With 93.3 The Peak radio personality Jolie McMullan, what you see and hear is what you get. She says she owes this trait to the best advice she ever received.
“Always be true to who you are and don’t try to be someone that you’re not – my nana told me that,” McMullan said. “So I’m that kind of person that you like or you don’t and if you don’t – oh well.”
The effervescent mother of two grown daughters was born in December 1966 in Brandon, Man., and grew up there.
Her earliest memories are of battling with her older brother, whom she quickly defended when he got too rough. “We get along great today,” she said.
McMullan is slender and compactly built, the result of an early life of hard work rather than diet or aerobics.
She grew up on a farm that had cattle, horses, pigs and chickens. And there were lots of chores. “I learned the value of hard work very early on,” McMullan said.
The family kept a 33-horse stable on the property and so began McMullan’s lifelong love affair with horses. “I show jumped, barrel raced and trained thoroughbred racehorses later,” she said.
A life high point was meeting Canadian Olympic equestrian rider Ian Millar. “He was an absolutely amazing rider and he’s also a very patriotic guy,” McMullan said.
McMullan wanted to be a veterinarian when she graduated but worked at everything from running a daycare to working at an optical firm.
McMullan came to Port Alberni 17 years ago when her former husband took a job in Ucluelet, then in Alberni.
A sales rep – and friend – who was leaving the Peak encouraged McMullan to apply for the job and she was hired. She worked sales at first then later moved on air.
The best parts of the job are the regular hours and the perks, which McMullan defines as “Working with the best people who are involved with charity work and helping out however I can,” she said.
She’s interviewed Darby Mills, Colin James and Nick Gilder.
If she could have dinner with a famous radio personality it would be with radio shock jock Howard Stern.
“He beats his own drum his own way,” McMullan said. “The public didn’t like it so he got a satellite program.”
reporter@albernivalleynews.com