Regrets, we have a few

I'm going to break my thoughts into several different posts, in order to keep from being confused with Ragu.

What did I learn as a broadcasting major? How to cue up 33 and 45 records and make smooth transitions/seques, the difference between monodirectional and omnidirectional mics, how to read a "hot clock", how to run a board with twist pots, how to erase and record on carts, how to splice reel-to-reel tape (I have the block somewhere), how to record (without sound) and edit by hand Super 8 film, how to hand-record log entries and monitor transmitter readings, how to carry a wooden tripod, a 1-inch video recorder and a bulky full-size "portable" TV camera.

And I'll bet that's the case with almost any job -- my drafting major roommate at Fresno State who laboriously hand-drew screws and camshafts on a drafting table with an mechanical pencil and templates is probably using whatever has replaced CAD.

Exactly NONE of my "physical radio skills" exist today, unless you find a museum. And even my voice has lost its timbre. Last time I was in an actual radio station, everything was tap and touch on a computer monitor. When I got let go from Turner Sports in 2017, I called Doug Turnbull at WSB for fun and asked if he needed a fill-in traffic reporter. But they didn't have a single cassette machine to listen to my last air check.

So technology that was cutting edge in 1977 was useless within no more than 15 years, which -- along with the terrible pay and working hours -- was one reason why there were so few 30-year-olds in radio news in 1988. I became, in essence, a dinosaur. I should be extinct. But Darwin's theory applies just as much to journalism as evolution: Adapt or die.

Now the good news: What I learned in the news and script writing and copy editing classes has always been transferable, whether I was typing on a manual, an IBM selectric, a Trash 80 or a Dell laptop. The AP Style Guide, the 26 letters, punctuation and spaces haven't changed significantly over 45 years -- and if anything, I was a damn sight better at it by then from sheer repetition and deadline pressure. Those skills have been invaluable, whether I was on the air, in print or on the Internet.

The only thing that has changed was the technology used to transmit the message. And that will continue to be the case. The world is speeding up, not slowing down. Whatever you're doing now is going to change dramatically. And all you can do is use your core skills to get a leg up on the next big thing. Don't be a dinosaur.

 

In 1980 to write a headline I had to:

1. Write down a headline idea I thought would work.
2. Count the spaces---letters such as W/O/m/e/l each had different counts---to make sure it (probably) would work.
3. Hand the sheet of paper to a person at a machine who would actually produce the headline in the size requested.
4. Watch the composing room person place the headline, cutting it apart between words and squeezing them together if my count was slightly off.

A few months later I was introduced to the joy of Atex and the delight of seeing ***LINE FULL*** when a headline fit perfectly.

 

Just nothing better than three stacked flashing **LINE FULL ** indicators. Like hitting a jackpot. (Yes, we deskers took our dopamine hits wherever we could get them.)

 

My first writing job after college was as a copywriter and traffic manager for a rock radio station in Wisconsin's Fox River Valley. A lot of my colleagues were graduates of the Brown Broadcasting Institute in the Twin Cities. A lot of the skills you menti0on were the ones they learned at Brown. With that crew, I enjoyed the most creative 12 months of my working life. Everything after that was a descent into adulthood. If I'd been heir to a vast fortune, I might still be playing with radio.

 

I was trying to explain to some college kids recently how we used to lay out our paper as collegians (print out the layout, paste it up, crop photos using that circular cropping thingie, drive it to the printer). If they weren't interested, they did a good job of feigning it, But even as I spoke, I was like, I may as well be telling them we hammered out the paper on stone tablets.

 

I still have my pica pole. Makes a great back scratcher.

 

I don’t miss developing film.

 

I use an old pica ruler as a straightedge for cutting my hobby materials.

 

That smell still makes me cringe.

Last I knew, the darkroom inside the campus newspaper office was a library. Which frankly is a solid utilization of space.

 

Photo chemical stains on clothes were fun, especially at my last photo job at a newspaper where there was a dress code requiring what I call “Sunday school clothes.”

Some of the stains weren’t obvious until they oxidized a bit and turned dark. Usually I could use laundry treatments to at least lighten them up a bit. I usually bought neckties that were dark or had pronounced bold patterns.

 

The wonder wheel. And the pica pole made a great weapon. My colleague stuck one in the wallboard in a fit of anger. The hole reminded everyone not to f*ck with sports on deadline.