Among the revelations that came out this morning when WHMI’s Mike Marino and Jon King announced they were ending their affiliation with the station effective immediately was this bombshell: Marshall from Fowlerville, one of the most popular contributors to their morning show, isn’t a real person.
“Marshall,” they revealed, is actually Dion Clark, WHMI’s creative director. He’s been doing the Marshall character since the beginning, along with several other recurring characters he did on WHMI.
It’s a well-kept Livingston County secret that they’ve kept for about 12 years, since “Marshall” first called into the show.
Until today, everybody in Livingston County thought that Marshall was an impossibly stupid guy from Fowlerville who had a Joe Dirt-style mullet and lived in his mother’s basement. Marshall first popped up about 12 years ago when he called into the show and couldn’t answer the most basic of questions.
That turned into a twice-weekly segment on Mike & Jon in the Morning called “Are You Smarter Than Marshall?” Callers would be pitted against Marshall in a quick game of trivia. WHMI even gave Marshall his own page on their website, which included a fake photo of some guy in a mullet.
As they announced this morning at 9:45 a.m. that today would be their final day on the air, Mike and Jon ended the ruse they’ve maintained for the last decade or so, revealing for the first time that Marshall isn’t a real guy. They announced that Clark was the real Marshall, saying that he’s been the “third member” of the morning team for years.
