Flo Ayres

Flo Ayres (born Florence Aaronson, July 12, 1923) is an American radio actress[1][2] and a founding member of the Washington, DC chapter of AFTRA-SAG.

Ayres was born Florence Aaronson in Baltimore, Maryland in 1923. She had two brothers and a sister and attended Western High School. After high school, she studied at a drama school and worked with local theater groups for three years.[3]

In 1948, Ayres acted in Baltimore in a Johns Hopkins Playshop production of an English translation of Martine.[4] She broke into radio in the late 1940s in Washington, DC, and was one of the first women to make the new technology a full-time career. In the 1950s, Ayres teamed up with Walt Teas, another nationally known voice from Baltimore, to become one of the first freelance voiceover teams in the radio industry.[3] Over the next 30 years, Ayres, along with Teas and another personality, Joe Knight, recorded thousands of commercials and syndicated programs on a national scale, mostly at Baltimore's version of Hollywood, Flite Three Studios, and overseen by legendary audio engineer, Louis Mills.

In the 1960s and 1970s, Ayres also taught radio and communications at several Baltimore-area institutes of higher learning, such as Johns Hopkins University, Goucher College,[3] and Towson University, and has collaborated on projects with famous Vatican painter Joseph Sheppard and Beatles' photographer Morton Tadder. Ayres also has had an extensive solo career spanning over 50 years. In addition to radio commercials, Ayres has narrated for such institutions as the National Geographic Society, SeaWorld, and the AARP. During the past twenty-five years, Ayres has hosted regular radio shows such as "Tuning into Life," "The Heart of the Matter," and she wrote and produced the radio series "For the Young at Heart." Ayres wrote, produced, and starred in a children's music CD about manners, entitled "Doo-zees and Don't-zees," which was released in May, 2007.

Today, in her 90s and mostly retired, Ayres still produces occasional spots from her home in Baltimore, and from nearby B.H. Audio studios in Pikesville, Maryland.

In 1983, Ayres won and Addy Award from the American Advertising Federation and a Best in Baltimore Award from the Advertising Association of Baltimore for commercials that she made for the Baltimore Blast.[3]

References
  1. "Flo 'Granny Packer' Ayres". tribunedigital-baltimoresun. Retrieved 2018-03-13.
  2. "Veteran voice-over actress and lifelong Baltimorean still thrives". Washington Examiner. 2008-05-17. Retrieved 2018-03-13.
  3. McGuire, Patrick A. (January 25, 1987). "A Variety of Voices". The Baltimore Sun. pp. 362–367. Retrieved November 13, 2020 – via Newspapers.com.
  4. "Hopkins Playshop Offers 'Martine'". The Baltimore Sun. February 22, 1948. p. 66. Retrieved November 13, 2020 – via Newspapers.com.
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