Yes, it was a very well-run and pleasant venue, but it's now gone.

A little aside. After the first airing - a debate broke out on various Simpson's websites as to which "Springfield" was correct. Many assumed it was MASS as that's Scully's home town. For the re-runs, I went back into the studio to identify it as "Springfield...." (fill-in the state). Did more than a 1/2 dozen options for various markets. If memory serves me - I did one for AK.

Happy New Year to all. It's been great re-connecting to Tulsa. Actually hosted a show for Winnercomm earlier in the year.

~ Jim

Here are some comments about Jim's "The Simpsons" episode. It ranks number one in this fan's top twenty list.

More about Jim below.

About KATV chroma key...KTUL was doing the "weather walk" which involved the large studio covered in blue, the wrong blue by the way, with Don Woods walking around on this map of the U.S. or Okla. showing the isobars etc. It was done perhaps once or twice a week due to KTUL being VERY busy at all times doing commercial production as local stations used to do. It was much more fun when more entertaining pics were put up! AH, but I drift from the info!....

Anywho, they sent me down to KATV to relite their chroma key. It just didn't work right. I soon found out that even tho they had the same cams we did, they looked awful! I figured out the problem right away. While KTUL had fine engineers & this caring lighting-type director (yours truly), KATV had no lite guy. Hence there was no direction in lite & no cooperation between studio & the engine. It was a job I still feel bad about to this day. KTUL engineers would listen to me while KATV's wanted to know who the heck this "boy" is from Tulsa.

I feel it is important to relay this to you all so that it is understood why cooperation between studio & engineering is so important. There should be an understanding of what "ID" or "look" the studio (station) puts out to the public. It is my belief that lack of this understanding is the main reason most local stations appear to come from the same place. Am I preaching to the choir?

See Edwin below.

My relatives in the Little Rock market - back in the '70's-mid 90's dialed around - they liked a weatherman on 1 channel (Tom somebody) and news on another....They, too, disliked the red-haired sports guy on KATV who used to do the Frank Broyles Show (as Frank would say, "..ya see now, dontcha see..." a la Foghorn Leghorn)...Speaking of the revered Mr. Leghorn - Warner Bros. released a compendium of all the great Bugs Bunny et al cartoons before Xmas - about $69 for trhe DVD set IF you can find one. The Borders' here all bought like 1 copy per store - look for it at the TTM Amazon.com link.

I am sure Mike Denney probably has one for Zeb Show flashbacks. Mike would cackle, giggle and laugh at cartoons that he had seen so many times. I think we all felt that way on the Warner cartoon library at 8.

To Bro Hillis - I worked at 3 joints on Gates Stereo Yard boards (for TV sound and Radio use) but the other Gates board models I don't remember. Why the board was called a "Yard" I don't know. We had a Collins at KWGS for a while - I think it had come from KVOO TV. We had RCA boards also at 8 in Control A & B and yet another Gates in audio production in the early '70's. You will remember the George Jacobs-designed scratchbuilt audio boards at KOTV from our days there.

Since then have worked on Sony analog, Amek Analog and about 4 other boards whose manufacturers I done forgot...

KTUL's sister station in Little Rock, KATV, has been celebrating its 50th Anniversary. Friday, December 19 and Friday, December 26, two separate programs were shown. The December 19 program was an hour of vintage video clips and interviews from present and former KATV employees. There were some very vintage clips. The December 26 program was a "funny moments" and "bloopers" special.

Gusty was drawn on KATV for many years in the seventies but the character was discontinued on the nightly newscasts in 1980 or 1981. I do not really know why.

In the early 80s, KATV went through a serious turnover of weather personalities. One personality who had been the weekday weatherman became the weekend weatherman. This weather personality would draw Gusty on the weekends, but his weeknight replacement would not on the weeknights.

Gusty made a return as a Saturday morning segment between a couple of the ABC network Saturday cartoons as an educational segment about a weather feature in the early nineties.

I do not know if you find it interesting that KATV had by the late 70s the chroma key effect for the weather, but they did not use it to display the weather map behind the weatherman. One segment shown on the December 26 special, they showed then-weatherman Ron Sherman appear out of the blue in the middle of a sunrise photo. He walks over to another part of the photo and opens the drawing board out of thin air and starts drawing Gusty.

The chroma key was used to put the weatherman in the middle of a remote cityscape shot or location behind the weatherman. When computer graphics started appearing in the newscasts by 1982 or 1983, the cityscape shots were reduced to a few seconds showing live shots from a remote camera or tape. Then, the computer graphics would appear in the background behind the weatherman.

In the December 19 program, they showed the signing of KATV's ownership to Allbritton Television. I suspect that signing also transferred the ownership of KTUL as well.

I have been looking for a localized version of the 1977 "Still the One" promo. On a night back in December 1979, KATV ran it at the end of the early evening newscast. I know that many ABC stations around the country had localized versions of the 1977 "Still the One" promo where the ABC logo was replaced with the affiliate's logo. I found the ABC network version of the promo on the Internet a few years ago, and I was trying to locate a localized version with the Circle 7 logo. It does not have to be from Little Rock since I know that several other Channel 7 ABC stations use or have used the Circle 7 logo. Have you come across KTUL's version of this promo package?

Mike Bruchas sent me a tape awhile back with a "Still The One" promo or two; I'll try to get one out here shortly.

Hope everyone has a safe and fun New Year's celebration tonight.

Oh, I just remembered that TTM was 5 years old as of 12/29.

Of course, there's no doubting the great work he does on that show, but I think we would be doing him a great disservice if we didn't mention his work on Behind The Laughter, the Simpsons' version of Behind The Music.

My favorite quote from that episode:

"The dream was over. Coming up: was the dream really over? Yes it was. Or was it? And Homer finds a new passion: dusting and polishing mixing boards. When "Behind the Laughter" continues."

More about Jim below.

Were the control board brands RCA and Gates? [Gates, which also made xmtrs and stuff, was bought out by Harris Intertype, which ultimately just became Harris Corp. I have worked and am now working with the guys at Harris Broadcast on more TV projects than you can shake a stick at, and they're good people, even if they don't make those great big pots on the control boards anymore.]

And, I set out to answer the New York Philharmonic announcer question before realizing that it was the Metropolitan Opera I was thinking about. Of course, it was Miiilton Cross who announced for Texaco well into the 1970's, and for many of those later years, the intermissions were filled by the Opera Quiz, featuring Tulsa's Tony Randall.

But as for the Philharmonic, fuggedaboutit.

'Tis true. Mark Wedel, formerly of KRMG hosted the morning show for a few years. He and producer/host Kevin Thames were let go last week. Too bad. Hard to compete in the mornings.

Ryan Rahal hasn't been on TV or radio for over a year now. When the "Morning Sports Cage" show left am1430 for The Sports Animal on am1550, he never went with it. Big Al now hosts it with former OU player Jimbo Elrod.

Rahal wasn't a fixture on TV for 10 years. More like 5 or 6. He originally left KJRH to run his own wireless phone store, but I don't believe he does that anymore. Not sure if he's still in town...

Happy New Year to all... Jim

I believe Russ Morgan used the phrase/logo "Music in the Morgan Manner" and "Man with the Horn" was Ray Anthony's theme song.

Wild guess on Mack's Oiler baseball chief sponsor would be someone like Oklahoma Tire and Supply, but I'm probably wrong on that.

Frank, do YOU know who anchored the first KVOO-TV (Ch-2) newscast in color?

We were monitoring CBS network lines and they were feeding assorted VNR's on Mondays. The Amer. Council of Life Insurers ran a video news release today with former OK Gov. Frank Keating as one of their directors and as a spokesman.

Former Gov. Frank Keating with Edwin Fincher

Thanks to Si Hawk for reminding me of some past adventures.

Mother Adams was a carry over from my radio show.Her thing was "Mother Adams just called in..." with a corny joke or a dig at someone (usually Troy Gordon). We went on KOTV in drag and hosted old movies for awhile.

The political thing was one of the worse moves I made. Thank goodness I didn't win, but I did beat some guy in the primary who went on some time later to become Mayor.

Happy New Year to all!

More from Chuck farther down the page.

On New Year's Eve, Lanna Thai is featuring Tommy Crook, then "Zombie Zoo" with my brother Alan on bass.

Cinderella G. Stump was (I think) the nom de joke of Jo Stafford, when she sang with Red Ingle--was it The Natural Seven? The one I recall is her send-up of Perry Como's "Temptation" which, ended up sounding like "Tem-tay-shun" in her Arkied-up dialect, backed by Ingle's Spike Jones-ish arrangement.

And the singer named after the dairy was The Singin' Rage, Miss Patti Sealtest.

Remember what "actualties" and "sounders" were?

I can't name the Magnecorder models any more or if its spelled Magna OR Magne corder...but I used to be able to do so!

What were the names of two KVOO newswriters?

What was the name of the KOME morning news show?

What were the names of the KTUL and KVOO “Women’s” programs?

What was the real name of singer “Cinderella G. Stump?”

What band did she record with?

Who was the director of KVOO’s “Eggs at Eight?”

Who used the phrase/logo “Music in the ( ) Manner?”

What band used the theme song “Man With the Horn?”

Which local sportscaster referred to race horses as “bangtails?”

What local singer got her name from a dairy?

Who was the main sponsor of the Tulsa Oiler baseball games that were announced by Mack Creager?

What was the name of the announcer for the New York Philharmonic broadcasts?

What were the two main sound board brands that were used at combo stations?

What ET brand recorded from inside out rather than the traditional outside in and required special filtering?

I'll send the answers later, if I can remember them.

"Studio5 is located in the northwest corner of the 401 N. Michigan Ave. building, which is adjacent to the NBC Tower on Columbus Drive. NBC5 is the first television station in Chicago to broadcast live from a street-side studio. The space is leased from the Zeller Realty Group."

Duh - what folks don't realize is that in front of nearby Tribune Tower and a few seconds walk away - WGN TV ran "Man on the Street" for 15minutes M-F nights in the 50's/early '60s' with legendary Jack Brickhouse interviewing folks either before or aften WGN's then 15min. early evening news. I think Maxwell House Coffee was his long time sponsor.

It's funny that to have a studio on Michigan Bouilevard in Chicago - they rented space out of their owned building. WMAQ for years was in the Jos. P. Kennedy, Sr. estate-owned Merchandise Mart. Then in the '80's or '90's moved to their own building - a pretty hefty investment then. I think Jerry Springer and Jenny Jones were both shot there, too.

Does anyone know why Clear Channel made the decision other than just money? I'm also curious as to what happened to Al Jerkens and Ryan Rahal's radio show. I heard it moved to AM 1550, a station I can barely pick up from my location. I was told Rahal left the show.

Does anyone know if he's still in the Tulsa area? He was a fixture on both KJRH and KOTV for almost 10 years. Happy Holidays everyone...

Webmaster: re my comments after his previous email, Jim said:

Given the photos you attached, I'm certain we're talking about 2 different people, Mike. The John Ross I worked with was an outstanding young photographer @2 in the early 80's.

Nice ditty on the Troubleshooter....you must have written that about Bunn....he was more of the sappy one:)

best,
Jim Forbes

More about Jim below.

Gen. Stafford showed off his Russian, NASA and USAF memorabilia and spoke a little Russian, too. He has the "last man" bottle of booze from the Soyuz mission - everyone on the mission drank from it - but he is custodian of it. The Staffords have a lap pool which the kids enjoyed. The Gen. - though looking older than he did 20 years ago (duh)- still looks like he is in shape to fly. He's one of my Okie born heroes still!

We also were watching a feed today of David Letterman and Paul Shaffer entertaining the troops in Iraq. He said that he is glad to born American and proud of the guys/gals there on duty...

I want to thank everyone who clicks by my reviews here at the super site and wish all a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

Oh yes, I didn't feel the quake out here, but the buildings were swayin', I hear, in SFO; ya know?, Shakey Town.

By the way, speaking of Shakey's, Sacramento is where that pizza parlor got its start.

I remember the one that was out on East Admiral Place years ago in Tulsa.

Also, the mention of "KRMG-News On the Move" reminds me that when KVOO-AM was still in existence, they also used that slogan (along with "Traffic On the Move").

I saw current Star 103 morning man Mel Myers this weekend while out Christmas shopping. I haven't seen his face in probably 10 years, but he hasn't aged. He's like Dick Clark! I was a victim of a "Birthday Wake Up Call" when he and Banana Bradley hosted the morning show on Z104.5 back in the early 90's before it went alternative. I still have that on tape somewhere...

I was a reporter and "The Troubleshooter" at KJRH from Memorial Day 1980 to Labor Day '81. Specialized on tensions and problems at "Big Mac" following my coverage of the New Mexico prison riot, while working in Farmington, NM previously. Also hosted "Studio2Live" after John (Erling?) of KRMG stopped.

Worked with Anthony Mason (saw him in NYC last year) Roche Madden, Jerry Webber, Al Jerkens, Dean Lewis, Kristi Conrad, Mendes Napoli, Susan Silver, John Bateman, Duane Jones, Johnny Thomasson, John Ross and so many others.

Left for Post-Newsweek station in Hartford (WFSB) in '81, and then to KCBS in LA in '85. Have been in LA since, working for many different nets.

Guess I'm just saying hello and would love to hear from any former colleagues.

I'm a native Bronx Boy - but absolutely loved Tulsa and my days there.

Regards to all,
Jim Forbes

Good to hear from you, Jim. John Ross...is he our current Four Day Furniture pitchman, Johnny Ross, I wonder? (Later: Jim says no.)

That reminds me that I "composed" a little tribute to the office of "The Troubleshooter" back around 1980. It was one of those story songs that should be performed by a gruff, grizzled type of singer, propped up by a choir on the chorus:

He's the Troubleshooter
He'll come into your home.
He's the Troubleshooter
He spends a lot of time on the phone.
He's there whenever someone, somewhere
Feels like pickin' a bone.
He's the Troubleshooter
He stands for us, 'cuz he stands alone.

Tulsa Tribune "Call The Editor" item, circa 1980.

Later, I threw the Tulsa World and would listen to Herb Jepko on KSL/KVOO, on the Nite Caps show.

I discussed with my dad (84 yrs old) tonight and he remembers some DJ by the name of "Vibrant Victor" days either on KRMG or KVOO (BC) Before Country.

Hear that Herb Jepko Nitecap song here: Nitecaps.org.

Linda Cavanaugh is still a main co-anchor at KFOR.

Patti Suarez left KWTV in the early 90's to anchor at the LA Fox affiliate. Last I heard, she was a stage actress in Phoenix.

Thanks, Chris!

Anyone know where Patty Suarez went to? Is Linda Cavanaugh off the air in OKC? Ann Nyberg is still #1 up in Hartford, CT...

I worked on PM Mag with Karen, then edited spots for her when she moved to Ackerman McQueen -- she's a real sweetheart.

I was going through a bored period at KRMG and signed on with the news team at KVOO-TV (soon to become KTEW) headed up by Jack Morris as anchor, Ron Franklin as our sports guy and I had the weather slot. It seemed a great move at the time, especially when management assured me this would be a great place to develop my sparkling personality (as I had in radio). It didn't quite work out that way, as I soon tired of my few minutes in the Six and Ten PM news blocks and doing the breaks in the Perry Mason reruns from 10:30-11:00. Program management cut the weather from its scheduled five or so minutes to no more than a minute or so. Upset by the limitations placed on me, I was pretty vocal about it. I remember Jack Morris discussing the situation with me, and telling me not to worry because as long as he was there I had a job. It wasn't too long after that that I was back in radio!

Don't misunderstand, Jack and I remained good friends. But for anyone who is as naive as I was, if you hear "as long as I'm here", et cetera...better get your resume updated!

Happy Holiday wishes to all.

Finally took the time to catch one of the shows. I enjoyed it. Lot of imagination and creativity going on there. I could tell a lot of time, effort, and energy must go into those shows. I was particularly impressed with the posting of the show, i.e., video effects, etc. Overall production is obviously light years ahead of anything I did.

Congratulations to all of those young men.

While I was on vacation, someone put in a lot of bogus entries about KJRH; they are all deleted. Good stuff remains, though; take a look.