Radio host Jackie ‘O’ Henderson reveals her surprising first job

She started her radio career in her late teens after meeting her first husband, ‘Ugly Phil’ O’Neil, when he was host of the night show at Sea FM.

But before her big break on the airwaves, Jackie ‘O’ Henderson was a junior real estate agent working for Ray White on the Gold Coast at the age of 17.

She reflected on her brief stint in the property industry on The Kyle and Jackie O Show on Tuesday, saying her team had a heated rivalry with the LJ Hooker office.

‘I wasn’t a Hooker girl. I was a Ray White girl, thank you,’ she told her co-host Kyle Sandilands, after he cheekily suggested she’d worked for the competing firm.

‘Oh, Ray White. I’m sorry, I forget there’s so much rivalry,’ Kyle, 49, responded.

Jackie, 46, then explained the Ray White and LJ Hooker offices were on the same street at the time, which intensified the competition. 

‘I wore like those big power suits with the big shoulder pads like I was on Dynasty… My Ray White days. Good old days,’ she said.

‘I think it’s just a pride thing, isn’t it? Like you want yours to be the best and they’re your competition.’

Jackie began her radio career within a few years of leaving Ray White.

She met Ugly Phil when he was hosting a show on the Gold Coast and she called in to request tickets to a Guns N’ Roses concert.

Their professional partnership soon became a romantic one and they married.

At about this time Jackie ditched her maiden name, Last, and adopted the ‘Jackie O’ stage name while hosting shows with her husband in several cities.

Sadly their marriage didn’t go the distance and Phil moved back to his native UK in the late ’90s after the couple divorced. 

The end of their on-air partnership left a vacancy on 2Day FM’s Hot 30 Countdown which was filled by Kyle Sandilands.