Friday, February 4, 2011
1977 interview with Miami R&B legend Betty Wright; Clean up Woman; Miami Groove
1977 WCIX-TV interview with Miami R&B singing legend Betty Wright on her recollections of the Miami music scene, and the artists who performed at the Sir John Hotel in Miami.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-thfb6BFwo
The long-since destroyed Sir John Hotel discussed in the clip was located in downtown Miami on N.W. 6th Street & N.W. 3rd Avenue, and was only a few blocks from the old Channel 4 WTVJ-TV studio that was at 316 N. Miami Avenue.
C.T. Taylor, mentioned in the clip by Betty Wright as a music DJ at WMBM-AM, was hired in 1968 by Channel 4 news director and anchor Ralph Renick to become the first African-American on-air news reporter in Miami.
That fateful year was the year of the Liberty City riots in Miami during the Republican National Convention over on Miami Beach at the Miami Beach Convention Center.
(In 1972, it hosted both national party conventions.)
Taylor's extensive knowledge of the area and its personalities, people's trust of him, and his nightly fact-filled, context-heavy reporting from the scene during the riots, gave WTVJ a huge reporting advantage over their local news competitors and the three TV networks of the time.
His insightful reports sometimes appeared on the CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite.
For most of my childhood growing-up in Miami, Taylor and Renick were each among the best-known and most widely-respected men in all of South Florida.
They had credibility earned thru merit.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betty_Wright
http://www.youtube.com/user/wolfsonarchive
Betty Wright Clean up Woman (LIVE)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0ssMVL9I1Q
Betty Wright - Miami Groove
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Azb8MtVzCO4
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Two spot-on columns by Orlando Sentinel's Darryl E. Owens and Miami Herald's Jackie Bueno Sousa demand your attention
August 25, 1982 Ralph Renick editorial on WTVJ-4, Miami,
on the filming of Scarface in South Florida
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fyuJGHrjbRY
It's neither here nor there, per se, but per this excellent column by the Orlando Sentinel's Darryl E. Owens that I spied on Saturday -the same day the Miami Hurricanes played like disinterested turkeys two days after Thanksgiving Day- I can distinctly recall as a kid growing-up in North Miami Beach in the 1970's that when a story like this would bubble up to the surface in South Florida, i.e. with lots of context, it would quickly become the main topic of discussion of AM Talk Radio, back before it was almost all nationally-syndicated fare.
Of course, back then, when the Dolphins were consistently good, the area also had an All-News Radio Station, something it now sadly lacks, with South Florida being much worse off for that, as I've often lamented here and at various websites.
Some subject would get under the skin of a columnist at the Miami Herald far enough in advance of some planned public event that a rather pointed column would soon appear, and either cooler heads would prevail, the best option, or, local politicians and govt. officials would be publicly embarrassed and hung out to dry.
If the issue reached a certain threshold of seriousness, local broadcasting powerhouse Ralph Renick at Channel 4, back when it was WTVJ, on N. Miami Avenue in downtown Miami, would make one of his devastating editorials on the six o'clock newscast and simply mop the floor with whomever was responsible for the problem by pointing out the simple facts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Renick
Après toi, le déluge!
That was a measure of the power and influence throughout all aspects of life in South Florida that Ralph Renick had to wield.
Renick was THE most-respected man in South Florida other than perhaps Dolphins head coach Don Shula.
But now, in my opinion, other than the rare Herald column that takes us all completely by surprise, or Jackie Bueno Sousa's common sense columns that demand accountability and integrity from local elected officials or govt. agencies, there's just lots of dopey paint-by-numbers news stories about inconsequential fluff or shopping or diets.
See http://www.miamiherald.com/columnists/jacqueline-bueno-sousa/ and my post from July 12, 2009
May the good news be yours: Ralph Renick's South Florida TV scene 18 years later; Where's the news in Broward? Or local investigative news anywhere? http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2009/07/may-good-news-be-yours-ralph-renicks.html
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Orlando Sentinel
City funded Amway party — but not a Parramore tradition
Darryl E. Owens COMMENTARY
12:46 a.m. EST, November 27, 2010
Good thing Charlie Brown doesn't call Orlando home.
In his world, his only worry is Lucy snatching away the football as he prepares to make the kick.
The City Beautiful might send cops to snatch the pigskin.
This isn't an anti-cop screed.
After all, the would-be footballers — all three of them — who were confronted by police on Thanksgiving Day at the John H. Jackson Community Center lacked a permit.
Instead, consider this a reflection on an embarrassing — and obvious — missed opportunity for Orlando.
Read the rest of the post at: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/columnists/os-ed-darryl-owens-parramore-football20101126,0,5199263.column
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http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/11/23/1940706/real-leaders-in-short-supply-in.html
Miami Herald
Real leaders in short supply in Miami
By Jackie Bueno Sousa
November 23, 2010
It's not that Miami lacks leadership. Rather, it lacks bold, transformational leaders.
You know, the kind of people who use their power and influence to bring about fundamental change in a community, even though doing so will make enemies of other people of power and influence.
And so it is that so many Miamians now are fascinated with Norman Braman. Beyond his battle to recall Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Alvarez, he's filling a civic leadership vacuum long felt in this community.
Bold, transformational leaders aren't easy to find. That may be a good thing; too many of them could be more problematic than too few of them. But when they become scarce, as they are now, we flock to them and their causes, knowing that they represent a rare opportunity.
Such leadership requires a unique combination of attributes not found in ordinary, run-of-the-mill leaders. Nothing wrong with ordinary leaders; their generosity, in terms of both time and money, has brought many good and worthwhile programs for our community.
It's just that every once in a while we need something more. We need, for example, leaders who are passionately focused on a cause.
MAS CANOSA
The late Jorge Mas Canosa had that passion and focus. The Cuban exile leader was vilified and chastised for his sometimes close-minded stance on Cuba policy. Yet no other person could so effectively spur large numbers of followers to take action, to show up at a rally, to lobby congressional representatives, to write letters to the editor. Who has filled that void in the Cuban exile community?
Such leadership also requires community-wide status and power. It helps to be the chairman of this or the president of that, but such titles aren't always necessary.
Marjory Stoneman Douglas was a simple journalist and writer, and yet she helped preserve the Everglades for future generations. She once wrote a pamphlet on behalf of creating a botanical garden that resulted in countless speaking invitations at local garden clubs and ultimately helped create Fairchild Gardens. Who is today's Marjory Stoneman Douglas?
Such leaders must back up their words and actions with money. The money can be their own -- as in the case of Braman's recall battle. Or it can come from the ability to access money, as was Alvah Chapman's gift. In the 1970s, Chapman led the creation of The Non-Group, an elite body of business and civic leaders who set an agenda for resolving the area's most pressing problems. Who in the business community is filling Alvah Chapman's void today?
We see contemporary glimpses of extraordinary civic leadership every so often. Former TotalBank chairman Adrienne Arsht gave $30 million to save the performing arts center. Banker Adolfo Henriques has the power to rally important business leaders. Miami Dade College President Eduardo Padrón is passionately focused on improving education in our region.
CHARTER REVIEW
And we even see glimpses of bold leadership. Attorney Victor Diaz Jr., as the head of the Miami-Dade County Charter Review Task Force, a couple years ago proposed a series of fundamental changes that could have brought about important improvements in local government.
When the County Commission slapped down most of the suggestions, which civic and business leaders came forward to fight for the proposed changes?
And, so, the void remains.
Personally, I would have chosen different people, but her central premise is sound and echoes a sentiment that nearly everyone I know and respect in South Florida agrees with completely.
Which is why all the unethical behavior by elected officials in South Florida, from small-fry to County Commissioners, grates on people here in a way that is different than other parts of the country.
For those of you who don't live down here, there's a real brazenness and entitlement that's neither funny or amusing but simply venal and creepy.
Monday, July 26, 2010
Weeks later, Miami Herald, Sun-Sentinel & Miami TV newscasts STILL consciously ignoring Bob Norman's spot-on story re School Board's Jennifer Gottlieb
BrowardPalmBeach NewTimes
Daily Pulp blog
Emails Reveal School Board Chairwoman Romanced Schools' Banker
By Bob Norman, Fri., Jul. 2 2010 @ 8:48AM -
She was a second-year elected school board member at a political conference in Tampa, getting quite literally wined and dined by high-rolling bankers at Citigroup, enjoying the "luxury" of a night out in a town that didn't know who she was.
He was one of those bankers, working the deals behind what has become $2 billion in Broward School Board debt. Both were married with young children.
And after meeting and flirting at an all-you-can-eat lobster and steak dinner put on by Citigroup for elected officials at The Palm restaurant in Tampa, romance blossomed between current Broward County School Board Chairwoman Jennifer Gottlieb and Citigroup finance manager Rick Patterson.
Read the rest of the post at: http://blogs.browardpalmbeach.com/pulp/2010/07/school_board_chairwoman_jennifer_gottlieb.php
That post from July 2nd currently has 499 comments as of 4 p.m. today, which shows that despite the local MSM's attempt to bury this story, people who actually pay attention to what's going on in the community, regardless of their opinion, are talking about it, anyway.
This foolish attempt to bury the story only makes the old traditional media in South Florida seem more irrelevant and ridiculous than ever, and it's not like they are that relevant anymore to begin with, since there are clearly many reporters on local Miami TV who ought to be in smaller TV markets, but are here, warts and all.
(That will be a topic of future posts.)
And seriously, when was the last time you read a lengthy and well-written story in the Herald about the goings-on at local Miami TV news operations the way that once was fairly common in the 1970's and '80's?
Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar and things are exactly what they seem, and in this case, there clearly seems to be a conspiracy of silence among the South Florida news media and chattering class about the personal and professional behavior of Jennifer Gottlieb.
But then as we are constantly at pains to remind ourselves, this is South Florida, an outlier more often than not in the best of times when journalism is either hard-hitting or popular, and this is hardly the first time since my family moved here in 1968 that a perfectly valid and compelling news story was ignored by the then-extant MSM on account of... well, whatever the popular excuse offered up at the time at One Herald Plaza or over at the old Channel 4 studio in downtown Miami was.
Usually, when pressed, the answer was always "lack of column inches" in the newspaper or available time on a newscast.
Try to imagine a current local TV anchor publicly going after a local pol like Demetrio Perez Jr. the way that anchor/news director Ralph Renick does here in 1982?
It's inconceivable in the current era of sycophancy, and our great loss.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fyuJGHrjbRY
1982 Ralph Renick editorial on WTVJ on political efforts in Miami to prevent Scarface from being filmed in Miami due to concerns of negative portrayal of Miami and its Cuban-American population.
The local TV and print reporters whom we've grown accustomed to seeing report regularly on the latest education funding/scandal/crisis/antics involving School Board Superintendents Alberto Carvalho in Miami-Dade and James Notter in Broward, overwhelmingly female reporters, are quite simply, NOT doing their job by ignoring this story.
They've collectively taken a pass on mentioning something embarrassing about an elected official in Broward County that should be of great concern to every Broward County taxpayer, especially those with children in the public school system.
Why?
And is part of the reason that there is such great reluctance among South Florida's news media to face this issue head-on precisely because the person involved is female? As I've stated previously in writing about other neglected education issues, I personally think the answer is YES.
There is a palpable dis-connect and obvious sense of hypocrisy among South Florida's news media in how they report on the foibles and legal problems of male and female elected officials, so it should hardly be surprising that once again, they just swallow their hypocrisy whole because this case involves a female.
If this had involved a male School Board chair, though, we all know that this same story would've made the front page of the Miami Herald, albeit, with lots of quotes from supportive friends
and work colleagues.
My own experience in corporate life from working with large nationally-known law firms on big cases, as well as from being involved at a high level in presidential political campaigns, plus my own personal relationships with people in South Florida, Chicago and Washington, D.C., is that people who have particularly bad habits tend to have those traits throughout the day, regardless of whether they are at home or not.
There's no OFF switch they hit.
People who are consistently NOT punctual, NOT properly prepared and who are generally untrustworthy, who can't keep a confidential secret about a client from others, tend NOT to be able to do the exact opposite when they are away from the office.
I've personally gotten lots of very smart and talented people re-assigned or fired from firms or political campaigns because of the above issues, and I had no qualms in doing so because I've found that personal recklessness almost always reveals itself at the worst possible time.
Just like a film director, I need to know that people around me on a project or campaign are on top of things and focused on the matter at hand, not worrying about extraneous matters, esp. involving romance.
If you see people consistently making poor decisions and exhibit carelessness in their job, are you really supposed to believe that their judgment is any sounder and grounded when you don't see them?
That said, this personal issue Bob Norman writes about so thoroughly doesn't make Jennifer Gottlieb a bad person, just human.
But it does indicate to me that she should be somewhere else, and NOT making important decisions.
http://www.browardpalmbeach.com/search/index?keywords=Jennifer+Gottlieb&x=0&y=0
Because Jennifer Gottlieb is running for re-election as an At-Large Broward School Board candidate, every registered voter in Broward County can and should vote against her and give her the time she clearly needs to get her personal life together, however that shakes out.
Having said that, on Saturday afternoon at the Hallandale Beach Parks Master Plan meeting, while I was setting up my camera tripod in the back of the A1A Community Center, I saw her husband Ken, the former State Rep. who's running for Circuit Court Judge.
I felt both sorry for him but also very uncomfortable, since he doesn't know whether or not people he runs into have read the story Norman wrote, which in my opinion was extremely fair.
Two years ago, I voted for Tim Ryan for State Senate to succeed Steve Geller when Ryan, Gottlieb and Eleanor Sobel ran for the seat that Sobel eventually won after a VERY NASTY primary race that left a very bad taste in Southeast Broward voters mouths, due to the influence of secretive groups affiliated with Sobel that ran untruthful TV attack ads and mail that savaged both Gottlieb and Ryan.
(Ryan later took Sobel to court about the groups' efforts, but after an initial flurry of stories about the trial, the press coverage completely disappeared. Shocker!
That's the current state of South Florida journalism in a nutshell: here one minute, gone another! Just like the summer rain!)
Unlike some people I know in the Broward political/citizen activist community who swear by the guy, I'm lukewarm to Ken Gottlieb, but I will acknowledge that he does seem like a genuinely earnest and hard-working guy who puts everything into his efforts, which makes him somewhat unusual in these parts, where coasting on the job and letting staff do all the work is the norm.
Personally, though, I'm just not crazy about the idea of enthusiastic activist pols becoming judges because I don't think people can fight that part of their nature.
I believe that the personal qualities that people clearly liked and admired about him in one job, State Rep., are not the same ones required to be a fair-minded judge that all parties can have full confidence in.
Frankly, if his wife Jennifer wasn't already on the Broward School Board, though I haven't put too much time into thinking this through to its logical conclusion, I'd much prefer him or Tim Ryan as Broward State's Attorney in two years against incumbent Michael Satz, who seems energy-deficient in the extreme.
Natural enthusiasm in a D.A. is much better than in a judge, especially in such a target-rich environment like corrupt Broward County.
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Adrienne Roark from CBS4 to KTVT-TV in Dallas, Cesar Aldama from KYW-TV to CBS4 as News Director
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Sunday, July 12, 2009
May the good news be yours: Ralph Renick's South Florida TV scene 18 years later; Where's the news in Broward? Or local investigative news anywhere?
Dear Ms. Kay:
My letter to you today is actually long overdue, as I had planned on congratulating you earlier, before the end of the year, on the consistently great job you did last year of covering what passes for the South Florida legal system in the Daily Business Review, and imbuing your stories with the proper amount of anger, enthusiasm and curiosity -and incredulity- for the peculiar way things have of sorting themselves out here, regardless of any actual law, statute or precedent.
For what it's worth, Kirsch added absolutely zero to your original story, not even bothering to supplement his version of your story with additional interviews with other parties, just to cover his bases.
Nope, it was strictly paint-by-numbers; your numbers.
Since that initial report back in June, I haven't taken anything Kirsch says seriously, since I now have a clear sense of what he's capable of.
Maybe he should stick to doing stories on 'hot' new celeb-filled boutiques or trendy restaurants on South Beach, that way, there's no real public harm or misrepresentation.
Not that things before in local/state govt. or local legal circles were so rosy and on the level, of course, since I know that clearly wasn't the case.
Even while watching the local TV news out of Indianapolis
(I even mentioned this particular line of thought, such as it is, to CNN's Larry King once at an American Cancer Society Ball in DC, around '89, that I was involved with in a small fashion, with Larry being honored as the guest of honor. While I know that many people often laugh at Larry's own unique brand of infotainment and news, and I'm quick to admit that I've heard the reels of crank calls at his expense, that night at the Hilton Towers, while his then-wife was being photographed with friends and various DC celebs like Al Haig and former FBI Director William Webster, Larry and I stood in a corner for about ten minutes, just the two of us, reminiscing about life in Miami, mostly about local radio and TV personalities we'd known and liked and wondered about every so often.
But now?
Nowadays, that same reporter is assigned to go to
Maybe it's me, but I keep thinking of Jane Fonda's
WHERE'S THE NEWS IN BROWARD?
Sometimes local stations ignore it all together. When thunderstorms flooded the region earlier this month, one TV reporter noted the hazzards "throughout Dade," never mentioning its northern neighbor.
Other times, it's just the basics -- stories about county commission and school-board meetings, I-95 traffic tie-ups and robberies. Sophisticated, investigative analysis and feature reporting are for Dade only.
Yet Broward's TV audience increased 86 per cent during the last ten years. By comparison, TV homes grew only 36 per cent nationwide and 43 per cent in Dade. If Broward were a TV market all its own, it would rank alongside Syracuse, N.Y., and Richmond, Va.
But it isn't. Broward is wrapped into a viewing area dominated by three network-affiliated stations based in Dade. It doesn't have its own VHF broadcast station. And while 40 per cent of South Florida's viewers live in Broward, stories about it occupy only 10 to 15 per cent of the available time in 6 p.m. newscasts.
"I don't think they cover us to the extent that their market would indicate," says Marcia Beach, Broward County Commission chairman.
To a large degree, Dade's dominance is justified. The southern county, with its much-publicized crime rate and refugee camp, is more newsworthy than Broward's bedroom communities. Still, the future of Dade's stations is tied to Broward, with its large concentration of affluent residents. "It's a very Anglo-oriented market, with Dade being more Hispanic and black," says Dave Choate, WCKT-Ch. 7 news director.
In response, each station has added staff in the last two years. In January, WTVJ-Ch. 4 moved into a larger Broward news office with anchor Ralph Renick broadcasting from the facility on opening night. Ch. 7 will occupy a new building come September, and WPLG-Ch. 10 is searching for larger quarters.
WCIX-Chs. 6/33, the Dade independent station, has a small news operation in Broward.
Other changes, albeit small ones, have been incorporated to emphasize the region as a whole. Ch. 7 calls itself "South Florida's 7." Anchors and reporters at Ch. 10 must say "in Broward," not "up in Broward," lest the "up" isolate the county.
But Broward remains a quandary: How do you cover Broward without boring Kendall?
Chs. 4 and 7 acknowledge the differences. Each has given Broward its own anchor, and most Broward news is presented in a short, self-contained segment. The stations say the format increases credibility. A separate Broward anchor is "more authoritative than me speaking from Third and Miami Avenue in Miami," says Renick.
Ch. 10 uses its format to emphasize the unity of the Dade- Broward region. There is no separate anchor, and Broward stories are placed throughout the broadcast according to their newsworthiness. "We do not ghetto-ize our coverage," says Steve Wasserman, news director. "It trivializes the stories and sends signals. It's like telling Broward that it's different, that anchors Ann Bishop and Glenn Rinker are too good to read Broward news."
The stations have other differences, too. Here are some evaluations based on monitoring newscasts and visiting each bureau:
Ch. 4: In Broward since 1961, this granddaddy of news operations has the least air time but the largest staff and the best facility of the three stations.
Ch. 4 produces 30 minutes of news at 6 p.m., while Ch. 10 has 90 minutes, beginning at 5:30, and Ch. 7 an hour at 6.
Fourteen people--including three reporters, a reporter/ anchor and bureau chief Frank Lynn-- work out of a large, relaxed office and mini-studio above a Fort Lauderdale movie theater. It is the only bureau to have a remote truck assigned to it full time. When other stations want to broadcast live from the scene, a truck comes in from Miami.
The combination of a big staff and little airtime should translate into more thoughtful stories, since reporters have time to work on them. Sometimes it does. But day by day, there's significantly less Broward news -- usually two or three stories in two minutes, compared to three to five stories occupying four or five minutes in the other early-evening newscasts.
Still, the ratings show Ch. 4 is the station preferred at 6 by most Broward viewers. As in Dade, Ch. 10 runs second, Ch. 7 third.
Ch. 7: It's the best overall effort in Broward news, balancing quantity of stories with quality and position in the 6 p.m. broadcast. A Broward story usually runs in the show's top segment. Later segments feature one or two groups of stories, with Steve Dawson anchoring.
Ch. 7 opened a Broward bureau in 1962 but did not begin building staff until 1 1/2 years ago. These days, two reporters, a reporter/anchor, bureau chief Jere Pierce and seven others work out of a jammed storefront office.
These days, WCKT's Broward studio has a static, old- fashioned look on the air, but Pierce says that will change when the bureau moves to its new facility.
Ch. 10--Traditionally, it has been an afterthought in the Broward market. "I guess Ch. 10 also does some coverage, too," is the way Marcia Beach puts it.
The station didn't open its bureau until 1974 and continues to play catch-up. It has the smallest staff: a total of eight, including two reporters and bureau chief Elaine Hume in an office on the 19th floor of a Fort Lauderdale building. June 1, a third reporter and two-man crew will join the bureau full time.
For all the late start, the Ch. 10 bureau bustles more than its sisters down the dial. Every workday hour, a staffer calls local police and fire departments to check for breaking news; the other stations check twice a day.
And when a big story breaks, Ch. 10 quickly calls in Miami reinforcements. On the day bodies of Haitian refugees washed up on a Hallandale beach, "they swarmed all over the story," a competing newsman says.
Ch. 10 promises more coverage in the future. "Broward is where it is all happening if you want to build up the ratings," Hume says, "if you want to beat the pants off the other stations."
The same station that gave South Florida its first news anchorman, Ralph Renick -- on a different channel and different network -- will be broadcasting from Broward in two years.
To appreciate the historic significance of Channel 6's decision to move to Miramar, it helps to remember when Broward TV news consisted of film cans being shuttled down Interstate 95 at rush hour or snippets of news delivered from ``the Broward bureau'' -- a small studio in the Yankee Clipper Hotel on Fort Lauderdale beach.
Stations pay more attention to Broward than ever before. But there are still some nights when Broward TV coverage is little more than a crime newsreel sandwiched between longer Dade stories, and Miami-based meteorologists still warn us about those thunderstorms ``up'' in Broward.
By moving its studios, satellite TV trucks and anchors to Miramar, NBC-owned Channel 6 is moving closer to the region's population center. But the TV station is making a public-relations commitment to Broward that no amount of promotion can buy.
Station executives described the decision as a move to the center of the region's booming population. Don Browne, WTVJ's vice president and general manager, said the ``artificial'' county line is meaningless in today's society.
``We're making a natural response to the population growth and shift,'' Browne said. ``We look at this as one community. . . . This is a decision based on an understanding of the dynamics and growth of our entire community.''
Effects on coverage
The questions are whether a Broward location will mean better Broward coverage on Channel 6 -- and whether Channel 6's rivals will feel pressured to beef up coverage because a competitor is headquartered there.
``There will be more coverage of Broward. We're talking about two broadcast facilities,'' said Ramon Escobar, WTVJ's news director. ``Covering South Florida is more about preparation and strategy than it is about position. Having a Miramar location does help us have more Broward [coverage].''
Station executives spoke of a ``dual studio'' in Miami and South Broward, with an indoor-outdoor studio on Biscayne Boulevard in Miami. It is important that in moving north, WTVJ not appear to be abandoning Miami-Dade.
The move is the second half of a positive civic 1-2 punch, coming after the Florida Panthers agreed to move to a new arena in western Sunrise.
A television station, like a newspaper or a sports team, gives an area a sense of place, an identity -- and not having a hometown station has been one reason why Broward lacks a stronger identity.
Stepchild perception
Even in an age of cable and satellite receivers, South Florida TV news reinforces a perception that Broward is Miami's suburban stepchild.
``You turn the TV stations on here, and it's mostly Miami news, so you do not have that daily confirmation of where you are,'' said Jack Latona, a Fort Lauderdale lawyer who grew up watching three hometown TV stations in Buffalo.
In a modern age of media saturation, Latona said, the boundaries of communities are not municipal lines, but the circulation of a newspaper or the reach of a TV signal.
As a city commissioner in Fort Lauderdale, Broward's largest city, Latona can count on one hand the number of times a TV crew has been inside City Hall -- but that may change when WTVJ moves to its new six-acre site near Interstate 75 and Miramar Parkway.
``It stands to reason the news is going to be skewed more toward Broward, and I'm not so sure that's a bad thing,'' said Joe Angotti, a Miami TV consultant and former NBC News senior vice president and former dean of the University of Miami communications school. ``I know a lot of people who think Dade is losing an important media outlet, but I'm not so sure that Broward doesn't deserve a little more on newscasts than it's been receiving up to now. It's not going to happen overnight, but there will be a gradual tendency to have more Broward news on the newscast.''
Beyond local cable
That would be good news for people in Broward, who have to drive out of the county to get on network-affiliated television. Top politicians must settle for what exposure they can get on cable TV, or go to Miami's WPLG to appear on This Week in South Florida with Michael Putney.
BECON TV, the Broward school system's television network, airs a weekly Broward public affairs show called Countyline, but not all cable systems pick it up.
Two dueling state Senate candidates, Mandy Dawson-White and Matt Meadows, squared off Thursday in their only TV debate so far -- in the West Palm Beach studios of WPTV-Channel 5.
``Broward doesn't have its own TV station, and yet there are little towns in Montana with TV stations,'' Latona said.
It was not by accident.
When the first VHF television licenses were issued in the late 1940s, Miami already was a big city. Broward was still largely swampland. A half million people lived in Dade in 1950, compared to 84,000 in all of Broward -- fewer people than live in Pembroke Pines today.
Smaller West Palm Beach, just out of range of the Miami TV stations' signals, also qualified for licenses. Broward got a couple of UHF station licenses instead.
Broward's current population is estimated at 1.4 million. It consistently ranks among the top 10 fastest-growing counties in the United States. It is the 16th most-populous county in America, larger than Riverside County, Calif.; Montgomery County (Philadelphia), Pa.; Cuyahoga County (Cleveland), Ohio; and Alameda County (Oakland), Calif.
Herald staff writers Jane Bussey and Neil Reisner and researcher Harriett Tupler contributed to this report.
RAZING OF WTVJ'S OLD HOME STIRS UP STATION'S `GHOSTS'
But that night - March 21, 1949 - what was debuting on the small screen in the theater's backroom would make history. Television.
More than half a century later, it's curtains for the site of Florida's first television broadcast and home to the only station south of Atlanta in those early days. In the coming weeks, the historic but crumbling Capitol Theater and former WTVJ-NBC 6 studios will be reduced to rubble. In its place: a new $120 million U.S. courthouse, one of the largest in the Southeast, which federal officials hope will be majestic enough to bring back life to the once animated area.
Designed by Arquitectonica, the local architecture firm that designed AmericanAirlines Arena, the massive court building will house about 16 courtrooms, 16 judges' chambers, detention cells, U.S. Marshals Service offices and other facilities.
The 316 N. Miami Ave. site once lured throngs of South Floridians to the theater, then dubbed Wometco's ``first-run'' premier movie house. It was built in 1926 as the Capitol Theater and converted into WTVJ in 1949 by Miami pioneer Mitchell Wolfson as an outgrowth of his Wometco theater chain.
RUNNING LIGHTS
``I remember going to the Capitol Theater even before it was WTVJ. It had the most dramatic theater front in Miami with running lights,'' said Miami historian Arva Moore Parks. ``Everybody went downtown to see the movies.''
Among them: a young and mischievous Howard Kleinberg.
Kleinberg, a newspaperman and long-time Miami resident, was a teenager in high school when he went to see a rerun of The Four Feathers, a 1939 colonial-India epic.
As the film's thirsty hero made his way across sun-scorched land, Kleinberg jumped from his seat in the balcony, screaming ``Water! Water!''
His friends got a kick out of it. Kleinberg got a kick, too - out of the place.
In 1952, WTVJ remodeled the building. It added to the three-story structure 200 spectator seats for its 68-by-100-foot studio on the second floor. The ground floor housed the executive offices, programming and sales departments. The control and projection rooms were on the third floor.
END OF THE ROAD
The building's demolition marks the end of an era, said Parks, who remembers that Monday evening in March 1949 when she walked to a store on Northeast 97th Street and Second Avenue to watch the first broadcast on a set in the shop's front window.
``I stood in front of an appliance store with most of the rest of Miami Shores to catch it. It was only an eight- or 10-inch screen, but most of us had never seen television before and it was very exciting,'' Parks said. ``They were having a lot of technical difficulties that first night. The test pattern and signs that said `Please Stand By' were probably on more than the programming.''
Only about 1,000 homes in the Miami area had sets that night to tune into WTVJ, which was then Channel 4.
The station had but 21 employees and two cameras. The 16th television station in the country, WTVJ would be South Florida's sole station for the next seven years.
From behind an office-like wooden desk, 21-year-old Ralph Renick - ``a skinny, little kid,'' Parks said - delivered the station's first news broadcast in July 1950.
That amateurish 15-minute segment would pave the way for electronic media in South Florida. ``We were pioneering,'' Renick said in a 1991 interview. ``Pioneering is fun because nobody can tell you you're doing it wrong - because it hasn't been done before.''
Renick would go on to be one of the nation's longest-running news anchors before his retirement in 1985. He died six years later from cancer.
IN THE ARCHIVES
Some of the footage from Renick's early newscasts has survived. The Florida Moving Image Archive has four million feet of WTVJ film, with the earliest newscast dating to circa 1951, said Steven Davidson, the archive's director.
Maps and pointers were used, cardboard backdrops were common and advertisements were displayed on the set during Renick's newscast. Commercials were not taped. Instead the camera would pan over to a spot next to Renick where pitchmen would give their spiels live.
From its small studio carved out of the Capitol Theater, WTVJ would broadcast four hours a night except Tuesdays, when the station went dark.
Before the technology to link the station to national networks was developed, the station was dependent on live, locally produced programs.
STUNT WOMAN
There were sports trivia and Pictionary-style game shows, gardening segments and children's programming. And then there was Lee Dickens. The stunt woman who walked on the wings of planes for the show ``was my idol,'' Parks recalled.
The station, which moved to Miramar in 2000, produced many heavyweight journalists like CNN's Larry King, NBC's Katie Couric and ESPN's Hank Goldberg and former ESPN Up Close host Roy Firestone. It introduced editorials, black journalists and female sportscasters to South Florida television.
``Many great things happened there. The place is overrun with history,'' said senior correspondent Ike Seamans, who joined WTVJ in 1969.
Still, Seamans said, ``I can't think of a more dumb place to put it than an old movie theater, but as [Wolfson] said at the time he never realized the full impact of what he was starting.''
The Miami building was like ``an old pair of shoes,'' Seamans said.
``It was old and decrepit. You had people jumping on chairs to avoid the mice but it felt comfortable. There was a sense of camaraderie there that has not been duplicated. The [Miramar headquarters], as grandiose as it is, will never be the same.''
Moving Image Archives show Miami's past
The Lynn and Louis Wolfson II Florida Moving Image Archives are made up largely of newscasts aired by the area's first station, WTVJ -- the flagship station of Wometco Enterprises. WTVJ first went on the air in 1949, fronted by pioneer newscaster Ralph Renick. It is now NBC6.
Louis Wolfson II had presided over the television and cable division of Wometco prior to its sale in 1983 and had preserved the station's video collection.
This month, his widow, Lynn Wolfson and MDC President Eduardo Padrón signed an agreement transferring the archive to the college and establishing the new Lynn and Louis Wolfson II Florida Moving Image Archives Media Center to be housed in a new building to be constructed in MDC's Wolfson campus complex in downtown Miami.
Through the years, the collection has expanded to include local footage shot as early as 1910. There are also many reels dedicated to the Cuban Revolution, Miami's civil rights era, the McDuffie riots, the Mariel boatlift, Haitian refugees and the Cocaine Cowboys.
Recently, WPLG-Channel 10 donated 5,000 hours of tapes to the archives when it moved out of its longtime Biscayne Boulevard headquarters.
The historic archives are the latest cultural acquisition by the college. MDC already owns the Miami International Film Festival, Miami Book Fair International, the Freedom Tower and the Tower Theater in Little Havana.
Along with the donation of the video library comes $7 million from the Mitchell Wolfson Sr. Foundation to maintain and grow the new media center. And, Lynn Wolfson donated an additional $2 million toward its construction.
"These funds will allow the center to expand its capacity to preserve historically important film and video from around Florida and to preserve our heritage for future generations to better understand their past," Lynn Wolfson said.
Padrón thanked the Wolfson family in a prepared statement:
"On behalf of our nearly 170,000 students, who will benefit immensely from this gift, I thank Lynn Wolfson and family for this extraordinary contribution that will keep giving for years to come."
Lynn Wolfson helped found the Moving Image Archives in 1984, along with newscaster Renick and historian Arva Moore Parks, under the joint sponsorship of the Miami-Dade Public Library System, MDC and the University of Miami.
The archives are presently housed at the main public library.
To learn more about the archives go to: http://www.wolfsonarchive.org
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