In 1925, I was born in Ashley, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Wilkes Barre, PA and at age 18 months, my family moved to the country (Alberts, Pennsylvania). I grew up working on my Uncle’s and Grandfather's farms. I graduated from Fairview High School and then enlisted in the Navy and took my Boot training at Sampson NTS (in Romulus, NY).
I attended Navy Radio School, and then served aboard the USS Tennessee BB-43 as a Radio Operator for three years. After returning home, I found myself without a job so I attended Philadelphia Wireless Tech. at 16th and Pine (in Center City Philadelphia).
After graduation, I worked for 6 months at WBRE in Wilkes Barre in order to get an endorsement of my 1st class license (now called a General License). I worked at a few small stations before landing at KYW in the early fifties. The Chief Engineer at WBRE found me a position with WDOV in Dover, Delaware.
From there it was back to WBRE and then when a returning GI came back, it was on to WEEX in Easton, PA. While at WEEX, I received a call from an old friend telling me that KYW was looking for an engineer full time. It took me about one hour to be at the Studios of KYW at 1619 Walnut St, after the interview was over I was hired.
A year later, KYW had a cutback and I was cut from the roster and moved to WCAU for the next 6 months. In the mean time, there was a change at KYW and I was recalled to KYW and stayed there for the next 40 years. started as a Studio Eng. also worked at the transmitter. During the Newsradio operation I was the Production/Jingle/recording engineer and finally the studio supervisor until I retired.
I married Fay Snyder, formerly of Mountain Top, PA in 1950. Fay and I had two Sons, Christopher and Scott. Fay Died in 1989 and Christopher, deceased at age 36 in 1996. Scott, a retired LT. after serving in the Navy for 25 years, and family now lives in Maryland. I retired on January 15, 1991 and have been very happy since.
Most memorable occasions are hard to boil down to two or three but I will try. The day we started ALL NEWSRADIO in September sixty five would be first. Three Mile Island second, Moving the Liberty Bell third and last the weekend that GM Bob Whitney threw a wild weekend party after getting out or the RED for the first time.
Two or three most memorable people are another tough question. Andrea Mitchell has to be first. News Director, Ron Myers, came into my studio with a young lady who was his secretary (Andrea) and told me she would like to become a newsperson; would I cut a few audition tapes with her. I did and after a few weeks' work, I told her she needed to slow down and then she took some speech work and some lessons with the Evelyn Woods speed reading courses. We all know how successful this former secretary is today.
Bill Bransome would be second, simply because he was a former DJ and wanted to stay on just to see if he could become a good newsman and again we all know how that turned out. Sandy Starobin who was the Harrisburg bureau chief and a character. He even kept feeding reports after he became blind. I don’t know how he did it but I did admire his strong desire to keep reporting until the end. That’s three but there are many more and I don’t want to take up more time.
I think NEWSRADIO was so successful because management was convinced that it was the radio of the future. They were convinced KYW could become number one in our area and were going to supply us with the tools to do the job. I think we only had about four or five holdovers and hired a whole new crew of newsmen and editors. Westinghouse set up Bureaus; Charles Beirbauer from Bonn, Bernie Redmont from Paris; Rod McLeish from London along with Gene Pell and Fred Kennedy. Jim Slade and Sid Davis headed up Washington D.C. We all shared information between stations and that in my opinion was the start of success. I think like most successful companies, the new owners have tried to increase income by cutting down on personnel.
The oversea bureaus are no more. The Washington D.C. office is gone and where there were about ten Techs, there is now none. To day I hear stuff on the air that would not have been allowed is those days. But what do I know. I’m now an old man who has been around the track a few times and should keep my opinion to myself.
