I love it! Dan Rather sues CBS for $70 million dollars!

[Radio_Lady]

Dan Rather

It's because of people like Dan Rather that pioneer broadcasters, both male and female, can get some payback from those for whom they have toiled these many years. More power to you, guy.

In my 50 year career in media, which began in 1957, I might have had cause to sue at least three employers somewhere along the way, that is, if the laws had been as they are today. Here's my story:

Ford Foundation, New York City -- (1968) I believe this was my direct employer, but I may have held this job through a temporary agency (Tempositions) during the summer I was pregnant with my first daughter in 1968. I was due to give birth the first week in October, but they let me go in August. This was supposedly because I took a slight fall on their shiny, slippery parquet floor. I wasn't hurt at all, but I was asked to leave immediately – whisked out the door.

Truthfully, I worked for a woman manager whose name was Siobhan whom I did not like very much from the beginning. She was sort of snooty, and heading up the department that processed grant requests. I was a secretary there for a couple of weeks, but they offered me the job for a longer term. I was making some suggestions to her, mostly clerical stuff as she was involved with grant requests.

The job was really kind of boring. Maybe she felt I was competing with her in some way and was after her job! That was not true. While I wanted to work as long as possible before the birth, I definitely wanted to stay at home for a few months and then get re-employed in broadcasting. I had been working in TV and radio stations from 1957-58 (WTVJ, Miami) and then after I graduated college in 1962, and headed to New York in November of that year, looking for my big break. One of the jobs I held was with NBC, as assistant to Director Dick Carson, Johnny Carson's brother, in the "Tonight Show" unit. We were just around the corner from the "Today" people, including Barbara Walters, who I thought was wonderful. Barbara is about nine years older than I am, but she was clearly bright and vivacious even then. After that, I worked at WPIX as On-Air Promotion Supervisor for a woman named Phyllis who let me go for some spurious reason. In those days, they replaced people without the employee having ANY recourse. Big corporations still find their newer hooks to hang you on, I'm sorry to say.

WEEI Radio, Boston, Massachusetts (owned and operated by CBS at the time) I was hired on May 15, 1972 for minimum union scale. I was chosen largely due to affirmative action. They had heard that I was looking for work, and was covering for Larry King's overnight show at WIOD in Miami 11 PM to 5 AM (!) a couple nights a week. Larry kept promising me he'd ask for some money for my screener job. At that time, I was divorced and the sole support of two babies. Larry had been married before and had at least two children, Andy and Chaia, who was a beautiful little three year old. I met his mother, Jenny, who lived in a small apartment filled with memorabilia about her famous son. At the time, Larry was also a sportscaster for WTVJ, as well as a newspaper column for the Miami Beach Sun. Larry had a younger brother, Marty, whom I met once. I think Marty was in real estate.

Larry lived an expensive lifestyle and it was rumored he had some difficult financial problems. He was also a much different TV and radio guy than he is today -- geared to entertainment, not news, doing funny voices through filter mikes, spinning records, and taking telephone calls -- just having fun. As I recall, he didn't do any hard topics and I can say that I never saw him yell or be nasty to anyone. So, when the stars came to town, they seemed to want to be on Larry's show, and it was all very entertaining.

Background: Larry and I had had one date in the late 50s when I was on a TV kid's show and he was a young disk jockey at WAHR-AM. Later, we met up again in the summer of 1971. In a very strange twist of fate, I was just heading home over the North Bay Causeway and past WIOD where the station is located -- when he called out for coffee and donuts late one night. I brought them to WIOD on a whim -- I had been an intern at that TV station during my college career, answering fan mail for the TV show "Bonanza". Larry didn't remember me from the earlier meeting, but told me to sit down and answer the incoming calls to keep the people awake. That job is called the screener, and essentially, I did my own little show with the people who called in while they were waiting to go on the air. A couple of nights, I supplied cassette tapes of conversations as I talked with people in the Miami malls who answered my "woman in the street" questions. With an hour's worth of taped calls, we could go home between 4AM and 5AM.

So, I was involved with Larry's midnight to dawn program when he was arrested in December 1971 a few days before Christmas. (Let me hasten to add he was never indicted or convicted. This was about some money transaction that went sour. If you go to www.mugshots.com and search for Larry King, you'll see his picture that night.) The next day, I called Elliot “Biggie” Nevins, the Program Manager who said, "I have heard you on my air, but I've never met you. You better come over here and talk with me." He was a big, jovial guy, but during our interview, he told me I would not be considered for the overnight shift because of my divorced status with two young kids. But, he gave me temporary work at $50 a night a few nights a week, which put some food on the table while they were trying out male hosts. The late night hosts hooked up on WATS lines – so I had talked to Larry Johnson in Chicago, and Bruce Lee (No, not THAT one, another one), in Boston. Bruce gave the tape of our show to Dan Griffin, the PM at WEEI, who was looking for a woman to do the 10 AM to 2 PM shift – and I was asked if I'd like to interview? You bet! They flew me up to Boston, interviewed me for eight hours (!) and offered me the job.

So, I became the first woman talkmaster in Boston to do a daily four-hour call-in show SIX days a week. I did well there, but then Dan Griffin left to take a management job at WCBS New York. The new Program Manager, Mike Ludlum, didn't really like me. There were rumors he was looking around for another host. Then, CBS changed format to all news, and although I had done some news when I took over Larry King's program, I really wanted to be a personality or producer, which is more in tune with my strengths. I applied for the newscaster job, but didn't even garner an interview. This was in the days when there were few women newscasters on radio. I remember interviewing for a job with station WCRB in Boston. The PM began his interview with, "So, you have two little children. Who would be taking care of them while you work?" I picked up my resume and walked out. Mercifully, I have forgotten the name of that man. Later, I did return to WEEI as their movie critic, seeing two or three movies a week and coming in to the studio to record the reviews. That was fine for my schedule.

WMEX Radio, Boston, Massachusetts (mid-1970s) The station was privately owned by Dick Richmond. He was an older man with a big smile who took a liking to me. My Program Manager was Pat Whitley. I believe Pat had designs on my job himself, as he was a funny guy with a big personality. He did a successful restaurant rating show on days when I was on vacation or sick. Regrettably, I also had an extreme stress reaction to hour after hour of arguing five days a week, four hours a day 10AM to 2PM with their largely conservative midday audience. At that time, the listeners consisted of mostly Irish Catholic stay-at-home women and salesmen on the road who listen in their cars. BUT no cellphones! They had to stop on the highway at a phone booth to call! (Remember, this was AM radio, FM was just gearing up with music only. There no computers, no cellphones, and few radios ever allowed in offices.)

Furthermore, my lead-in at WMEX was Avi Nelson, a dunderhead conservative talk show host with an amazing ability to skewer me when I wasn't there. His smug opinions make me angry as hell during his shift from 6AM to 10AM. (All the rest of the men I had worked with were liberals, including Len Lawrence, Les Woodruff, Ben Farnsworth, Paul Benzaquin, Bruce Lee, and Jerry Williams.)

One day, I felt steam coming out of my ears as I listened to Avi while driving in to the station. He said I should be at home with my two children baking cookies instead of being on the air! I strode into the studio, sat down next to him, flipped on the microphone, and blasted him. It was kind of a Hillary Clinton moment as I jabbed my finger in his shoulder and in my most authoritative voice told him, "Don't you ever, EVER mention my personal situation during your hours in the morning. I have every right to this job and have been trained in broadcasting with a degree in Communications. I have been working in the media field since January 1957. What are YOUR credentials?" (At that time, I think he may have been a lawyer -- he became a politician later, and did TV editorials.)

Anyway, the audience loved the dust-up between us. As it happened, the Program Manager was away, and the mice were at play. For the rest of that week, we glared at each other when we crossed paths and dealt with the rants from the people who called in. They took sides, of course, as we took each other to task in our separate time slots.

The ratings went through the roof, of course. (People just love a good hang-it-all-out squabble, don't they?) When the Program Manager returned, we were cautioned never do it again.

Later, I developed the worst flu I ever had and the bronchitis lasted for weeks. My doctor was concerned that I was overdoing it. (I had met and married a widower with three children in 1973, blending his older kids with my two toddlers, so I was pretty busy.) It all came to a head when I found out that the men were making much bigger salaries than I was, and to boot, the other talk show hosts had either a company-owned car or a car allowance! I gave them six weeks to pull my income up to the level of the men, but it didn't happen, so I quit.

Now, I'm retired but still volunteering with an hour-long interview show on Oregon Public Broadcasting'd Accessible Information Network, Portland. It's been a good ride, and I wouldn't trade my life for anything. Read more about my program on my journal at: http://journals.democraticunderground.com/Radio_Lady

All in all, the women in broadcasting who are now my age or older (or deceased) were all broadcasting pioneers -- Barbara Walters, Betty Rollins, Pauline Fredericks, Betty Furness are a few who come to mind. In radio, Sally Jessy Raphael was still in Palm Beach, Florida -- I was a guest on her program there once.

Anyway, forgive the outpouring here, but Dan Rather deserves whatever he gets. Now his suit on top of Don Imus’? It's the revenge of the senior men on the CBS Eye! More power to them!

*****************************************************************************************************************

Age 17 -- Girl on a ladder in my first job as a children's co-host on Popeye Playhouse at WTVJ-TV, Channel 4, Miami, Florida, a CBS station. This was taken in January 1957 while I was a freshman in college:

[yourout]

1. Great read........

Recomended.

[Radio_Lady]

2. Thanks so much -- how nice of you!

[librechik]

3. I always love your posts, Radio Lady

I'm an old broadcaster myself--in fact the production co. I work for now is frequent partners with HDnet, Dan Rather's new digs.


I wish he would sue Bush too! Seems like the Shrub had a material role in what happened to Dan and has never been held to account.


:loveya:

[Radio_Lady]

5. Hi, Librechik. Thanks so much for the lovely post!

Interesting viewpoint. How do you reach Dan's lawyers -- or better still, I'll bet he has a personal assistant or staff.

I know less than nothing about HDnet. I really should check it out, but I'm still tracking a local opportunity (Right, they're going to hire me as I head towards three score and ten -- my 70th Birthday -- May 31, 2009. Isn't that special? Get real! Only Barbara W. and Larry King are working past this age.)

What am I talking about? A new opportunity for a local talk personality -- to handle a NEW radio show on KOPB-FM tentatively called "Town Square". But Portland is a city, not a town, and many of us are not "square." This personality is currently being sought at Oregon Public Broadcasting. I feel like the aging but capable football star... "Send me in, coach! I know I'm over the hill, but I could win for you!"

I'd love to be a part-time consultant, movie critic, or maybe something else? Who knows? But how to I apply when the HR manager told me, "We don't necessarily EVER hire volunteers, even if you've been volunteering here for years." I was never even interviewed for a job with Audience Services which opened up before I came here as well as during the six years I've been working with the programs on the sub-channel now called "OPB's Assisted Information Network." We're a 24/7 feature and I have a pre-recorded hour long show once a week.

Anyway your premise about Bush's involvement in the sad Dan Rather story is fascinating. That would be something the lawyers would have to discuss. Do you know anything about the law? I think I discussed this with someone as to whether things said about you on air are (Slander and libel... please forgive me -- I never remember the difference. One is spoken, the other is written. Maybe they have enough on their hands with the people they're targeting right. But you could drop them an anonymous note using snail mail. Should be easy enough to get that information out anonymously.

Where are your offices? Are they in the same building as Rather's current recording location?

Hey, "Female" wherever you are, since you're an old broadcaster (older than me -- 68?) and a secret DU admirer SOMEWHERE.

Would you tell me your story via PM, or is that asking too much?

Making peace a priority,

Radio Lady in Oregon

[Radio_Lady]

7. UPDATE: Librechik, you wrote me such an interesting note. I'm flat out tonight to respond

to your delightful PM, so I'll put you on my "Buddy" list and try to remember your screen name.

That's my biggest problem -- the wide-flowing, sweet river of this pretty neat group of people I meet and greet among the 108,000 people here. (Now, just don't count an occasional ALLIGATOR who's likely to BITE OFF a piece of your leg!) I now have seven people who can't see my messages and I can't see them -- we are all on ENFORCED IGNORE, imposed by the administrators when we tussled earlier this summer on some stupid issue. I tried to contact them to apologize, but didn't do it in the right way, and made one awful mistake (accidentally called someone in the middle of the night) so that's it. It's like two-way solitary confinement.

But thanks for taking the time to write. I really enjoyed hearing from you. We've never been to Denver (well, I haven't, HE HAS...) except for stops at the Stapleton Airport.

I have heard Betty Ann Bowser (no offense... but isn't that an old-fashioned dog's name?) Wow, your description of the work you do makes me feel really old. Like the historical "Watson, come here, I want you." New York, to satellite, to Denver to edit.

I was one of the "Tonight" show production staff at NBC in 1963, helping out by getting coffee (!) for all the men, typing and checking out the teleprompter copy, which was done by an outside organization. I usually worked until about 6:30 PM. After the taping of the "Tonight Show", I worked with the TV engineers to manually "bleep out" whatever swear words came on during the show. It was much different then, of course, and most shows went out without any delay.

However, one memorable night, Mel Brooks was on with Johnny Carson. He started in the beginning with the SEVEN SWEAR WORDS YOU CAN'T SAY ON TELEVISION, and then liberally sprinkled them in and around the conversation -- as if he had Tourette's syndrome. He laughed gleefully and remarked, "Someone assistant will have to work for hours getting this language out!" Ha-ha-ha-ha... guess what -- that was me. I remembered calling my husband to tell him I had to work late.

You see, I had the responsibility of helping an audio engineer edit the tape, which could take FOREVER. Then, the check tape was "bicycled" (not really -- it actually went by cab or limousine) from 30 Rockefeller Center, NYC, out to La Guardia or JFK, where it was placed on an airplane and flown to Los Angeles. There, that show was aired the FOLLOWING EVENING -- tape delayed from the East Coast for airing the following night.

[MiniMe]

4. He should sue Hannity and Rush too

[Radio_Lady]

6. I agree completely. Those two bashed him royally for months.

Although that's just a presumption on my part. I rarely watch Hannity (can't stand him) and never listen to Rush.