Tom Magliozzi, co-host of Car Talk, has died as a result of complications from Alzheimer’s disease, NPR reports. He was 77.
Magliozzi hosted Car Talk with his brother, Ray, and together they were known as “Click and Clack the Tappet Brothers.” The show humorously covered automobiles and automotive repairs.
The Magliozzis began the show on the WBUR network in Boston in 1977. A few years later, when they took the show to NPR, it gained a national audience. In 2012, the brothers announced they were retiring, but reruns have continued to air. 
Magliozzi is remembered as a friendly, upbeat man who loved to joke around.
“We can be happy that he lived the life he wanted to live; goofing off a lot, talking to you guys every week, and primarily laughing his ass off,” his brother, Ray, said in a statement posted to the Car Talk website.
Doug Berman, the producer of Car Talk, sent this note to NPR on Monday:
“I have the sad duty to report today that Tom Magliozzi, one of the hosts of Car Talk, passed away this morning due to complications of Alzheimer’s Disease. Tom’s been such a dominant, positive personality amongst us for so long that all of us in the public radio family — and I include our millions of listeners — will find this news very difficult to receive.”
Berman added that the Magliozzi family has asked friends and listeners to make donations to their local Alzheimer’s society, or public radio stations, rather than sending flowers.
For more information, read the NPR story here.
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