A Farewell

This one is going ramble, and be a bit more disorganized than I'd like. Maybe I'll fix it up and add to it later.

It's 6:30 on a Saturday morning and I just learned that my friend Joel Siegel has passed away at the age of 63, and I'm saddened.

I can't say we were close friends (wish I could), but we were more than just acquaintances when we worked together at WABC in the early eighties. Come to think of it, everyone who knew Joel was a friend. He was a genuinely nice man.

When you're new to New York (as I was), the city and the job can be a bit intimidating. Sinatra had it right: "If I can make it there..." But it's not necessarily a welcoming place. The WABC attitude seemed to be, "You've never worked in New York before? Then you've never worked. Period. Your career starts now, and you'd better be good...or else!"

Joel's attitude was, "How are you, welcome, nice to meet you." I had a coffee pot in my office which everyone was free to raid. Many did. Joel stayed for conversation.

He was an amazing raconteur. If you saw him only as the movie critic on "Good Morning America" you already know that he was more than just clever and witty. He had insight and could make you laugh and think at the same time. And he was a student of New York and New Yorkers. He knew something about everything that had ever happened in the Big Apple. Joel could tell anecdotes about the city and its residents than went back to the New Amsterdam days.

The only friction I remember was caused by the tug-of-war for his talents. As "GMA" became more and more popular, the network wanted more and more of his time. Joel, who had been doing movie and theater reviews and cultural reporting for WABC, started cutting back his local duties--aiming to become just a theater critic for Eyewitness News. The WABC brass were reluctant to loosen their grip on him, he was just too good at too many things.

I remember one election night--must have been 1982--when we left room for a Joel Siegel election-rated anecdote as the "bumper" before every commercial: little slice-of-campaign-life stories shot all around the city. The one that left everyone howling was the story of a mayoral debate in the early 1800s--maybe even the late 1700s. I don't remember the setup or the names, but it closed with one candidate cursing at the other and saying, "You, sir, are a cur and a vile cad, and you're bound to die of some loathsome disease."

The reply? "That, sir, depends on whether I embrace you principles, or your mistress."

Did you know Joel was a Broadway playwright? He wrote the book for a musical called "The First," based on Jackie Robinson's start with the Brooklyn Dodgers. A young David Allen Grier played Jackie Robinson, and Lonette McKee played his wife, Rachel. Martin Charnin (of "Annie" fame) wrote the lyrics and directed. How's that for a lineup? The show had a short run, though. I never could figure out why. I was smitten by it. To this day I can still hum some of the songs (like the one where Rachel responds to Jackie's marriage proposal saying, "I damn well better know you better" before marching down the aisle). I saw the show three times, including the final performance. I sat on the aisle and got to give Joel a sympathetic hug at the curtain. He became the only theatrer critic in history to be honored with a Tony award nomination. Hey, how many critics think they can be playwrights? All of 'em. How many can go on to be nominated for a Tony? Only one of 'em!

Parenthetically--and selfishly--I don't know how I'm going to pick movies now that Joel's gone. Over the years I've agreed with his movie reviews 99.9% of the time!

Anything else I should share? I sat shiva with Joel when his second wife died. She was young--a former WABC film editor, I believe--and her passing broke Joel's heart. Years later he remarried and has a young son, born in 1998, I think. By then Joel had colon cancer. At one point he was told he had only a 70% chance of living to see the birth of his child. That's when he wrote Lessons for Dylan, a highly-praised book, life lessons he wanted to pass down to his boy.

I stayed in touch with Joel Siegel a bit after I left New York. But he was very busy, and I didn't want to take up much of his time. Now I wished I had, if only to tell him that he brightened a corner of my life, that I was awed by his talent, thankful for his kindness, and that I liked him a lot.

The Fritz Rule

Back in the early 90s, at WEWS-TV in Cleveland, I instituted "The Fritz Rule."

Fritz was my five-year-old nephew, and the rule went something like this: "I don't want to see anything on our newscasts that I'd be embarrassed to have to explain to Fritz."

I don't want a five-year-old watching a story on Monica Lewinsky and asking, "What's oral sex?" I don't want to talk about what Michael Jackson may or may not be have been doing with little boys in his bed. I don't particularly want to have a conversation about uncovered, bloody bodies at the scenes of car wrecks. I don't want to have to explain the pictures from Abu Ghraib Prison, so keep the photos off my air or put a disclaimer in front of them three times the size of an interstate billboard.

I've talked here before about television as a "truth detector," and about "Eyewitness News," which was designed to let viewers experience the news as close to first-hand as possible. An argument can be made that the "Eyewitness" concept doesn't allow for either toning down or cleaning up the harsh realities of life.

That may be so, and I may be a hypocrite. But just as people can't reclaim their virginity, you can't give children back their innocence. I did grow up in a more innocent time. We didn't lock our doors. The keys were left in the car. We trusted our neighbors, and thought that the world was a safe place. Maybe we were delusional back then, but now I hear words on TV that I personally didn't learn until I was hanging around the locker room with the rest of the jocks in high school—and later! If I don't want to explain to a child that there's no Santa Claus, why should I have to explain what "nappy-headed ho" means?

I don't have any hard, fast answers here. I know that we do good by warning children of the dangers of the Internet and sexual predators and drug abuse and drinking and driving. I'd just like to hope that before we put things on the air we mull them over a bit and consider their deeper meanings and the impact they can have on impressionable young minds. So I think about my little nephew.

Fritz, by the way, isn't so little anymore. He's 17 and a high school sports star heading into his senior year. He probably knows more cuss words and more about sex than I knew when I was 21. But he didn't learn from me!

Uphill…Both Ways

Ah, ya young whippersnappers! Ya think you got it hard? You don't got it hard, nosireebob. You ain't hardly got no idee what hard is, goldang it! Why, when I was your age I used to walk fifteen miles to and from grammar school—and it was uphill both ways. We used to drive a herd of cattle in front of us, and along the way we'd trade some of the cows for firewood. We'd use the wood to start a fire so that when we slaughtered other steers we could tan the cowhide to make our own shoes. And we'd milk some cows—drinking the milk for breakfast and trading the cream for needles so we could sew our own clothes. All this and it was -30 degrees—in May!

Yep, kids today don't know the value of a little hard work.

That's what I heard growing up from my father; and my guess is you heard the same thing from yours.

I vowed that I'd never be one of those "Way Back When" types.

Another promise broken!

You see, I don't have much respect for some of the younger journalists I've encountered recently.

I've written here before about my first boss ("Man and Mentor," April 12^th) and said that my first broadcasting job was part-time at WOOD AM-FM-TV in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Let me tell you "The Rest of the Story."

In late 1968, early in my senior year at Michigan State, a professor in one of my broadcasting classes asked if anyone would be interested in weekend news writing at WOOD. Half the hands in the room went up. In those days (and maybe still, I'm not sure) the best TV stations in all of Michigan were the network affiliates in Detroit and WOOD. Channel 8 was simply the class of medium-market Michigan TV. And in those days there were literally no internships in broadcasting, and real jobs were tough to come by. A chance to work at WOOD would be dream come true.

Then the prof. explained the hours: 5:00 a.m. until 11:00 p.m. on Saturday (18 hours), followed by 10:00 a.m. until 11:00 p.m. on Sunday (13 hours).

Every hand went down...but mine.

I applied, I interviewed and I got the job (if I remember) $2.55 an hour. Now, Grand Rapids is 75 miles from East Lansing. So the drill was get up at 3:00 a.m.—drive to Grand Rapids—work until 11:00—get a motel room—catch eight hours sleep—work until 11:00—get home at 1:00--and head off to class on Monday.

(TRIVIA: know how the "Motel Six" chain got its name? Because all rooms in those days were $6.)

Counting the gas (at about 25 cents a gallon), the $6 motel and meals—heck, I was still clearing $60-$65 a weekend. But you couldn't put a price tag on what I was learning.

After WOOD, every time I had a career choice to make I asked myself--What do I need to learn--Where can I go to learn it? I made what looked like lateral (or even backwards) moves so I could pick up new skills and master my craft. Each stop along the way was a link in the chain--the chain I called a career. It was my apprenticeship. It took me eleven years (until I reached New York) before I considered the apprenticeship over. Still I never stopped learning, never stopped striving, and could never resign myself to being a 40-hour-a-week clock-watcher.

Fast-forward to the 21^st century. In my most recent incarnation as a news director I found most of the staff willing to give 100% effort 50% of the time. Or was that 50% effort 100% of the time? Either way, most had jobs but not careers. Most were dedicated to taking the easy way out. A few years back, in short succession, I lost two young producers from my medium-market station to a much larger market where they signed on as Production Assistants--newsroom go-fers. Talk about lateral or backward moves! When I asked why, about the best they could come up with was that both were big baseball fans and their new city had a good major league team.

Have no idea where either is today. My guess is in some sports bar with their baseball caps turned backwards pounding home the brewskies.

Different station, same dilemma. Rookie producer helped put herself through college by waittressing at a popular local restaurant. Came to me to say she'd had an offer to go back as the lead hostess. Let's see: hostess, news producer--hostess, news producer--hostess, news producer. These career choices are tough, aren't they? In the end she stayed in TV (and I lost my chance to double up at the salad bar without paying extra).

A lot of people want to be "TV Stars." How many want to do the grunt work of producing, reporting, shooting video, running the assignment desk? Everyone wants the big bucks, no one wants to pay any dues. Am I crazy, or does it seem as if more and more TV news people aspire to Paris Hilton's lifestyle than to Walter Cronkite's?

I know what you're thinking: that I've settled in to my "Old Fart Emeritus" years. That could well be true. But prove me wrong. Please.

This One Got Me Into Trouble

This one is going to be a bit long, but please bear with me. It contains an article that was picked up by "ShopTalk" on TVSpy.com back in 2001, which got me into hot water with my bosses at WBRE.

I've been a news director off and on since 1975. Several times I've consciously stepped away: once to teach, twice to accept second-in-command positions (EP in one case, ME in another). Truth is, I liked not being the ultimate boss. The news director is busy all day in meetings with the Sales Department on how to arrange a trade-out so anchors can get their hair styled for free! The ME or the EP gets to do news (what a concept).

In the article below I was quoted (correctly) as saying that over the years the job of news director has become more administrative and less about journalism. When it appeared the WBRE higher-ups were upset. They thought I was taking pot-shots at them.

Only indirectly. I think my criticism here applies to just about every TV station in America. One exception? There's a story about my friend the late Ron Tindiglia when he was General Manager for WCBS in New York. The story goes that he hired a new News Director, and on his first day told him, "You'll get the keys to your office in thirty days. For the first month your job isn't behind a desk, it's in the newsroom." Might be apocryphal , but I certainly hope not. And it sounds like Ron Tindiglia. If anyone ever got it, it was Ron!

A couple of years later WBRE's News Director "left to pursue other career goals" (Nudge, nudge, wink, wink, know what I mean, say no more!) and I was made acting ND. After the proverbial "nationwide search" (Nudge, nudge, wink, wink, know what I mean, say no more!) the station couldn't find anyone willing to take the job and it was offered to me. Maybe "offered" isn't the right word: when I asked if I could stay where I was (ME), doing what I liked to do (news), I was told that there would be a new ND, and that he or she would be hiring a new ME or EP. It could be me doing the looking, or me looking for another job.

So I reluctantly became News Director. I took a job I didn't want--doing things I didn't want to do--for people I didn't respect.

Want to guess how that ended?

Anyway, here's that article from more than six years ago.

=========================================================
A News Director By Any Other Name

By Stu Nicholson

Columbus Media Talk

A News Director by Any Other Name . . .

By definition, a news director is simply someone who directs the news. He or she is also the person to whom tons of mail is uselessly addressed in the hopes their news release and/or event will rise to the top and get covered. Santa Claus answers more mail than the typical news director does. While this may come as a shock to all but the most savvy public relations mongers, it is significant evidence that the job of news director has changed (some would say evolved) over the last few decades in television news. Today's news director, I submit, has less and less to do with directing the news of the day, and has become increasingly more of a newsroom manager. In other words, he / she has become a bureaucrat. That's one of the kinder names I've heard from my brothers and sisters in the news business . . . news directors included.

Some of this evolution, if you want to call it that, is attributable to the growing corporate nature of broadcasting as a whole and TV news in particular. You have the Jack Welchs of the corporate world putting the pressure on local managers to perform or else be viewed as some kind of impediment to the greater good of the corporation. Being an impediment is not a good thing in the eyes of the folks at "corporate". They expect you to do more (and more) with less (much less), and make that profit margin look good. Their concern over whether a news market is being adequately served and informed by their local outlet is minimal. They want to see ad revenues, first and foremost. So the local news director, with some exceptions, sees himself / herself as being forced into towing the corporate line: reviewing budgets almost constantly, hiring and firing, dealing with visiting corporate honchos who (for the most part) know or care little about local news, and maybe once in a while poking their head into an editorial meeting to make a show of looking like they're in control. Ultimately, they are in control: in control of the professional lives and careers of everyone in the newsroom. There are still some news directors who do that job with a sense of humanity and true leadership. But I know and hear about many more who treat their people like some kind of corporate-owned cattle. Don't perform up to their vague expectations and you're sent to the meat-packing plant for your career to be sliced and diced.

But while all this is going on, who is left in charge of how and if local news gets covered, if it gets covered at all? It's the executive producer at many stations, or the title may be assistant news director. If that person is competent and knows how to use their knowledge and journalistic skills to lead, the newsroom and news people can still do their jobs. For some, it is as far as they want to go in local news, because they realize they will give up much of that day-to-day influence on the output and quality of news if they grab the brass ring and allow themselves to be elevated into an ND's job.

Or, consider the case of long-time news director Paul Stueber: a man who has led newsrooms in markets like New York, Baltimore, Miami, Cleveland, Oklahoma City and Wilkes-Barre. He recently made the conscious decision to step back from being a news director and become Managing Editor at WBRE-TV in Wilkes-Barre-Scranton. His reason? "I get to do NEWS," say Stueber. He traces the change in the role of news director back to the 70's when, as he puts it, "One (TV station) salesman turned to another and said, 'you know, if we could get a couple of more share points we could break even on news.' And his buddy said, 'y'know, if we could get FIVE more share points we could turn a profit!' And that was that."

News, says Stueber, then became a business instead of a duty and service of local stations. It was no longer a newsroom. It was a "profit center." "Suddenly, being a good newsman (there weren't many women in the biz back then) didn't count for much. Suddenly, you had to be a (gulp)"MANAGER."

Of many of today's news directors and station owners, Stueber observes, "They don't know or care about their communities. They don't view broadcast news as a service performed for your neighbors, but as a product for sale." What's the resulting new measure of success? High ratings and high income.

I once worked for one who went home at 4 PM almost every day, missed his own newscasts and then had the gall to be critical of the people who labored everyday to put on a decent half-hour of news. Stueber wonders how many local news directors will watch their newscasts tonight and say, "I didn't know that!"

"But they SHOULD know," says Stueber, "because they should be setting journalistic standards, not just BUSINESS STANDARDS."

Former Memphis news director Bob Jacobs shares many of the same observations, saying the corporate pressure on the industry has forced the job to be more difficult than ever before. "You are usually promoted for your work as a journalist, and you're thrown into a position that requires you to manage multi-million dollar budgets, handle human resources for 60 or more people, come up with regular special assignment and series reports that will bring in viewers and, in your spare time . . . concentrate on the quality of your daily news coverage."

Even the decision-making process has largely been taken out of the hands of many local news directors and given to some Armani-clad executive at corporate headquarters. D you think they really know or care what makes news, much less quality news? Don't bet your remote on it.

"But let those numbers slip", says Jacobs, "let the profit margins fall, and it's the news director's head that's offered to corporate management on a platter.

Jacobs is now out of the business and says he cannot imagine stepping back into a news director's job again. "There's an assumption that the news director makes decisions. That's simply not the case. However, they are saddled with the responsibility if something goes wrong." He decries the corporate pressures that have turned many newsrooms into profit-or-die operations. After climbing the career ladder into his life-long dream of his first news director job, Jacobs says his lofty ideas about doing solid journalism were dashed by those pressures. "The corporate heads wanted profit margins in the 50% range. You cut people and you don't invest in the technology infrastructure. Simply put, you do more with less. It didn't last."

Jacobs admits "there are plenty of people who still find being a news director rewarding, and I applaud their ability to make it through the pile of garbage thrown in their way each and every day from sleazy general managers to car and cash giveaway contests. It is hard for a news director to keep his/her head above it all. And if they stick their neck out too far, someone's likely to lop off their noggin."

He says he misses the daily news challenges, "but I don't miss the petty and petite minds that pull the purse strings."

Like Bob, I have found there is life after news. Still with a sense of humor intact, Jacobs says of his new life, "To this day, I don't know whether to slap my last general manager, or give him a big kiss." It is probably too much to hope for much to change for the positive. That's going to take the same chipping away at the corporate culture that has infected and diminished local news bit by bit for the last three decades. It will take enough news directors and other newsroom folks to take up the challenge of doing challenging news. It will take the realization of the corporate suits that the reason the numbers of homes watching TV news are down is that viewers are tired of watching over-consulted, ratings-driven drivel instead of actually being informed about the important stories in their community.

Some will say to do this is too difficult, too expensive, too boring. I submit such people are too lazy, too cheap, and journalistically-challenged to pick up the fight and make the business of news a worthwhile profession once again, and one that once again serves the public.

Here's to those who fight on. Here's to those who have fought the good fight and have earned the right to step back and live a new life. To those who stand in the newsroom and do nothing, I say either lead or follow or get the hell out of the way of those who still view hard work as a virtue and news as an honorable profession.

A Lesson from Josh

Bear with me. As I write this, my dear friend Simon should be on the way to the airport to reunite with the love of his life after many years apart.

OK, Simon being Simon, many loves--and what seems like many lifetimes.

Still, he says, this woman has been in his mind and in his heart for many years. Recently widowed, she's coming from California to see Simon.

I was with him last week, and his mind was racing: if this happens, then maybe that will happen, and if she does this I could do that, or maybe the other, and I could say this and maybe she would say that, and what if something else happens, could I do another thing???????

Now, who am I to give advice about anyone's love life? But I had to say it—stop projecting—stop over-thinking—just react—be there in the moment—stop eating the menu—stop steering with the rear-view mirror.

Right now you're saying, "Eating the menu?" Sure. We go to a restaurant and we see one of our favorite dishes on the menu and start to remember how it tastes. Pretty soon we've conjured up a dandy image of the perfect meal. When it arrives at the table, we're too busy thinking about how it was in the past to taste it in the present.

"Steering with the rear view mirror?" Uh-huh. We can't possibly know with 100% certainty how any situation is going to turn out. So we try to predict by looking at what's happened in similar cases in the past. We drive full-speed ahead looking at what was and trying to predict what will be.

I told Simon to reject his preconceptions.

And that got me to thinking about Josh Littman.

Josh and I worked together 30+ years ago at WISH-TV in Indianapolis. Seems I learned a lot of useful things at WISH. Josh taught me, "Reject your preconceptions."

I've got to admit it. To my shame, I didn't think much of Josh when I first met him. He didn't look like much and he didn't sound like much. I guess I was in my "Reporters should look like movie stars and sound like studs" days (which I outgrew by the time I got to WABC). That's the first preconception I needed to get past. Josh helped kick it right out of me!

Once I started working with him I saw that he was all energy and enthusiasm and very, very sharp. He could throw himself into any story at break-neck speed and make it better. I've said over the years that I don't care about the reporter covering the plane crash: it's already a "10." I can send the station janitor (I mean, maintenance professional) out to cover a plane crash and it will come back a "10" every time. No, what I'm after are reporters who can turn "3s" into "6s" and "7s" into "10s." Enter, Josh Littman.

I was riding the assignment desk one day and sent Josh out to cover the annual home and garden show. He came back a couple of hours later, marched up to the desk, and said, "I’m here to apologize."

"What for?"

"I got a story, but it's not a very good one."

"Well, Jeez, Josh, I mean it was just the home and garden show."

And then he said something that took my breath away: "No, you don't understand. Over the next six days 100,000 people are going to go to the home and garden show. They're going because there's something there that fascinates them, or excites them, or something they're dying to learn. I couldn't get a handle on it, and I came to tell you I'm sorry."

Wow! Josh was teaching me that for a true reporter every story is a fresh story, and has a fresh angle.

In newspapers, reporters take a lot of their credibility from the masthead. Work for the Louisville Courier, you've got good cred--that's a good paper. Work for the New York Times, you've got all the credibility in the world. But in television news that's your face up there, and the folks at home will learn to respect you, to trust you, to like you. So DON'T EVER CHEAT THE AUDIENCE. Go for it all the time!!! I have this mental image that every night at 6:00 all over Indianapolis “Joe” was leaning forward in his chair and saying, “Mary, that Josh guy is on: better come here and see what he’s up to.” I know I felt that way.

Sadly, Josh Littman is no longer with us. Sometime after I left WISH, he did too—for WJBK in Detroit. There he learned he had leukemia. He spent the last months of his life making a documentary "Castles in the Sand" about his fight, his losing fight. I've never seen it. I'm torn between wanting to see Josh's last work and being afraid to. He taught me an important lesson about how to look at life, and I'm told he faced death rejecting his preconceptions.

Ironically, in my next job as News Director for WEEK-TV in Peoria, I won a reporting award--almost by accident--by thinking like Josh Littman.Channel 25 had a small staff in those days--fewer than 15 full-timers. One afternoon a small handful of us in the newsroom heard the scanners go off: report of a disaster at the local power plant, mass casualties being rushed to a local hospital.

In the newsroom: the 6PM producer, one reporter, two photographers, and me. The reporter and one photographer headed to the power plant, and I took the other photog. and raced to the hospital. Along the way we found out more. This was a coal-fired plant. Know what fly ash is? It's the incredibly fine residue left by burning coal. Something like 20 workers were digging a "fly ash receive pit" to bury thousands of cubic yards of the stuff when the flue carrying it overhead gave way and buried them.

Imagine: instantly blinded—coughing, gagging, drowning in gray ash—trying to "swim" out of the pit. Two men didn't make it. The rest were dragged to "shore," put on respirators and rushed to the hospital. My shooter and I beat the ambulances to the hospital. There we found 25 nurses, 25 oxygen tanks, 25 gurneys, and every doctor in the place waiting in the ER parking bay. When the ambulances pulled in teams of doctors and nurses went to work on the ash-covered survivors—and saved them all. And my photographer and I shot it all.

As the situation stabilized I went to the hospital head-man and told him how impressed I was with the response. He told me the facility had mock disaster drills all the time. When I asked when the last one was, he said "Two weeks ago."

"What was your scenario for the drill?" I asked.

"A disaster at the power plant."

And suddenly my story—a good story—turned into an excellent story. And I, years removed from holding a microphone, won a reporting award.

Thanks, Josh.

They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. For a young broadcast journalist, a little experience is a dangerous thing. You go to your 30th city council meeting, or your 40th fire, or your 10th murder, or your 5th haz-mat spill and you say to yourself, “I know how to cover this.”

Yeah. Everybody knows how to cover it. And that’s why everyone’s story looks exactly the same. I don’t give a damn for people who trot out the “Think Outside the Box” cliché. Tellwiddum. Treat every story as a new experience, a great chance to learn something new and share it with your audience. Be excited and involved in your stories. Reject your preconceptions.

I can’t guarantee you (or Simon) true love: only that you’ll be a better journalist.

"Weathering the Storm" (I Stole This Title)

Remember this? It's a National Lampoon magazine cover from 1973--voted one of the Top Ten covers in the last forty years by the American Society of Magazine Editors.

OK, now check out this promo from KWTV in Oklahoma City, shown on the "NewsBlues" media commentary site. Compare and contrast. Discuss amongst yourselves.



Do you get the same message I'm getting: "Watch Gary England during severe weather or your kids will die!"

I'm disappointed. I know Gary England. I worked with Gary England. Quite simply, Gary England invented severe weather reporting on television. He doesn't need to hype his coverage or his credentials. He's the founding father of tornado coverage as we know it. His warnings have saved countless lives over the years. No brag, just fact. Why, then, the over-the-top frantic mom clutching her frightened child to her bosom and hinting that maybe God can't save us, but "Gary England" can.

I know, I know: it markets the product.

Let me counter by saying that a simple recitation of the facts can "sell" viewers on KWTV's weather coverage better than any actors-dodging-the-special-effect-debris spot can.

Gary was the driving force behind KWTV's decision to become the source for severe weather information in the Midwest. He and his company, Enterprise Electronics, developed the world's first commercial Doppler radar. In the early 80s Gary became the first person to use Doppler radar for direct TV warnings to the public. He had the first color Doppler on TV. Those little "First Warning" weather maps you see in the corner of just about every TV screen in America? Gary England's idea.

And I don't care where you live, there's a 99.9% chance you've seen Gary England. He appears (in KWTV archive tape) in the first few minutes of the movie "Twister," airing a tornado warning. That's not acting, that's the real deal, actual tape of an actual broadcast. Gary is the real deal, too. He served as a technical adviser on that blockbuster film. Some years ago I met a terrific meteorologist from WHNT-TV in Huntsville, Alabama, Dan Satterfield, an Oklahoma native. He told me he saw Gary that night. Not the Gary depicted in the movie—the actual warning, that actual night. He said it changed his life and determined his future.

You’ve heard of “Da Man?” Gary England is “Da Weatherman!”

When I arrived in OKC as news director I thought I knew about tornadoes and severe weather coverage. Guess again! I inherited a weather department that operated with military precision, staffed 24/7, ready to go at all times. And I found that Gary England ran the station—or could, anytime he chose to. He had a switch at his desk that would fire up a camera and lights and microphone and override Master Control. He could literally get himself on the air in under five seconds! The decision had long since been made that in times of severe weather the on-duty meteorologist should take to the air instantly and stay on the air non-stop until the danger had passed. The entire news staff—the entire station—stood poised to take marching orders from Gary.

Let me make it clear: I had nothing to do with it. When it comes to weather coverage I can’t claim I did a single thing in my six months at KWTV except cheer from the sidelines and run for an occasional cup of coffee for the troops. My biggest achievement? Staying the hell out of the way so Gary and his team could save lives.

Gary has written an excellent book. “Weathering the Storm: Tornadoes, Television and Turmoil.” Fortunately it’s long on the drama behind the science of predicting storms and the excitement of live TV coverage—and short on the drama behind-the-scenes at KWTV. I’ve referred to that soap opera in another post. As Gary says of the 70s and 80s, “It was beginning to become a bit confusing—another boss and another set of rules, thirteen news directors in fifteen years.”

He doesn’t mention names, but I think there's a chance he’s referring to me when he writes, “The year 1988 arrived, and with it came another news director. My fourteenth boss was older, quiet, knowledgeable, and best of all had a healthy respect for meteorologists and our array of sophisticated equipment.”

Hard to say because of the revolving door in those days, but I'd like to think he’s talking about me as knowledgeable. I know I have a healthy respect for Gary and his pioneering work.

Maybe that’s why I was disappointed with the promo and its theme music and its sound effects. The reality of Gary England’s work has been on display to Oklahomans for more than 35 years. No brag, just fact.

------------------------------

(A late note: in re-reading Gary's book, I'm now convinced I'm NOT the "older, quiet, knowledgeable" chap referred to. Whoever he is--and I never met the man and have no recollection of his name--he was, I'm convinced, my predecessor.)

The Truth of the Matter

Now that I’m 60, I’m probably a little too old to go back to college for an advanced degree, so let me share with you what would have been the topic of my doctoral thesis:

TELEVISION IS A “TRUTH DETECTOR.”

Thank you, you’ve been great, I’ll be here all week, please tip your waitress.

What’s that? You want a more detailed explanation? OK, here it is, and a visual aid to boot:

Notice I didn’t say television is a “lie detector.” It’s not. Of all the people who have ever appeared on television, what percentage has been lying? Politicians—my guess is upwards of 90%. Lawyers—I’ll go with 75%. Sports figures—65%. Clergy—“survey says…” 50%.

But every once in awhile someone forgets about the camera, the microphone and the lights and just speaks the truth. Someone speaks from the heart, and it goes through the air at the speed of light and hits us in our hearts and suddenly we understand. Suddenly we know. And we care about people who obviously care so much that they'd bare their souls.

That’s why those of us who have been in TV for a long time aren’t quite so bothered by the mic-in-the-face-at-the-scene-of-the-fire story. We know that sometimes people really want to share their feelings. An ambush “How do you feel?” is, of course, the stupid, rote way to ask the question we all want to answered: “At this second, what do you want people to know about your life?”

If I keep referring in these posts to WABC, it’s because that’s where I learned my “Eyewitness News” lessons.

Strangely, I’ve never actually met Al Primo, the inventor/architect/creator/teacher of the “Eyewitness” format. Never met the man, but I’m his disciple (or is that “apostle,” I always get the two confused). Anyway, I learned from the people who learned from Al Primo. I think I’ll go into more detail about “Eyewitness” in future posts. My purpose here is to say that among the truths I learned in New York City 20+ years ago is that everyone wants to live in a small town. New York City is a small town! We all want to believe that if we had a problem we could knock on any door and tell our story to a kindly neighbor who would help. We all want to be cared for and about—and we all want to care for and about others. Guy jumps off a subway platform to save a man who fell under a moving train? I got tears in my eyes hearing him say that he just couldn’t do anything else, that he knew he had to help. He was telling us about his life, and he proved my point: TV is a “truth detector.”

I guess I knew that before WABC. I guess I first realized it watching Richard Nixon. That’s right—bear with me—Richard Milhous Nixon.

In August, 1974, Nixon resigned as President: we called it "Watergate," but it was a patchwork of lies and cover-ups and petty crimes that did him in, and he faced the music and the nation on the night of August 8th. Contrary to his repeated assurances, Richard Nixon was a crook: he used his office as a money-making scheme. And he was a liar. Time and again he looked the American people in the Cyclops eye of the TV camera and told blatant untruths. And yet—and yet—a majority of Americans believed him right up until the “smoking gun” recording of one of his Oval Office conversations made it clear what he knew, when he knew it, and that he’d been lying all along. He fell on his sword, insisting he was a man of honor, just as he was facing impeachment and removal from office.

Since the Watergate break-in a majority of the American people had bought the ticket and had taken the ride. Hey, what did we know? We watched him on TV. How were we supposed to know he was lying? Television is a lousy lie detector.

Not everyone remembers the next morning when Richard Nixon, surrounded by his stricken family, addressed White House staffers at an impromptu farewell in the East Room. He was (as was typical) sweating under the TV lights. He was (as usual) trying to be funny—and the man had no sense of humor. He was trying to be warm—and we had most often seen him coming across as stiff and wooden. I remember thinking that the only people who “got it” that morning were his staffers--openly weeping—and his family, trying to be brave while obviously devastated. It was a funeral service, and the only person in America who didn’t get it, was the corpse.

And then—and then—Nixon started talking about Teddy Roosevelt, and about the death of Roosevelt’s young wife. He put on a pair of glasses. We’d never seen Nixon in glasses before. And in a choked voice he read from TR’s diary: “And when my heart's dearest died—died, the light went from my life forever.” He was barely in control of his emotions. His voice caught. He was teary-eyed. Everyone in the room wept. I remember glazing over at the tragedy before me. And it was unfolding at the same second in living rooms around the country and around the world. Here was a broken man telling the truth about how he felt, and for the first time in my life I felt I KNEW him. I cared about him. I felt pity for him. I wished him peace. Amazing!

Nixon being Nixon, he finished with self-justification. The man who lived for revenge, who hated his enemies (and was sure he saw them lurking behind every White House pillar) went on to say, “Always give your best; never get discouraged; never be petty. Always remember others may hate you, but those who hate you don't win unless you hate them, and then you destroy yourself.” And I knew that Nixon, too.

Richard M. Nixon wrote his own epitaph that morning. I know. I saw it. Thanks to television I was there. And because television is a TRUTH DETECTOR I felt it in every bone of my body. I remember thinking, “The New York Times can write thirty full pages tomorrow on what just happened, but it won’t convey the experience I just had.”

And I thought, “My God, television is a wonderful tool.”

I spent the first few years of my career bemoaning the fact that I wasn’t a “journalist” like the folks working for newspapers. It dawned on me that day that I should work my side of the street and let them work theirs.

That’s even more true today in this time of cable news saturation and the Internet. The lines that used to so clearly delineate the news delivery systems have blurred. I don’t know how people will be getting their news 20 years from now (or even 20 months from now!). But I do know a camera and a microphone and the truth make a potent, irresistible combination.

I say we should seek to do more truth detecting. It works for us, and for our audience. And I think we should do less of the stuff that doesn’t work.

Sounds simple. But if I’m so smart, how come I ain’t rich?

By the way: here’s a link to a web page with the video of Nixon’s farewell speech as well as a full transcript. If you’re my age, it’ll bring back memories. If you can’t remember Nixon, here he is, warts and all. Here’s the truth detector at work.

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/richardnixonfarewell.htm

Getting a Kick(er) Out of Grimsby

I’ve posted before about WABC uber-anchor Roger Grimsby. Did I mention that he was a masterful writer?

Don’t know where he got it, but somehow over the years he seemed to have been granted carte blanche to write five or six segment “kickers” to end various blocks in the 6:00 o’clock news hour. No editing. No veto. For years Roger did an ABC Radio Network newscast each afternoon so he’d have an excuse to sit down and scan the wires looking for three or four stories that caught his fancy.

Of course the best was saved for last: the final spot in the final block at 6:00. Grimsby would come up on camera, and if he had that certain twinkle in his eye news director Cliff Abromats would groan, “Oh, no. Please Roger. Don’t do this to me. I’ve got a wife and a mortgage. I need this job. Please don’t do this to me.”

I committed to memory—more-or-less—one of my favorites. It went pretty much like this:

“Finally tonight, from Kansas City, the story of Ricky Smith, who wants to be known as Raquel. And to that end he is halfway through a series of sex-change operations which will turn him into a her. But police say he/she has been financing his/her re-gendering by sticking up liquor stores. They caught him/her last night, and now they’ve got a problem: do they throw HIM in the mens’ cells or HER in the womens’ cells?

(LONG PAUSE)

“Either way, it’s too early for a halfway house.

“Hoping your news is good news, I’m Roger Grimsby.”

Bill Beutel chuckles, the studio camera bobs and weaves while the cameraman tries to stifle his laughter, and Cliff Abromats turns and says, “I guess it could have been worse.”

Selective Perception

I'm knee-deep in writing my masterwork, my dissection of charges that the media are biased: longer than the Bible, footnoted throughout, sure to sell at least five or six copies to not-so-leading academics.

But you don't have to wait to plunk down your $49.95 at Amazon.com. Let me share with you one of my major conclusions: bias is in the eye of the beholder. You see what you expect to see. Your opinion is colored by--well, by your opinion! Anything that runs counter can be rationalized and explained away.

In the late seventies, at the annual convention of the Radio Television News Directors Association, Ted Koppel told this story to make the same point.

Guy gets home very late one night, very drunk, his wife is very upset. "Just where have you been?"

He says, "I've just been to the most fantashtic bar. It had a high blue ceiling with twinklin' lights like teeny-tiny stars. It had red velour on the walls. And in the bafroom it had a golden urinal."

His wife, disgusted, sent him to bed. But the next day, after he shame-facedly headed off to work, her curiosity got the better of her and she started calling around town looking for this "fantastic bar." No luck, until in the afternoon she got hold of a bartender.

"Excuse me, does your bar have a high blue ceiling with twinkling lights like little stars?"

"Yes, ma'am, yes we do."

"And do you have red velour on the walls?"

"Yes, ma'am, yes we do."

"This last question is a little embarrassing, but please bear with me: do you have a golden urinal?"

And the bartender covers the phone with his hand and shouts, "Hey, Ernie, I think I've got a lead on the guy who ruined your saxophone."

Selective perception: you see what you expect to see.

The Greatest Spectacle in Racing

Just finished a Memorial Day tradition, watching the Indianapolis 500. That's Dario Franchitti on the right, slugging down the traditional drink of milk (no one ever finishes the full bottle) after winning this year's rain-shortened 500, the 91st in Speedway history.

Of course my mind drifted back to when I drove the pace car at the 500, back in 1976.

OK, OK: it wasn’t the pace car, but it was a pace car. And it wasn’t in the race (or even on race day) but it was on the track.

I started as Executive Producer at WISH-TV in Indianapolis in April, ’76, knowing something about the famous race, but not knowing that in those days before NASCAR hit it big the 500 was the premier auto racing event in the world, and that it turned the entire town of Indianapolis on its ear for race month.

But I’m a fast learner. At the end of my first week, on a Saturday, I was getting gear stowed in my new desk when Sports Director Chet Coppock (I’ve written about him here before) walked into the newsroom, said he had some errands to run at the track, and asked if I’d like to tag along. Would I!

So we piled into his loaner car: a pace car replica. Don’t know if it’s still a 500 practice, but back then dignitaries and local sports figures were given replicas of the official pace car to drive around town for the month of May. Several dozen replicas were loaned out. Chet got one—a silver Buick LeSabre, if memory serves, with orange markings.

First stop, the Speedway Motel (the one at the top of Turn One, with the balconies overlooking the track). There we met up with Sid Collins, the long-time radio voice of the race. Sid was about to call his 25th Indy 500. No one knew then that it would be his last. A year later, less than a month before the 1977 race, Sid Collins killed himself after being diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s Disease (ALS). But on that long-ago Saturday, being with Sid Collins at the Brickyard was like being with Babe Ruth at Yankee Stadium: he couldn’t move ten feet without being asked for his autograph, and he couldn't have been a nicer guy.

As we left, Chet asked if I’d like to take the car around the track. “You’re kidding! They won’t let us do that!”

“Sure, if the track is empty, you can take it around.”

And so…I did!

First impression? The smoothest piece of interstate asphalt feels like a rutted gravel road compared to the racing surface at Indy. A hundred miles an hour felt like 35 on I-70. Next thing you know I was going 110, then 120, then 130 (the Buick didn’t have the full race tuning of the actual pace car, but it was plenty quick). That’s when Chet started narrating: “Over here is where Billy Vukovich was killed. ‘Course, that was back in ’55. Now up here is where Swede Savage crashed and burned just three years ago. But he didn’t die in the wreck; he died a month later from burns.”

Next thing you know I’m going 90, then 80, then 70.

That was fun, and memorable. But the experience of race day—the crowds, the colors, the people, the sounds—words fail me. When the command “Gentlemen, start your engines” was given, and all those cars started revving up, only to be drowned out by a half-million cheering fans—I tell ya, it took my breath away.

The race that year was cut short by rain, just like this year’s. Johnny Rutherford won the “Indianapolis 255:” the race was called 102 laps in, making it the shortest race in 500 history.

I remember pledging after that day that no matter where I was, no matter what I was doing, I’d always return to Indianapolis for the race. Sadly, I’ve only made one since. And every year I regret not being there for “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing.”

One other note. In those days the race was seen around the country on a tape-delay basis, hours later—except in Indianapolis. In Indy the ABC races played every year as a Christmas Week special: the track owners didn’t want to dilute their fan base by making the race to accessible for the locals: didn’t want to give them an excuse to stay home.

BUT, each TV station in town was allowed to shoot and air its own one-hour race-night special. The logistics of placing and manning the cameras, then rushing the film (in relays) back to the station for processing during the race, is a story I’ll save for another time.

I've been to an NFL championship game--pre Super Bowl, December 27, 1964 when "my" Browns won football's biggest game. I've been to a World Series game. I've never been to an NBA playoff game, or a Stanley Cup final. But what’s the line from that old movie: “Friend, I been to two state fairs a rodeo and a goat show and I ain’t never seen nothin’” like the Indianapolis 500.

Congratulations to Dario Franchitti, the winner of the 91st Indianapolis 500. Hope you had as much fun in ’07 as I had in ’76.

Some Thoughts from Howard Beale

And he said it in 1976, in the movie "Network." Which means that Paddy Chayefski wrote it.

No, this isn't the "I'm Mad as Hell" speech. This is something scarier.

"Right now there is a whole, an entire, generation that never knew anything that didn't come out of this Tube. This Tube is the gospel, the ultimate revelation. This Tube can make or break presidents, popes, prime ministers. This Tube is the most awesome, goddamn force in the whole godless world, and woe is us if it ever falls into the hands of the wrong people...Listen to me. Television is not the truth. Television is a Goddamned amusement park! Television is a circus, a carnival, a traveling troupe of acrobats, story-tellers, dancers, singers, jugglers, side-show freaks, lion tamers and football players. We're in the boredom killing business! So, if you want truth go to God. Go to your gurus. Go to yourselves because that's the only place you're ever going to find any real truth. But, man, you're never gonna get any truth from us. We'll tell you anything you want to hear. We lie like hell. We'll tell you that, uh, Kojak always gets the killer and that nobody ever gets cancer at Archie Bunker's house. And no matter how much trouble the hero is in, don't worry. Just look at your watch. At the end of the hour he's going to win. We'll tell you any shit you want to hear. We deal in illusions, man! None of it is true! But you people sit there day after day, night after night, all ages, colors, creeds...We're all you know. You're beginning to believe the illusions we're spinning here. You're beginning to think that the Tube is reality and that your own lives are unreal. You do whatever the Tube tells you. You dress like the Tube; You eat like the Tube; You raise your children like the Tube; You even think like the Tube. This is mass madness! You maniacs! In God's name, you people are the real thing. We are the illusion! So turn off your television sets. Turn them off now. Turn them off right now. Turn them off and leave them off. Turn them off right in the middle of this sentence I'm speaking to you now. Turn them off!"

I saw "Network" with a friend who was working in news for one of the "Big Three" networks. As we drove away from the theater she said, "I know those people." 31 years later I think we all know those people. The scary thought is that perhaps we are those people!

If it's been awhile since you've seen William Holden, Faye Dunaway, Robert Duvall and Peter Finch (as deranged anchorman Howard Beale) you owe it to yourself to take another look at "Network." See if you can spot Walter Cronkite's daughter in a bit part!

You May Quote Me...I Guess

I said it…sort of.

Some people know me for my all-inclusive description of what makes a compelling television news story:

ACTION, REACTION…
MOTION, EMOTION…
WHAT YOU SEE IS WHAT YOU SAY,
AND THE GOOD STUFF GOES UP TOP.

A dear friend even had it framed for me; it was on the wall of several of my offices over the years.

It’s really self-explanatory. The stories that reach out and grab you are the ones that contain action, reaction, motion and emotion. TV doesn’t do a very good job of showing what people are thinking. That’s why the city council meeting probably doesn’t produce interesting TV unless someone is ranting and raving: action, reaction, emotion. Space shuttle takes off: action, reaction, motion and (possibly) emotion. Think of any story that ever made you lean forward in your La-Z-Boy and my guess is the more of those four elements it contained the more caught up you became.

“What you see is what you say” means that the words and pictures better match—exactly. When I was in Miami anchor J.D. Roberts (now “John” Roberts of CNN) and I had a running disagreement over having the words and pictures coincide. My contention was that if you were saying “The cow jumped over the moon” you’d better see the cow…jumping…over the moon. His idea was that the “MTV Generation” could process audio and video separately and simultaneously. He contended that complementary information could be conveyed at the same time; that the whole could be the sum of the two parts.We went ‘round and ‘round. Finally, when one of our news consultants came to town, I asked his opinion. He told me he didn’t have an opinion, he had fact: that several research studies had been done and that all showed it was cleaner and clearer to present information if both audio and video matched. He said it demands too much attention to ask people to weave two separate strands into a whole—better to do it for them. So what you see had better match what you say.

“The good stuff goes up top” means that you put your most compelling story at the top of the broadcast and your most compelling video at the top of each story. Put the hook into your viewers and don’t let them go.

Bad news for telegenic reporters: no matter how attractive you are, the best video is probably not your face! So no stand-ups at the top of the story. No talking heads, either, unless the sound itself is the most compelling part of the story: the mother of the kidnapped child asking for help, Vice President Cheney glaring and denouncing detractors.

Yup, that’s everything you need to know about putting together a compelling news story.

And I said it.

I just didn’t say it first.

And I don’t know who did! I got it (a gift, as it were) from a photographer named Tom Lehnen at the old WOOD-TV in Grand Rapids more than 35 years ago. Tom may have been the best photographer I ever worked with: he had an uncanny eye, a great sense for what was going on around him, a terrific rapport with the common man. That’s because he was an “Average Joe.” I don’t think he graduated from high school. He was not a lettered man. The only time I ever saw him read anything it was a newspaper—or some publication that would make him a better photographer. I visited him at home: not a book or a magazine in the place. So while he was a brilliant man, I don’t think I’m doing him a disservice by saying that I’m sure the “Action, Reaction” mantra wasn’t his. He never told me where it came from.

A quick sidebar. Tom got his first job in TV while working in the camera department at a local K-Mart. A reporter and photographer from WZZM-TV were filming in the store when the shooter fainted. After an ambulance hauled him away, the reporter asked if any bystander could finish shooting the story. Tom Lehnen, who had never held a 16mm camera in his life stepped up—and stepped into his new career.

As good as he was (and as I said, I think he was the best I’ve ever seen) he was frustrated because he couldn’t get better, faster. His drive was always pushing him for more, more, more. Sometime in the late 70s he got frustrated enough, I’m told, that he got out of the business. I don’t know where Tom Lehnen is today. If anyone out there does, let me know.

And I don’t know the origin of the phrase I sort of co-opted. If you do, let me know and I will gladly give credit where credit is due.

So You Wanna be a News Director?

Then I have a tip for you.

When you visit your prospective new employer, as part of your "due diligence" ask to be left alone in the News Director's office. Shut the door. Close the blinds. When you're sure no one can see, turn over the desk chair and look for a label on the bottom of the seat.

If you find one that says, "In Emergency Seat Back May be Used as Flotation Device," govern yourself accordingly.

The last survey I remember seeing said the average ND's tenure remains under 2 1/2 years. That means for everyone like WISH's Lee Giles who served 30+ years at one station, there's someone else who's out after 30+ weeks!

Seriously: the times I've gotten into trouble have all been when I didn't know what I was getting or my new boss didn't know what he (or she) was getting. Be careful!

A good friend once said that being a news director is like being a pro basketball coach. The day you're hired, you're also fired--we just haven't worked out the timetable.

Fingernails on the Blackboard

I heard it again today. It drives ma crazy! You’d think I’d be used to it by now. You hear it everywhere. No one complains. No one but me. And I’m right. The “Radio Reader” told me so!

A talk-show host on one of our local stations, WILK, went to a commercial break saying, “This is Dub-You-I-L-K.”

The 23rd letter of the alphabet is pronounced duhb-uhl-yoo. I learned that from Dick Estell in my first (and only) radio announcing class at Michigan State in the mid-sixties. Recognize the name? Dick still appears on many public radio stations every day reading books as “The Radio Reader.” Today you can buy audio books narrated by Dick Estell, but the truth is that reading books on-air goes back to the beginnings of radio. Michigan State’s radio station, WKAR, had a daily reading show as far back as the mid-1930s. Larry Frymire was “The Radio Reader” for twenty years. When he retired in 1964 WKAR’s young General Manager, Dick Estell, took over the duties—in addition to running the station and teaching classes. Dick was instrumental in the formation of National Public Radio and served as board Chairman from 1972-74. Even though he retired from MSU in 1986, he continues to produce “The Radio Reader” from his home.

On our very first day in Dick’s class he had each of us tape a mock newscast for WKAR. When he critiqued mine, he taught me two valuable lessons.

First, he told me to look at the letter “W” and see it for what it is: a double-“U.” Got it! I was reporting for Double-You-K-A-R, not Dub-You-K-A-R.

Then he asked, “If a cow moos and a kitten mews, how do you pronounce N-E-W-S?” Got it! It’s not “Dub-you-K-A-R Noos,” it’s “Double-You-K-A-R knews.”

One other note about “The Radio Reader.” Dick’s habit (one that I imagine hasn’t changed) was to read each book “cold,” without so much as skimming through it. He said that he liked discovering the work a page at a time, just the way a reader (or listener) at home would. He had a safety valve: he recorded each book weeks in advance. That way if he found, halfway through, say, that the book was worthless he could abandon it and move on to the next without torturing his audience. He’s read more than 500 books on-air in his more than 40 years behind the WKAR mic.

Oh, and he was also—for many, many years—the public address voice of the Michigan State Spartans football team. He has a clear, bell-like voice. Good guy. Good teacher. Obviously, I learned my first lessons from him well enough that they’ve stood the test of time.

In Harm's Way

I couldn’t have picked a more interesting time to work in Oklahoma City than 1988. KWTV produced and aired Oklahoma State University head football coach Pat Jones’ weekly TV show. Who knew the “Cowboys” were going to go 10-2? Who knew Barry Sanders was going to become a superstar at running back and win the Heisman trophy? Who knew that the Heisman announcement would be made while Oklahoma State was in Tokyo, Japan (of all places) where the team was playing Texas Tech in the “Coca-Cola Bowl?” Who knew that we’d arrange a live-from-Japan satellite interview with Barry right after the announcement in New York? Really a memorable football season for OSU football, for the station that billed itself “The Spirit of Oklahoma” and for me.

Also memorable because of KWTV General Manager Duane Harm.

When I started as news director Harm told me, “You can delegate some responsibility—but never trust anyone. That way you’ll never be surprised when they screw you. And they’ll always screw you.” Duane Harm ran his station and lived his life by those words.

Here’s how the coach’s show worked. Our KWTV crew, led by Sports Director Bill Teegins, would shoot the game then hurry back to the station the 60 miles from Stillwater, edit the highlights, and prepare for coach Jones’ live studio appearance at 11:00 Sunday morning.

That’s fine for a home game. But what if the game is on the road? The charter plane gets back to Stillwater at, say, midnight (or later). Then it’s back to the station at 1:00 a.m. (or later!), edit highlights for four or five hours, catch a quick nap (if you’re lucky) and air the show.

Duane Harm let me know that a good news director, a smart news director, a news director who didn’t trust anyone would find some excuse—any excuse—to “accidentally” show up at 4:00 Sunday morning. That way a smart news director could catch the crew goofing off and nip it (and them?) in the bud.

Duane’s suspicion was that he was being taken for a ride. My suspicion was that by 4:00 Sunday morning we had a crew that hadn’t seen a shower, a toothbrush or a bed in about 20 hours. But I desperately wanted to get off to a good start with my new boss, so I started showing up at 4:00.

I showed up, though, with two dozen donuts, fresh coffee, and an offer to play “go-fer” and do anything I could to help. I don’t know how much help I was, but maybe I provided a little moral support and I enjoyed being a part of the process.

As I said, that was Barry Sanders’ superstar, Heisman-winning year. The show was terrific, Pat Jones was what you’d expect from a big-time college football coach (whip smart, entertaining, a walking advertisement for his school and his program), and the dedicated efforts of the sports staff made it a big success.

The story has several endings; not all of them happy.

I left KWTV not too long after the football season. I told Duane Harm that I didn’t know why he had hired me in the first place, that I couldn’t be the kind of news director (or person) that he wanted me to be.

Some months later Duane Harm left KWTV; and here’s where things get cloudy. I have no personal knowledge of what happened, I can only tell you what little birdies told me. KWTV was and is owned by the Griffin family. After the death of company founder John Griffin, there were (the story goes) a lot of questions about how station money was spent. Specifically, I’m told, the Griffins (husband and wife) had signed a lot of paperwork Duane Harm had put in front of them without (it was said) really looking it over: like leases on a lot of equipment (cars, live trucks, a helicopter) that turned out to be owned by members of Duane Harm’s family. An insider told me that folks named Harm made a lot of money leasing equipment to people who thought they already owned it.

I do know that when a luxurious state-of-the-art horse racing track opened in OKC, KWTV had the most lavishly decorated suite in the place (to entertain clients, we were told); and I knew that Duane's wife did the decorating and spent (here's that word again) lavishly. Apparently the Griffin family didn't know it.

One day (I’m told by someone who was there) the staff was assembled, told that Duane Harm was no longer with the station, and asked to exchange their door keys for ones that matched the new locks.

Maybe when Duane told me that employees will always try to screw you, he was speaking from personal experience. There apparently were lawsuits and countersuits, but in the end everything was quietly settled.

Nice note: some time after Harm's departure I got a call from David Griffin, John’s son, who was trying to sort things out. He said he’d had individual meetings with every single employee to talk about the station’s direction. He said one question he had asked was, “What’s the biggest mistake we’ve made in the last few years?” and that many people had said letting me resign. On the phone, on the spot he offered me the job back. It was tempting—I really liked OKC and almost all of the people at KWTV—but I was already working for the CBS O-and-O in Miami, and didn’t want to look back.

Bill Teegins (whose real name was spelled “Tietgens”) eventually became the radio play-by-play voice of both the Oklahoma State football and basketball teams. In January, 2001, three chartered planes left Denver after a basketball game against the University of Colorado. The one carrying Bill, two players, a flight crew of two and five others connected to the basketball team crashed. All ten died. A memorial has been erected at the crash site 40 miles outside Denver, and there's another with a statue of a kneeling cowboy on the OSU campus in Stillwater. Bill was 48, and left a wife and daughter. I didn’t realize until I did some research as I started writing this that he was an eight-time winner of the Oklahoma Sportscaster of the Year award. That figures. He was good enough to win it, and modest enough not to talk about it. A good man.

Focusing on Film

On a shelf here in my den—where I can put my hands on it at any time—is a Bell & Howell 70-DR camera. Sometimes I pick it up just to feel its solid weight. I put my left hand through the worn leather strap, use the wing-shaped key to wind it up, brace its bulk against my forehead and crank off a few imaginary feet of film.

That’s right—film. 16mm single-perf Kodak film. Silent (you saved the more expensive magnetic stripe, or "mag-stripe" film for your bulky sound cameras). Kodak film: Ektachrome 7242 for daylight or 7240 for use indoors under tungsten light. Of course, in a pinch you coulduse 7240 film outdoors by putting an 85B filter in the filter holder. The orange tint of the filter brought the tungsten film closer to daylight: otherwise tungsten film shot outdoors would be bluish.

I twist the turret and bring one of the three lenses into position—and the ratchet brings the proper viewfinder lens into place. That, of course, is the difference between the DR and the DL. With the DL you had to manually move the viewfinder lens every time you changed lenses. With the DR when you rotated the lens turret you were rotating the viewfinder turret as well. No zoom lenses here! “Through-the-lens” viewing?—hardly. In theory the viewfinder lens showed you what you were getting on film. In theory.

Focus you can guess—especially at larger f-stops. f22 for bright sun on snow—f16 for bright sun—f11 for overcast. All the way down to wide open (f1.9) at night under a frezzi lamp. Remember, though, that if you’re going to shoot wide open in low-light you probably ought to use a wide-angle lens to minimize focus problems.

Did I just say, “Remember, though?” I did, didn’t I? How the HELL do I remember those obscure facts from almost forty years ago? I have no idea.

My first job at WOOD-TV in Grand Rapids, back in 1969, was producing the 11:00 p.m. news. But I knew I was in my apprenticeship years, and that anything new I could learn, anything more I could learn, would pay off for me down the road. I went to Chief Photographer Tom O’Rourke and told him I wanted him to teach me how to shoot film.

“What makes you think I’m going to give you an expensive film camera to play with?”

“Well, how about high school football games on Friday nights? You never have enough photographers to go around.”

“Kid, now you’re making sense.”And that’s how I tricked Tom O’Rourke into teaching me how to shoot football games—how to wander the sidelines about 20 yards ahead of the line of scrimmage—when to move from the sideline to the end zone for the (anticipated) touchdown—what to do when you get trampled on a sideline play (jump up quickly and pretend you’re not in agony).

Film was expensive. Our 70-DRs took 100-foot reels. At 24 frames a second, 33 feet a minute, one spool was good for just over three minutes of exposed film. By the time you factored in film processing (every TV station had its own on-site lab), it cost 14½ cents to shoot a foot of film (and how did I remember that?). You wanted to keep costs to a minimum, so in a medium-sized market like Grand Rapids Tom O’Rourke had us aiming for a 3-to-1 film ratio. That is, for every three minutes of footage you shot the station hoped (expected, demanded) one minute would make it to air. If you got to 4-to-1 or (God forbid) 5-to-1, you were either working in a big market with money to burn or working on a special project. Tom kept a chart that showed each photographer’s shooting ratio.

The joke—absolutely apocryphal—is that O’Rourke once sent a photographer to a minor league hockey game with 100 feet of film. When the photog. complained and asked how he was supposed to shoot an entire match on one roll of film, O’Rourke (it was said), replied, “Easy. Just shoot the goals.” Obviously untrue—but a cute legend.

That, of course, was the first thing we noticed when we (the TV news industry) switched to videotape in the early 70s: shoot as much as you want of anything you want. We can always reuse the tape later.
The old Bell & Howell 70s were the workhouse of the newsreel and TV news business for decades. You can still find them on eBay—even, occasionally, brand-new government surplus DRs in factory cases. But even if you could find film, and if you shot some footage, and if you wanted to get it on TV, I don’t know how you'd do it today. Not many photo labs handle 16mm film anymore—and few TV stations can air it. Film projectors are almost nonexistent in most TV stations. Too bad. Film was fun.

I was around for film's final days. One of my chores at WABC in New York in the early eighties was to find a buyer for the station’s film freezer: a huge walk-in meat locker used to keep the film fresh. But WABC was a film holdout, keeping some film crews on staff until about 1982 and mostly, if memory serves, for union reasons. Those were the days. Cameraman, soundman, lighting man (and I mean no sexist disrespect: 99.99% of the crews were male).

Field Producer Eddie Galorenzo once told me of the problems of a five-person crew (five when you add the field producer and the reporter): “No matter what you need to do and when you need to do it, somebody’s always off taking a pee.”

Forget the debate about the aesthetics of film, about which looks better—tape of film. Forget the fact that an ENG camera’s output can be beamed back via microwave or satellite for live news coverage. Film had a couple of advantages from a reporter’s perspective.

First, the film had to be processed: which meant you got to finish your day in the station! No trying to write a complete script in a notebook, no trying to record an audio track in the back of a live truck.

Second, you knew it was going to take at least a half-hour for the film to come out of the lab and be ready for editing. That meant you were in the station, at your typewriter (no computers, kiddies!) with time to craft your piece. Yeah, we lacked immediacy. With film runs at, say, 10:30 a.m., 2:00 p.m., 3:00 p.m. and 4:30 p.m., that 5:45 fire didn’t get on until 11:00.

Want to know the scariest thing in a producer’s world back then? Going back to the lab at 5:00 to see how the film run was coming—and finding the door locked. A locked door meant that the lab was sealed—a sealed lab meant it was dark in there—dark meant that there was a processor problem (the film probably jumped off one of the guide rollers) and the technician had opened the light-tight processor trying to fix it—and you stood outside trying to figure out what to do if two-thirds of your newscast was lost in a vat of chemicals. It happened.

The film went over-and-under, over-and-under, over-and-under a series of rollers through various tanks of processing chemicals—then through a dryer box where hot air and light bulbs finished the job. Hundreds and hundreds of feet of film working its way through the "soup" during a film run. I remember a day when the dryer broke, and sticky wet film started coming out of the machine. Somebody got a huge take-up reel and sat with it in a chair about twenty yards down the hall while the rest of us ran up and down with borrowed hair dryers trying to save the run.

Adapt—improvise—overcome. We had our film that night.

What else? When my friend Elden Hale was news director at WNEP in Scranton/Wilkes-Barre in the early 70s he got a great buy on some “double perf” film stock: with sprocket holes (which pulled the film through the camera) on both sides, instead of on one side like single-perf. I was visiting Elden and watched as his lead story got on upside-down and backwards. Back to single perf!

Teases, bumpers, promos, headlines: sick of seeing the same shot over and over and over and over again? Not in the film days. Catch the building collapsing on film? Great! It goes in your story. But there’s no way to use and re-use it until you get it dubbed to tape. When I was starting out that meant 2” tape (no 3/4” yet). Not an easy thing to do in most medium-sized TV stations in the early 70s.

Let’s end with a primer on B-Roll and DP.

The term “B-Roll” is still used today—it refers to a shot laid over a jump cut to minimize the distraction. But what does it mean? DP (“double projection”) was rolling two film projectors for the same story. At WOOD, with an hour-long newscast, we might use 20 minutes of film telling our stories—but only use DP to cover jump cuts in five or six stories.
Your main film reel was spliced together, in order. It was loaded on your main film projector. The DP, maybe a minute-and-a-half in all, was spliced together (again, in order) and loaded onto your secondary film projector. Since the main film was on the “A” projector, the DP reel became your “B-Roll.” B-Roll covers jump cuts, get it?

Here endeth the lesson.

Meryl and Me

OK, make that "Meryl and I," as in "Meryl Streep and I had a conversation about TV news. "

I was sitting at the WABC assignment desk early one morning, maybe 7:30, answering phones. The voice on the other end said, "This is Meryl Streep, and I have a complaint."

Y'know how sometimes you just "get" that the person on the other end of the line is for real? Maybe it was the anger in her voice, and I knew it was Meryl Streep and I knew she was upset, so I asked what was on her mind.

She told me she was watching Good Morning America, that she liked the show, but that she couldn't stand the local news cut-ins: they were all doom-and-gloom and body counts (my words, not hers--but you get the idea). She said she was trying to raise children in the city (I think she said two, but I'm not sure), and that she didn't want her children growing up thinking the world around them was evil and ugly and dangerous.

So I got the chance to trot out "Standard Reply #17:" "I understand completely, and certainly sympathasize with you. You have to remember, though, that we're in the 'news' business, and NOT MUCH NEW happens overnight that's not bad for someone. The Mayor doesn't cut many ribbons on new bridges at 2:00 a.m.--the cure for cancer won't be announced at 3:00 a.m.--the Knicks won't win the NBA championship at 4:00 a.m."

No, I explained to her, the "new" news overnight is pretty much murders and fires and robberies (lions and tigers and bears, oh my!).

I think she got my point, and I know I got hers; but it's even more of a concern today. In the 25 years since she and I talked local news has gone in for more camera-pointing and less reporting. Al Primo's "Eyewitness News" concept preached taking people to the scenes of stories, introducing them to the participants and letting them get the same feeling they'd have gotten had they been there themselves by giving them a balanced look at the facts.

It was "we report, you decide" decades before Fox--but there was more reporting back then, more tackling of tough topics, more making sense out of complicated issues for the viewer.

How do you make sense out of a dead body on a New York street corner?

Ironically, I think the networks did an excellent job covering the biggest non-war "body count" story of this decade, the Virginia Tech massacre. They certainly did the "Ain't it a shock?" and "Ain't it a shame?" stories, but then they went further. They quickly got to "What does it mean? and "What does it mean to you?" and "What can we learn?? and "How do we prevent it from happening again?"

Felt like "Eyewitness" to me.

Mean is as Mean Does

I’ve talked here about mean bosses. I guess I forgot to mention me!

Honest to God, I’ve never considered myself mean. Often straightforward, sometimes blunt, always demanding, but never (at least to my way of thinking) mean-spirited.

There’s a story that refutes that claim. My-right-hand-on-the-Bible, I don’t remember this at all; but I’m told it’s true by an absolutely unimpeachable source: Jerry Giesler. Jerry was a reporter and anchor when I was news director for WEEK-TV in Peoria in the mid-70s. He’s since gone on to an excellent career in news and station management. Last I heard he was running a station in Ft. Wayne.

Jerry swears this story is true, and who am I to doubt him? But if called upon by a Congressional committee, my answers would all be along the lines of, “Senator, I don’t recall.” “Not that I’m aware of, Senator.” “It depends on your definition of ‘is,’ Senator.” Or maybe just a plain, “Who, me?”

And I don’t recall the circumstances: but apparently Jerry and his photographer had just made a major gaffe on a big story and were returning to the Channel 25 newsroom after having pretty badly screwed the pooch.

I’m told (“…by reliable sources, Senator”) that I reached them on the two-way radio and had a conversation that went something like this:

“I want you two to pull over to the side of the road.”

“What?”

“Pull over to the side of the road.”

“Pull over to the side of the road??????????????”

“You heard me.”

“Why?”

“Don’t ask questions, just do it.”

“Uh, wait a second.”

“I don’t have a second. You need to pull over to the side and stop.”

“OK.”

“Are you stopped?”

“Yes. Why did you have us stop?”

“Because we have a company policy that only station employees can drive station vehicles.”

LLLoooooooonngg pause.

As I say, I have no recollection of any such incident, Senator. But if it did happen—and Jerry Giesler is an honorable man, who can doubt him?—it was kind of funny, wasn’t it? A little bit, maybe?