believe in God?", Limbaugh said in his national daily broadcast.^[7]

Limbaugh, a cigar and former cigarette smoker, was diagnosed with advanced lung cancer on January 20, 2020, after first experiencing shortness of breath on January 12. He had previously downplayed the link between smoking and cancer deaths, arguing that it "takes 50 years to kill people, if it does."^[8] He announced his diagnosis during his radio show on February 3. He advised he would miss airtime to undergo treatment, and that he would try to continue the program "as normally and competently" as he could.^[9] On October 20, 2020, Limbaugh announced that treatment had been ineffectual at containing the cancer, that his diagnosis was terminal, and that he had been given a time frame on when he should expect to die. In his final broadcast of 2020, he said "I wasn't expected to make it to October, and then to November, and then to December. And yet, here I am, and today, got some problems, but I'm feeling pretty good today."^[10]

Limbaugh made his last radio broadcast on February 2, 2021. He died on February 17, at the age of 70. According to his wife, Kathryn Rogers Limbaugh, his death was attributed to complications of his lung cancer.^[10] Limbaugh was interred at the Bellefontaine Cemetery in St. Louis, Missouri.

Career

1971–1988

In February 1971, after dropping out of college, the 20-year-old Limbaugh accepted an offer to DJ at WIXZ, a Top 40 station in McKeesport, Pennsylvania. He adopted the airname "Bachelor Jeff" Christie and worked afternoons before moving to morning drive.^[4] The station's general manager compared Limbaugh's style at this time to "early Imus."^[1] In 1973, after eighteen months at WIXZ, Limbaugh was fired from the station due to "personality conflict" with the program director. He then started a nighttime position at KQV in Pittsburgh, succeeding Jim Quinn.^[4] During his time in Pittsburgh, he became a lifelong fan of the Steelers NFL team. In late 1974, Limbaugh was dismissed after new management put pressure on the program director to fire him. Limbaugh recalled the general manager telling him that he would never land success as an air personality and suggested a career in radio sales.^[1] After rejecting his only offer at the time, a position in Neenah, Wisconsin, Limbaugh returned to living with his parents in Cape Girardeau.^[4]

In 1975, Limbaugh began an afternoon show at the Top 40 station KUDL in Kansas City, Missouri. He soon became the host of a public affairs talk program that aired on weekend mornings which allowed him to develop his style and present more controversial ideas. In 1977, he was let go from the station but remained in Kansas City to start an evening show at KFIX. The stint was short-lived, however, and disagreements with management led to his dismissal weeks later. By this time, Limbaugh had become disillusioned with radio and felt pressure to pursue a different career. He looked back on himself as "a moderate failure [...] as a deejay."^[1]

In 1979, he accepted a part-time role in group sales for the Kansas City Royals baseball team which developed into a full-time position as director of group sales and special events. He worked from the Royals Stadium where he developed a friendship with then-Royals star third baseman and future Hall of Famer George Brett. The two men remained close friends.^[11] Limbaugh said that business trips to Europe and Asia during this time developed his conservative views as he considered countries in those geographic areas to have lower standards of living than the United States.^[12]

In November 1983, Limbaugh returned to radio at KMBZ (AM) in Kansas City for a year. He decided to drop his on-air moniker and broadcast under his real name. He was fired from the station, but weeks later he landed a spot on KFBK in Sacramento, California, replacing Morton Downey Jr. The show launched on October 14, 1984.^[1]

Limbaugh began to express his political opinions in 1985 when he mocked the Great Peace March for Global Nuclear Disarmament, which he considered along with the general anti-war movement to be "inherently anti-US, yet was reported as substantive and morally correct by a willing and sympathetic media."^[13]

1988–1990s

In 1988, former ABC Radio Network executive Ed McLaughlin offered Limbaugh the nationally syndicated 12pm–2pm slot at ABC Radio Network to replace Owen Spann. Since many local radio stations of the time were hesitant to carry nationally syndicated programming during the daytime, he also secured Limbaugh a separate 10am–12pm show at WABC-AM in New York City to satisfy the provision of his contract requiring employment in a Top 5 market to leave KMBZ.^[13]

Limbaugh began his new show at WABC-AM on July 4, 1988, with the first episode focusing on the Iran Air Flight 655 shootdown the previous day. His national program debuted on 50 stations the next month on August 1, and by three months later had expanded to 100 stations.^[13][4] He debuted just weeks after the Democratic National Convention, and just weeks before the Republican National Convention. Limbaugh's radio home in New York City was the talk-formatted WABC (AM), and this remained his flagship station for many years, even after Limbaugh moved to West Palm Beach, Florida, from where he broadcast his show.^[1] Limbaugh's show moved on January 1, 2014, to WABC's cross-town rival WOR (AM), its final New York outlet.

By 1990, Limbaugh had been on his Rush to Excellence Tour, a series of personal appearances in cities nationwide, for two years. In December 1990, journalist Lewis Grossberger wrote in The New York Times Magazine that Limbaugh had "more listeners than any other talk show host" and described Limbaugh's style as "bouncing between earnest lecturer and political vaudevillian."^[3]

By the 1992 United States presidential election, Limbaugh had established himself as an influential political commentator. During the Republican Party presidential primaries, Limbaugh expressed a preference for Pat Buchanan over the incumbent George H. W. Bush, which Buchanan himself attributed to his early success in the primaries.

In November 1992, Democrat Bill Clinton was elected President of the United States. Limbaugh satirized the policies of Clinton and First Lady Hillary Clinton, as well as those of the Democratic Party in general. Following the Republican Revolution, in which the party regained control of Congress in the 1994 midterm elections after several decades, the freshman Republican class awarded Limbaugh an honorary membership in their caucus, crediting him with having had a role in their success.^[14]

2000s

Limbaugh had publicized personal difficulties in the 2000s. In late 2001, he acknowledged that he had become almost completely deaf, although he continued his show. He was able to regain much of his hearing with the help of a cochlear implant in 2001.^[15]

In 2003, Limbaugh had a brief stint as a professional football commentator with ESPN. He resigned a few weeks into the 2003 NFL season after making comments about the press coverage for quarterback Donovan McNabb that caused controversy and accusations of racism on the part of Limbaugh. His comment about McNabb was:

I don't think he's been that good from the get-go. I think what we've had here is a little social concern in the NFL. I think the media has been very desirous that a black quarterback do well. They're interested in black coaches and black quarterbacks doing well. I think there's a little hope invested in McNabb and he got a lot of credit for the performance of his team that he really didn't deserve. The defense carried this team.^[16]

In 2003, Limbaugh stated that he was addicted to pain medication, and sought treatment.^[17]

2010s

In 2013, news reports indicated that Cumulus Media, some of whose stations carried Limbaugh's program in certain major markets, including New York, Chicago, Dallas, Washington D.C., and Detroit, was considering dropping his show when its contract with Limbaugh expired at the end of that year, reportedly because the company believed that its advertising revenues had been hurt by listener reaction to controversial Limbaugh comments.^[18] Limbaugh himself said that the reports were overblown and that it was a matter of routine dollars-and-cents negotiations between Cumulus and his network syndication partner, Premiere Networks, a unit of Clear Channel Communications. Ultimately, the parties reached agreement on a new contract, with Limbaugh's show moving from its long-time flagship outlet in New York, the Cumulus-owned WABC, to the latter's cross-town rival, the Clear Channel-owned WOR, starting January 1, 2014, but remaining on the Cumulus-owned stations it was being carried on in other markets.

The Rush Limbaugh Show

Limbaugh's radio show aired for three hours each weekday beginning at noon Eastern Time on both AM and FM radio. The program was also broadcast worldwide on the Armed Forces Radio Network.

Radio broadcasting shifted from AM to FM in the 1970s because of the opportunity to broadcast music in stereo with better fidelity (AM stations in the United States would not get the opportunity to broadcast in stereo sound until August 2, 1982). Limbaugh's show was first nationally syndicated in August 1988, on the AM radio band. Limbaugh's popularity paved the way for other conservative talk radio programming to become commonplace on AM radio. The show increased its audience in the 1990s to the extent that even some FM stations picked it up.

Limbaugh used props, songs, and photos to introduce his monologues on various topics. On his radio show, news about homeless people was often preceded by the Clarence "Frogman" Henry song "Ain't Got No Home."^[3]

Limbaugh frequently mentioned the EIB (Excellence In Broadcasting) Network, trademarked in 1990. In the beginning, his show was co-owned and first syndicated by Edward F. McLaughlin, former president of ABC, who founded EFM Media in 1988, with Limbaugh's show as his first product. In 1997, McLaughlin sold EFM to Jacor Communications, which was ultimately bought up by Clear Channel Communications. Limbaugh owned a majority of the show, which is syndicated by the Premiere Radio Networks.

A November 2008 poll by Zogby International found that Limbaugh was the most trusted news personality in the nation, garnering 12.5 percent of poll responses.^[19]

Limbaugh signed a $400-million, eight-year contract in 2008 with what was then Clear Channel Communications, making him the highest-paid broadcaster on terrestrial radio. On August 2, 2016, Limbaugh signed a four-year extension of the 2008 contract. At the announcement of the extension, Premiere Radio Networks and iHeartMedia announced that his show experienced audience growth with 18 percent growth in adults 25–54, 27 percent growth with 25–54 women, and ad revenue growth of 20 percent year over year.^[20]

In 2018, Limbaugh was the world's second (behind Howard Stern) highest-paid radio host, reportedly earning $84.5 million.^[21] In December 2019, Talkers Magazine estimated that Limbaugh's show attracted a cumulative weekly audience of 15.5 million listeners to become the most-listened-to radio show in the United States.^[22]

Television show

Limbaugh had a syndicated half-hour television show from 1992 through 1996, produced by Roger Ailes. The show discussed many of the topics on his radio show, and was taped in front of an audience. Limbaugh said he loved doing his radio show,^[23] but not so much a TV show.^[24]

Limbaugh had become known for his love of cigars, saying, "I think cigars are just a tremendous addition to the enjoyment of life."^[25] During his syndicated television program from 1992 to 1996, he also became known for wearing distinctive neckties. In response to viewer interest, Limbaugh launched a series of ties designed primarily by his then-wife Marta.^[26]

Views

In his first New York Times best seller, Limbaugh described himself as conservative, and was critical of broadcasters in many media outlets for claiming to be objective.^[13] Limbaugh criticized the media and political activist movements such as feminism, environmentalism, and animal rights activism for allegedly serving as outlets for "anticapitalism, secular humanism, and socialism."^[13] Limbaugh, a proponent of American exceptionalism, often criticized politicians he believed reject this notion seeing them as unpatriotic or anti-American.^[12]

Race

Limbaugh was known for making racist statements regarding African Americans.^[27] While employed as what he described as an "insult-radio" DJ, he used a derogatory racial stereotype to characterize a black caller he could not understand, although he expressed guilt over this when recounting it. On the topic of slavery, Limbaugh said, "If any race of people should not have guilt about slavery, it's Caucasians."^[28]

He said of the genocide of Native Americans, "Holocaust 90 million Indians? Only 4 million left? They all have casinos, what's to complain about?"^[29][30]

LGBT and AIDS

Limbaugh expressed anti-LGBT views and viewed homosexual sexual practices as unhygienic. He made controversial statements about HIV/AIDS victims in the 1980s and 1990s.

In 2013, Limbaugh commented on same-sex marriage by saying, " This issue is lost. I don’t care what the Supreme Court does, this is now inevitable — and it’s inevitable because we lost the language on this. ... o far as I’m concerned, once we started talking about “gay marriage,” “traditional marriage,” “opposite-sex marriage,” “same-sex marriage,” “hetero-marriage,” we lost. It was over. It was just a matter of time."^[31]

Drug policy

Limbaugh was an outspoken critic of what he saw as leniency towards criminal drug use in the United States. He proposed that the racial disparity in drug enforcement could be fixed if authorities increased detection efforts, conviction rates, and jail time for whites involved in illegal drugs. He defended mandatory-minimum sentencing as an effective tool against the crack cocaine epidemic of the 1980s.^[32] Limbaugh accused advocates of legalization of non-medical cannabis in the United States of hypocrisy due to their advocacy of tobacco control and backlash against electronic cigarettes, and compared the advocates for its legalization in Colorado to Big Tobacco.^[33] Limbaugh's past comments on drug users were highlighted by numerous media outlets after his own stint in a drug rehabilitation facility in 2003.^[34]

Environmental issues

Limbaugh was opposed to environmentalism. Among other pronouncements, he rejected the relationship between CFCs and depletion of the ozone layer, claiming the scientific evidence did not support them. Limbaugh argued against the scientific opinion on climate change, and argued that projections of climate change were the product of ideologically motivated computer simulations without the proper support of empirical data. He said forcefully, "Climate change is a hoax!" Limbaugh also wrote that "there are more acres of forestland in America today than when Columbus discovered the continent in 1492."^[35]

Feminism

Limbaugh was critical of feminism, which he viewed as advancing only liberals and not women in general.^[29] He regularly used the term "feminazi", described by The New York Times in 1994 as one of his "favorite epithets for supporters of women's rights".^[14]

He credited his friend Tom Hazlett, a professor of law and economics at George Mason University, with coining the term:

I prefer to call the most obnoxious feminists what they really are: feminazis. Tom Hazlett, a good friend who is an esteemed and highly regarded professor of economics at the University of California at Davis, coined the term to describe any female who is intolerant of any point of view that challenges militant feminism. I often use it to describe women who are obsessed with perpetuating a modern-day holocaust: abortion.^[13]

Abortion

Limbaugh was vehemently opposed to abortion on demand. He called Roe v. Wade a bad constitutional law: "Rather than having abortion declared legal by the decision of nine guys in black robes back in 1973, I think it should be a moral choice, decided by the people in a democratic fashion."^[36]

Barack Obama

Limbaugh strongly opposed Barack Obama during the 2008 presidential election. Limbaugh accused Obama of using his race to prevent criticism of his policies, and said he was successful in his first year in office because it paralyzed legitimate criticism of the president of the United States with people afraid to speak out for fear of being accused of racism.^[37]

Relationship with Donald Trump

Limbaugh was consistently supportive of the candidacy and first presidency of Donald Trump, although he endorsed Ted Cruz during the 2016 Republican Party presidential primaries and took issue with Trump's treatment of Cruz.^[38]

After the election he became supportive of Deep State conspiracy theories, claiming that the United States had entered a "Cold Civil War" in which the Democratic Party was attempting to illegitimately overturn the election results and that it was part of a trend of Democrats contesting elections beginning with the 2000 Florida election recount intended to eventually eliminate free elections in the United States.^[39]

Controversies

Comedian Al Franken, in his satirical 1996 book, Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot and Other Observations, accused Limbaugh of distorting facts to serve his own political biases.^[40]

Limbaugh's humor frequently caused controversy, including such statements as the existence of gorillas disproves the theory of evolution, that the coronavirus was just the common cold, that a recent lack of hurricanes disproves climate change, and numerous others.^[41]

Deepwater Horizon

In 2010, after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, Limbaugh downplayed the need for a massive cleanup, saying that oil in the ocean was a natural phenomenon and as a result the ocean would take care of cleaning itself. He also speculated on his show that eco-terrorists deliberately destroyed the oil well to justify President Obama's deepwater drilling moratorium.^[42]

Unite the Right

After the white supremacist Unite the Right rally, in which a counter-protester was murdered in the Charlottesville car attack, Limbaugh said the U.S. may be "on the cusp of a second civil war" and that "America is under attack from within." He claimed that the violence was part of a campaign by "international financiers" such as George Soros to start a Second American Civil War to remove its status as a global superpower.^[43]

Prescription drug addiction

Limbaugh admitted to listeners on his radio show on October 10, 2003, that he was addicted to prescription painkillers and stated that he would enter inpatient treatment for 30 days, immediately after the broadcast. He noted that did not see himself as a role model for taking this step. Limbaugh stated his addiction to painkillers resulted from several years of severe back pain heightened by a botched surgery intended to correct those problems.^[44]

Before his addiction became known, Limbaugh had condemned illegal drug use on his television program, stating that "The answer is to find the ones who are getting away with it, convict them and send them up the river."^[34]

Charitable work

Leukemia and lymphoma telethon

From 1990 until his death, Limbaugh held an annual fundraising telethon called the "EIB Cure-a-Thon" for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.^[45] Limbaugh personally contributed between $100,000 and $500,000 annually to the society.

Marine Corps–Law Enforcement Foundation

Limbaugh conducted an annual drive to help the Marine Corps–Law Enforcement Foundation (MCLEF) collect contributions to provide scholarships for children of Marines and law enforcement officers and agents who have died in the line of duty. In 2026, in memory of Rush Limbaugh, MCLEF Board Member, Mrs. Kathryn Adams Limbaugh re-launched the New York Times Best Selling Rush Revere book line with proceeds benefiting the MCLEF.^[46]

Influence and legacy

Limbaugh was widely recognized as one of the leading voices of the conservative movement in the United States in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. He is given much of the credit for having revived AM radio at a time when most people had switched to FM.^[47]

Former president Ronald Reagan thanked him in a 1992 letter: Thanks for all you’re doing to promote Republican and conservative principles. Now that I’ve retired from active politics, I don’t mind that you have become the Number One voice for conservatism in our Country.^[48] In 1994, Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives made Limbaugh an honorary member.^[14]

In 1995, Limbaugh was profiled on the PBS series Frontline in a one-hour documentary called "Rush Limbaugh's America." Limbaugh refused to be interviewed, but his mother, brother, and many Republican supporters took part, as well as critics and opponents.^[49]

Limbaugh was awarded the Marconi Radio Award for Syndicated Radio Personality of the Year by the National Association of Broadcasters five times: 1992, 1995, 2000, 2005, and 2014.^[50] He was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame in 1993 and the National Association of Broadcasters Hall of Fame in 1998.^[51]

Conservative magazine Human Events announced Limbaugh as their 2007 Man of the Year.^[52] Later that same year, Barbara Walters featured Limbaugh as one of the most fascinating people of the year in a special that aired on December 4, 2008.^[53]

On February 28, 2009, following his self-described "first address to the nation" lasting 90 minutes, carried live on CNN and Fox News and recorded for C-SPAN, Limbaugh received CPAC's "Defender of the Constitution Award," a document signed by Benjamin Franklin, given to someone "who has stood up for the First Amendment ... Rush Limbaugh is for America, exactly what Benjamin Franklin did for the Founding Fathers ... the only way we will be successful is if we listen to Rush Limbaugh," reads the citation.^[54]

In his 2010 book, Rush Limbaugh: An Army of One, Zev Chafets cited Limbaugh as "the brains and the spirit behind" the Republican Party's resurgence in the 2010 midterm elections in the wake of the election of President Obama.^[4] Chafets pointed, among others, to Sen. Arlen Specter's defeat, after being labeled by Limbaugh as a "Republican in Name Only", and to Sarah Palin, whose "biggest current applause line – Republicans are not just the party of no, but the party of hell no – came courtesy of Mr. Limbaugh." The author continued: "Limbaugh has argued the 'party-of-no' conservative course for the Republicans vigorously, notably since six weeks after Obama's inauguration, and has been fundamental to, and encouraging to, the more prominently noted Tea Party movement."^[55]

Rush Limbaugh was inducted into the Hall of Famous Missourians on May 14, 2012, in a secret ceremony announced only 20 minutes before it began in order to prevent negative media attention. A bronze bust of Limbaugh is on display at the Missouri State Capitol building in Jefferson City, along with other awardees. ^[56]

On February 4, 2020, the day after he announced that he had advanced lung cancer, Limbaugh was a guest of President Donald Trump at the 2020 State of the Union Address, where he was presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Melania Trump.^[57]

Published works

In 1992, Limbaugh published his first book, The Way Things Ought to Be, followed by See, I Told You So, the following year. Both titles were number one on The New York Times Best Seller list for 24 weeks. His first book was dictated by himself, and transcribed and edited by Wall Street Journal writer John Fund.^[58]

In 2013, Limbaugh authored his first children's book, entitled Rush Revere and the Brave Pilgrims: Time-Travel with Exceptional Americans. He received the Author of the Year Award from the Children's Book Council for this work.^[59] Limbaugh's second children's book was released the following year, entitled Rush Revere and the First Patriots: Time-Travel with Exceptional Americans. His third children's book was released later this same year, written with his wife Kathryn and entitled Rush Revere and the American Revolution. The Limbaughs dedicated this to the U.S. military and their families.^[60]

The final work, Radio's Greatest of All Time, is a posthumously published collection of Rush Limbaugh’s greatest on-air moments. It contains special commentary and personal stories from his beloved widow, Kathryn Limbaugh, and brother, David Limbaugh, and other friends and prominent figures. When the idea of this book was first proposed, Rush joked that he couldn't possibly select the best of best from all his years of pure genius! The final product cements his legacy as the greatest voice for conservatism expressed in his distinctive humorous fashion.

• The Way Things Ought to Be. Pocket Books, 1992. ISBN 978-0671751456
• See I Told You So. Atria, 1993. ISBN 978-0671871208
• Rush Revere and the Brave Pilgrims: Time-Travel Adventures With Exceptional Americans. Threshold Editions, 2013. ISBN 978-1476755861
• Rush Revere and the First Patriots: Time-Travel Adventures With Exceptional Americans. Threshold Editions, 2014. ISBN 978-1476755885
• Rush Revere and the American Revolution: Time-Travel Adventures With Exceptional Americans. Threshold Editions, 2014. ISBN 978-1476789873
• Rush Revere and the Star-Spangled Banner: Time-Travel Adventures With Exceptional Americans. Threshold Editions, 2015. ISBN 978-1476789880
• Rush Revere and the Presidency: Time-Travel Adventures With Exceptional Americans. Threshold Editions, 2016. ISBN 978-1501156892
• Radio's Greatest of All Time. Threshold Editions, 2022. ISBN 978-1668001844

Notes

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Chafets, Zev. Rush Limbaugh: An Army of One. Sentinel, 2010. ISBN 978-1595230638
• Colford, Paul D. The Rush Limbaugh Story: Talent on Loan from God, An Unauthorized Biography. St. Martin's Press, 1993. ISBN 978-0312099060
• Franken, Al. Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot: And Other Observations. Dell, 1999. ISBN 978-0440508649
• Gay, Kathlyn (ed.). American Dissidents: An Encyclopedia of Activists, Subversives, and Prisoners of Conscience. ABC-CLIO, 2011. ISBN 978-1598847642
• Limbaugh, Rush, Kathryn Adams Limbaugh, and David Limbaugh. Radio's Greatest of All Time. Threshold Editions, 2022. ISBN 978-1668001844
• Toma, George. Nitty Gritty Dirt Man. Sports Publishing, 2004. ISBN 978-1582616469

External links

All links retrieved September 28, 2026.

• The Rush Limbaugh Show official site
• Rush Limbaugh IMDb
• Rush Limbaugh Biography.com
• Rush Limbaugh: How he used shock to reshape America BBC
• Rush Limbaugh Find a Grave