Media Notebook--7-26-24

MEDIA NOTEBOOK

A curation of news items about the media from this past week, with a particular emphasis on Chicago.

RADIO/PODCASTS

 

*Rest in Peace

=Don Buchwald

One of the most famous talent agents in America. This is what one of his former clients, former Chicago radio morning man Paul Barsky, wrote on Tuesday to eulogize Don…

        Today I learned that legendary broadcast talent agent Don Buchwald passed away. He's quite famous for being Howard Stern's long-time agent and in my opinion, he's the main person responsible for Howard's financial success. But a couple years before he became Howard 's agent, Don was my agent. Here's how I met him :

In the early 80's I was hired to be part of a new coast to coast music radio network that ABC radio constructed called " Superadio". One of the personalities on the network was the greatest top 40 DJ of all time...Dan Ingram of 77 WABC fame. Anyway, a month before the network was supposed to launch all over America...the entire staff was called into a conference room for a 2pm meeting at the ABC building in NYC and given the bad news that the project was " postponed indefinitely", which was another way of saying " canceled".

After the meeting, Ingram asked me who my agent was. I said I didn't have one. Then he said..." you need one, and I'm going to introduce you to mine.. his name is Don Buchwald....let's go". So now I'm walking down East 44th st. in NYC with Dan Ingram heading over to meet his agent. We get to the building, head up in the elevator , the doors open and Dan leads me directly into Buchwald's office and shouts, "Superadio's dead, and here's one of the casualties ...Paul Barsky...you need to sign him..he's gonna do big things". And right then and there , and without ever hearing a sample of my work...I became Don Buchwald's brand-new client.

Not long after that, Don went to work quickly and literally changed the trajectory of my broadcasting career. He landed me my first major market morning radio hosting job.... the morning show on WCAU-FM in Philly, and then a few years later he secured for me the morning drive hosting job at WLS-FM in Chicago. Always impeccably dressed, I used to call him " Dapper Don"... he was brilliant, wise, laid back yet fearless. May he rest in peace.

 

*Sound Exchange Sues AccuRadio

=Kurt Hanson is the long-time Chicago radio guy who created the internet radio powerhouse AccuRadio. Sound Exchange is the service that collects royalties for recording artists. The RAMP newsletter has the blow by blow of this lawsuit.

 

*Musberger Media Buys Back VSiN

=A few years ago (2021) Brian Musberger and former Chicago Tribune writer Bill Adee sold their multi-platform sports betting site to DraftKings. This week they bought it back from them. In a release, Musberger said:  "We truly appreciate the work we've done with DraftKings and look forward to continuing to collaborate on future projects. Bill and I couldn't be more excited about leading VSiN into the future and cementing our position as a trusted authority in sports betting."

 

*Blues Brothers, on Audible

=Dan Ackroyd is at the helm of this project on Audible. Count me in. The Associated Press has more information about it.

 

*Ex-Chicago Radio

=Jay Styles, who was here in Chicago at WSHE for about five years as the afternoon man/MD, has re-emerged on the radio dial. He is now hosting afternoons at WHEL in Ft. Myers, Florida.

 

*New Illini Announcers

=Two former Illini players will join the radio coverage of University of Illinois football this year, Carey Davis and Kevin Mitchell.  Davis was a co-captain for the 2003 Illini and later became a Super Bowl winner with the Steelers. Mitchell was one of the co-captains of the 2008 Illini team that went to the Rose Bowl.

 

*Rest in Peace

=John Mayall

British blues musician. He was 90.

=Abdul “Duke” Fakir

Last surviving member of the Four Tops. He was 88.

=Dick Asher

Former president of Polygram and Columbia Records. He was 92.

 

 

MEDIA BIRTHDAYS/MILESTONES

 

*July 21—Mary Ann Ahern birthday

=Political reporter at NBC-5 Chicago. Winner of multiple Emmy awards, and a Lisagor Award for Lifetime Achievement (in 2012). A native of Michigan City, Indiana.

 

*July 21—Danielle Tufano

=Danielle was a morning personality and program director at the River for several years before leaving the radio business. This has always been my favorite photo of her, strangling her fellow River air personality Mitch Michaels at one of Mitch’s book signings. I interviewed Danielle for Illinois Entertainer.

 

*July 21—Spike Manton birthday

=Probably best known for his years paired up with Harry Teinowitz at various different Chicago radio stations. Spike also co-hosted with Steve Dahl at WCKG and was the morning man at the Loop with Dobie Maxwell and Max Bumgardner in the early 00s. In addition, Spike is an award-winning playwright. I interviewed him on my podcast a few years ago.

 

*July 21—Tim Virgin birthday

=Tim is the afternoon man at WLS-FM but also had a long and successful stint at both Q-101 and WLUP. I interviewed him for Illinois Entertainer.

 

*July 21—Rich Strong birthday

=Rich has worked at WMAQ radio, CBS-2 television, and still works as a news anchor for USA Radio Networks. He now lives in Denver.

 

*July 22—Sam Alex birthday

=Nationally syndicated country music radio personality, originally from the Chicago area.

 

*July 23--Ray Rayner birthday

=The beloved children’s TV host of the 1960s and 1970s at Channel 9 was also a war hero. He was one of the men who escaped the German POW camp memorialized in the film “The Great Escape”.

 

*July 24—Sky Daniels birthday

=Sky was the evening jock and music director of the Loop during its initial heyday in the late 70s, early 80s. (PHOTO: Paul Natkin). I interviewed Sky for Illinois Entertainer just last year.

 

*July 24--Kathy Brock birthday

=Kathy was an anchor at ABC-7 in Chicago for 28 years. She retired in 2018. It was clear her co-workers thought very highly of her…

 

*July 25--Anna Davlantes birthday

=Anna has worked at high profile gigs in both radio and television in Chicago, WGN Radio, and Fox-32, NBC-5, and WTTW.

 

*July 26—Steve King birthday

=Steve had a famous run at WLS during their music radio days but is best known for his two-plus decade run as the overnight host at WGN Radio along with his wife Johnnie. He’s also the writer of a cult rock and roll hit. I wrote about that in the Illinois Entertainer in 2021.

 

*July 26—Charlie Van Dyke birthday

=One-time WLS-AM morning man during the station’s music radio days. Really made his mark out on the west coast at KHJ. Voice of television stations around the country. Father of Kiss-FM’s morning man Christopher “Brotha Fred” Frederick.

 

*July 26—Jim Avila birthday

=Award-winning television journalist, best known for his years at ABC network. He also worked here in Chicago at Channel 2 and is originally from the Chicago area (Glenbard East High School grad). Currently working in local television again in San Diego.

 

*July 27—Jon Hansen birthday

=Jack of all trades. Has worked in both radio (WGN) and television (WCIU, Fox-32), and also provides the in-arena entertainment at Chicago Blackhawks games. He’s also in the Illini Media Hall of Fame. I interviewed him for Illinois Entertainer.

 

July 27—Will Byington birthday

=Will is one of the premier photographers in Chicago. He’s also a frequent radio guest. He combined those two back in November when he came out to the first book signing for The Loop Files, hopped on the bar at Pippin’s, and took this photo.

 

TV/STREAMING

 

*Olympic Coverage

=There’s no excuse to miss any part of the Summer Olympics you’d like to see. NBC-5 Chicago and Telemundo Chicago will have 500+ hours of coverage beginning today with the Opening Ceremonies. The newscasts on both Channel 5 and Telemundo will also feature locally-focused coverage in every newscast through the closing ceremonies on August 11.

*Gaynor Hall Leaves WGN

=She announced the news on Friday just a few hours after my last column came out….

 

*Jon Lester on Marquis Network

=They gave Lester a tryout in the TV booth alongside the Hall of Famer Pat Hughes. If you want to see how he did, here’s a little taste of it.

 

*Ernie Johnson Takes a Leave of Absence from TBS

=He was the in-studio anchor for TBS baseball coverage, but he’ll be taking off the rest of the regular season and post season to attend to a personal matter. More info here.

 

*He’s Back

=Meanwhile, it appears someone else’s exile is over.

🚨 NEWS: Thom Brennaman, who has been exiled from broadcasting for fours years after using a homophobic slur on air, has been hired to call nationally televised college football games for The CW, The Athletic has learned.

Full story: 👇👇https://t.co/Elp1WpwbtS

— Andrew Marchand (@AndrewMarchand) July 21, 2024

 

*The BBC to Lay Off 500 People

=That’s a big number, even if it’s over a two-year period as this article explains. 

 

*Rupert Murdoch’s Battle with his Children

=Reading this article it’s almost impossible not to think about the show Succession. Rupert is trying to change his “inviolable trust” so that his oldest son inherits it all because he has the same politics as Rupert. Murdoch considers his other three children too politically moderate to “maintain the value of his media properties”. He’s pitting his children against each other exactly the way Logan Roy would have done it.

 

*One more Newhart item

=This was one of my favorite pieces about Bob Newhart in the wake of his passing. Block Club Chicago explained the opening sequence of his show set in Chicago, and why he was hopelessly lost every day.

 

*Rest in Peace

=Autumn Crittendon

The former 16 and Pregnant star was 27.

16 and Pregnant alum Autumn Crittendon has passed away at 27 years old. pic.twitter.com/lv6NMFohgR

— E! News (@enews) July 23, 2024

=Ester TerBlanche

South African actress who appeared in All My Children. She was 51.

 

DIGITAL/PRINT

 

*RIP Walter Shapiro

=Jeff Greenfield announced the news via Twitter

Some very sad news this morning: Walter Shapiro, died. A political journalist for half a century, he was steeped in political lore, leavened with a love for history a wicked sense of humor, and a rich abiding love for his wife, Meryl Gordon. (1/2)

— Jeff Greenfield (@greenfield64) July 21, 2024

=In addition to being a great political commentator, Walter also wrote a book about one of his ancestors who hustled Adolf Hitler. I talked to him about that for my podcast just last year.

 

*Gershkovich sentenced to 16 years in Russian Prison

=Evan Gershkovich was given a 16-year sentence. 

=Meanwhile another US/Russian journalist (Alsu Kermasheva) was given 6 ½ years in a Russian prison after a rushed and secret trial. The AP has that story.

As always, if you have any media story you’d like to share or think that I might be interested in sharing, drop me a line at rick@eckhartzpress.com or amishrick@yahoo.com. If you're in Chicago media and wondering why I didn't mention your birthday, it's probably because I don't know it. Drop me a line and let me know and I'll put you on my calendar.

20 Years: Free Excerpt from Father Knows Nothing

 

This year marks my 20th year as a professional writer. Over the course of 2024, I'll be sharing a few of those offerings you may have missed along the way.

This is one of my favorite stories from Father Knows Nothing. It's being published today in honor of my old neighbor Nancy Page. Today would have been her birthday.

It was just an ordinary summer day in 1973.

The old neighborhood was filled with kids. There were a dozen or more kids on my street about the same age as me, give or take a few years, and we played together outside for hours and hours at a time. The games of choice were Spud, Kick the Can, 500, Capture the Flag, and of course, baseball.

On this particular day I was watching some of the older kids play baseball at the park across the street from my house. They weren’t letting me play because I wasn’t good enough, but I didn’t mind. My best friend Stu was allowed to play, and I was lending my support by rooting for him, and chasing foul balls.

“Hey Ricky!” I heard from across the street. I recognized the voice of Stu’s sister Nancy, but I didn’t see her anywhere. “Up here,” she said. “In the tree.”

The tree in the front yard of her house was our favorite climbing tree. The lowest branch was low enough to allow even little kids access. Some of the neighborhood kids could climb nearly all the way to the top, but I was afraid to go that high. It was a pretty tall tree. And Nancy was up higher in that tree than I had ever seen.

“You can see the water tower from up here,” she said.

Now she had my attention. This was a small town with absolutely nothing exciting, but we did have a water tower downtown a few miles away. It seemed impossible to be able to see something of that magnitude from the bucolic confines of our little side street. So I wandered over to take a look.

When I stood at the base of the tree and looked straight up, it seemed like Nancy was a thousand feet in the sky. There was no way I was going that high.

“C’mon,” she said. “You’ve got to see this.”

She was right. I had to see it. So I started climbing, and this tree was made for climbing. The branches were smooth. They were staggered perfectly. They were sturdy. There really was nothing preventing me from continuing my climb except my fear.

I made it past the mid-point of the tree (my new all-time record) and saw something for the first time in my life: the roof of the school across the street. I could see a couple of dodge balls that had been kicked up there–an incredible find. But I still couldn’t imagine that I would make it as high as Nancy.

She was urging me on as I hit the 3/4 mark, but I still couldn’t see the water tower. I saw something else, however. Our Ford LTD was making it’s way down the boulevard on it’s way home from the train station. Inside that car was my dad’s car pool–my dad, our next door neighbor Mr. Reiss, and our backyard neighbor Mr. Walsh. It was my mom’s turn to pick them up.

I knew that car meant the end of my climb because dinner started moments after dad walked in the front door, so I put my fear aside and kept climbing. I made it just beneath Nancy as our car pulled into the driveway, and I couldn’t believe my eyes. There it was; its gold glimmering paint shining from a few miles away. A giant “1917″ was painted on its side, the year our town was founded.

“Can you see it?” Nancy asked.

“I can see it,” I replied.

We could hear the car doors open beneath us, and I couldn’t contain my excitement.

“Dad,” I called. “I can see the water tower from here.”

“Get down from there,” my mom called. “You’ll kill yourself.”

“Look at that,” Mr. Reiss said. “Ricky’s really all the way up there.”

He didn’t sound concerned and neither did my dad, who just told me to come down for dinner.

I never made it up that tree again. A few months later my little brother fell out of it, and one of the neighbors broke her arm saving him from getting hurt. After that, Mr. Page (Nancy & Stu’s dad) enforced a no-climb zone.

We moved out of the neighborhood the next year–all the way to Germany.

The Pages moved away in the mid-80s. By then Nancy was married, and Stu was in the Air Force. Many of the other neighbors eventually moved too, but one constant had always been Mr. Reiss. That era ended a few weeks ago, when he passed away. He had been the last living member of the carpool.

When I attended Mr. Reiss’ funeral, I couldn’t help it, I flashed back to that summer of 1973. I pictured him getting out of that Ford LTD, and looking up at the only tree climbing accomplishment of my life.

Sadly, it wasn’t a long journey back to 1973 for me, because I was already there, ever since Stu called me a few days earlier to tell me that his sister Nancy had also died. She died of ALS the same week as Mr. Reiss. Nancy would have been 50 this summer (2011), 38 summers after she reached the top of the tree.

The neighborhood hasn’t physically changed much; the same houses on the same street in front of the same park. Even the tree is still standing, and if you’re crazy enough to climb it, you can still see the water tower, which was recently repainted.

But you can’t see what I can see.

I can see Nancy. I can see Mr. Reiss. I can see Dad.

And I can see a perfect summer day in 1973.

***

As usual, here are some Cubs goodies

July 21, 1899--Hemingway's birthday

~Ernest Hemingway (Cubs fan 1899-1962)
Hemingway grew up in Oak Park and was a precocious boy of 9 when the Cubs won the World Series in 1908. He had more than a passing knowledge of that great Cubs team. His father was the doctor for Cubs owner Charles Murphy, and young Ernest saw his share of Cubs games at West Side Grounds. In 1949, he wrote a letter to his friend Ed recalling those days. He wrote: “I would say ‘Dear Lord, this isn’t as bad as what Frank Chance goes through every day, but please give me the courage to bear it like he does.’ Frank Chance couldn’t duck if they threw at his head. After he had his first concussion after I think it was Marquard hit him he would freeze, and nobody threw him anything that wasn’t high and inside. Finally he had such awful headaches that it was tough for me, a punk kid, to see him.” In the 1940s Hemingway invited ex-Cubs players like Billy Herman, Larry French, Augie Galan, and Curt Davis to hang out at his house in Cuba. But though he eventually became a Dodgers fan (all of those players ended up playing on the Dodgers after they left the Cubs–and the Dodgers trained in Cuba), his baseball teeth were cut in Chicago, watching the World Champion Chicago Cubs.

July 22, 1986—Cubs fire Marla Collins:

July 24, 1908—The feud between Evers and Tinker/This week in 1908

July 24, 2009—A perfect day at the ballpark

July 25, 1863—John Tener birthday, Politician Cub

July 27—Leo Durocher birthday. 2009--Nice Guys Finish Last re-released.  Rick reviews

Studio Walls--7-24-24

 

A weekly update/preview of my latest podcasts, and a look back at some of my previous audio work from this week in history over the past 40+ years.

Here are a few from the archives...

July 21--Spike Manton birthday

=We talked to the razor-tongued devil in this episode.  

 

July 22—National Cowboy Day. 

=One of the cowboys from the show 1883, Eric Nelsen, appeared on our show.  

July 22--Bobby Sherman birthday

=Yes, I have a Bobby Sherman story. I told it in this episode. 

July 22--Governor Jim Edgar birthday

=You won't believe this story.  He once offered me a job.

July 22—Alan Menken birthday. 

=His lyricist Glenn Slater explained the genius behind the man. 

July 22, 2022—Rick appears on Destination Eat Drink podcast 

=On this particular episode I was talking about Ireland. 

July 22, 2023—Pat Hughes inducted in Hall of Fame

=You can see his speech here. 

 

July 23—World Ant Day

=Coyote Peterson told us how painful it was being stung by certain ants.  

July 23—Slash birthday

=Yes, I have a Slash story. It's here. 

July 23--Ray Rayner birthday

=My one and only brush with the Chicago children's TV star of the 60s & 70s.  

July 23, 1965—Moody Blues release debut album. 

=Allan Hewitt was in the Moody Blues, and we talked to him about it. : 

July 23—Monica Lewinsky birthday 

=Max Joseph worked with her, and told us this story.  

 

July 24, 1970—I’m Your Captain released by Grand Funk Railroad

=Would you believe it came to Mark Farner in a dream? That's what he told us.  

 

July 25—Walter Payton birthday

=We have audio of Walter on John Landecker's show. It's on this show.

=Jim McMahon also told us a story about him. 

July 25—Mitzie Shore birthday

=Ross Bennett story about Mitzie told him ‘you’re not funny’ 

 

July 26--Darlene Love birthday

=My personal story about her was told in this episode.  

July 26—Mick Jagger’s birthday

=James Finn Garner and I argued about the Beatles vs. the Stones. 

=Lighting director Chip Monck told us a great Mick Jagger story.  

July 26--Shane Obedzinski birthday

=The star of The Sandlot was on our show a few years ago. 

July 26, 2000—Thomas and the Magic Railroad debuts

=Little Tommy Kaempfer reviewed it. We have the audio.

 

July 27, 1919—Chicago race riots.

=Chicago historian Robert Loerzel explained the story

July 27, 1990—Presumed Innocent (the movie) opens. 

=The writer of the book, Scott Turow, told us all about the film.