My dad, my hero

My father is an active duty pilot in the United States Air Force Reserve, and he recently left for an overseas trip. As I watched The War last night, only once did I wonder “Where is my dad?” Sometimes he doesn’t even know where he is going until he boards the plane.

In his 20 years of service, my father never says “goodbye” when he leaves for trips. It’s more likely “I love you.” With a quick wave or hug, my mother would shuttle him to an airport or he would drive away to the closest Air Force base.

I guess this is strategic, because as a child I never even had a second thought about whether or not my father would come home. Never tears or hysterics from my mother, no concern even crossed her face. It is always a casual “See you later, I love you.” He has been doing it for so long it is just normal for him to leave for weeks at a time.

Ken Burns’ tagline for The War is “in extraordinary times there are no ordinary lives.” Well, my parents made my life as ordinary as possible.

My father is the BEST at ordinary things. He dressed my Barbie dolls with me when I was younger, shingled my doll house roof and even would make presentations at my school about being a pilot. He always does father stuff well, especially telling me how proud he is of me.

However, I don’t think I tell him enough of how proud I am of him. There are those extraordinary moments when a light will go on in my head: my dad is an American hero. Like when I attended an air show in high school with my family, and he wore his flight suit; a little boy asked him for his autograph and a picture. I probably complained about being on asphalt all day in the hot sun, but I was proud to be there with him.

My ordinary dad is my everyday hero, and not because he is in the military—just because he is my dad.

Thanks for the reminder, MPT.


Desirée Edwards
Assistant Manager, Major and Planned Giving

The magical world of editing

No guts no glory. No edit no story.

Welcome to the magical world of editing. The place where months of planning, weeks of writing and days of shooting all converge. For a typical 30-minute show, an editor may see over 12 hours of footage.

Working closely with producers, an editor will piece together a basic outline—kind of like starting a puzzle around the edges. Once we get the outline in place, we fill in the story. We'll add graphics, special effects and music to make it sing. When we're done, a stack of tapes will have been miraculously transformed into a comprehensive and entertaining program.

It sounds simple, but there are a lot of decisions made along the way. It's not unusual for us to spend days working on the same scene–back and forth–trimming shots by fractions of a second. That same 30-minute show may easily take us 4-8 weeks to complete.

Over the past 15 years, the technology of editing as changed a great deal. Back in the day, stories were put together in a linear fashion—we'd start at the beginning and end at the end—not much different than typing a letter with a typewriter. If you got halfway through and you didn't like what you had, you'd get out a new tape and start all over again. Now with computer-based systems or non-linear editing, the whole process is a lot more creative. This technology is the video equivalent of a word processor. We can now move clips around faster than you can say, “by viewers like you.”

Here at Maryland Public Television we have over a dozen edit suites filled with incredible editors all working on the great programs that broadcast over our airwaves. It's in these suites where the stories are shaped.

It's said that good editing shouldn't be seen; if it all flows together, the viewer will be too entertained to take note. So, next time you're watching a show on MPT and you don't notice what we've done, we'll take that as a compliment.


Joe Campbell
Editor

Fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, brothers, sisters...

This Sunday, MPT will bring you Ken Burns' highly anticipated new World War II documentary The War. This is a huge production for the PBS system and one that will draw huge viewership, I’m sure. It is beautifully done and well worth investing your time to watch the seven-part series.

On a personal level, it is even more poignant as I have a son who is a Navy pilot currently flying over Iraq. Although I am well aware these two wars are from entirely different generations of technology, watching footage from The War cements in my mind that it takes individual efforts to achieve results. It’s not a faceless, mass endeavor but rather fathers, sons, mothers, daughters, brothers, sisters who are all away from their loved ones, giving their hearts and souls to retain the freedoms that those of us here enjoy daily.

So while you are watching, please give thought to those who are still answering the call of duty. The participants from World War II have been referred to as the “Greatest Generation” and I don’t disagree. But those who are participating now deserve the same respect.

Sue Vanskiver

Sr. Administrative Assistant, Content

Making the switch

Analog TV—what we have been watching since the 1930s (and in color from the 1950s)— is scheduled to go dark at 2 a.m. February 18, 2009. This date was carefully chosen because it is after the Super Bowl and before March Madness. (Who says sports don’t run the county?!) Do you really care about this? Yeah, if you are one of the 15 percent of U.S. households that only watch free, over-the-air TV.

So what do you do? You have three choices:

1. Buy a new TV with a digital (ATSC) tuner.

2. Pay for TV by subscribing to a cable, fiber or satellite delivery system.

3. Buy a digital-to-analog converter box. This is a standalone digital tuner that takes the free digital (and far superior to analog) off-air signal and converts it for viewing on your existing TV. Today these boxes are priced around $100-$150 but prices are expected to drop. But wait! There’s more: Uncle Sam is coming to your aid by distributing $40 rebate coupons to help you buy one of these boxes. The government plans on rolling out this rebate program in early 2008, so stay tuned.

“But don’t I need an HDTV digital antenna to receive those free digital signals?” you may ask. The short answer is no. Antennas are antennas. Before you buy a new antenna, try rabbit ears or your old roof-top antenna. I’m using a paperclip on my office set. Here’s a great link to learn about antennas. MPT has a site explaining the switch to digital as well.

Try digital TV! You’ll really like it!


George Beneman
Vice President of Technology

Start your engines!

Who knew when I raced home from school every day to watch Julia Child on MPT that I would end up in the very halls that the famed cooking show goddess had once walked? I still love the cooking shows but I do have another passion…

I know you are all familiar with the parent who thinks that her child is the prettiest, most talented and, well, just the best at everything. Yes, I am that annoying parent. The only problem is that my child is a ten-year-old BMW 328is.

I don’t know how my friends and family put up with it. At family gatherings everyone else is having normal conversations while I’m talking about purchasing an M3 subframe reinforcement upgrade and new bushings. Bless my friends because I think they’re going to strangle me if they have to hear one more time about how every other car is just a piece of farm equipment.

Thankfully, I get to come to work everyday and see what’s new on the MotorWeek section of the parking lot (could there be a new BMW for me to inspect?!) and the MotorWeek guys keep my desk and e-mail full of the latest car news and pics. Sometimes I even get to throw my two cents in, “Why yes, Dave, I’d love to give my opinion of the new BMW 335i.” [Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea since the 335i was a turbo (cheating + lag = yuck) and an automatic transmission...blasphemy!]

Even though the car had stacked up some bad points before I even touched the gas I couldn’t let my MotorWeek comrades down. Yeah, I liked it so much I was ready to treat Boo Boo Kitty (that’s my beloved 328is) like a red-headed stepchild. I guess MPT is where I belong. I mean, it’s where Boo Boo Kitty and I belong…

Tracy Gaspari

Studio Production Specialist

Alicia & Elmo

So, I was working at my computer while my daughter was watching TV in the same room. I was absorbed in whatever I was working on, until she says, “Mommy, Alicia Keys is singing with Elmo!” Now, I know that Sesame Street usually books really cool guests for really clever appearances, but THIS I have to see. I turn around, and there she is: my girl Alicia at the piano with Elmo doing a revamped rendition of “Fallin’.” For about three minutes, we were completely glued to the screen: me and my 8-year-old hooked on Sesame Street, and both “too old” for Elmo. It was the coolest thing ever.

Everything stopped in the room because of something on MPT. Go figure.


Faith Michel
Director of Community Outreach

Bragging rights

I have the coolest job at MPT—producer.

Some days, it’s a job like any other. But when I was recently asked to write a list of all the cool people I’ve met and the things I’ve seen, I was pretty impressed with myself. Working for five years on our local arts program, ArtWorks This Week, has created some exciting and thought-provoking moments.

One bragging right I like to hold around here is interviewing Duff Goldman, owner of Charm City Cakes and star of the Food Networks’ Ace of Cakes. We met in spring 2006 to do a story on a small, local bakery. In our round of phone calls to set up the interview, he mentioned another TV crew would soon be following him around for a reality TV show which would air that fall.

When we showed up with the camera and bright lights, he and the staff of CCC were a bit nervous because they hadn’t done a lot of TV and weren’t sure about our intrusion. The next year, billboards and ads were popping up all over Baltimore, and Ace of Cakes became one of the most-talked-about shows on the Food Network.

Charm City Cakes was already very popular when we met, but I like the idea that I found this gem and got to tell everyone before they were a household name.

Check out the ArtWorks This Week Charm City Cake segment below!

Katrina Threat
Producer, ArtWorks This Week

Reeling with mystery

I stumbled on the Mystery Reel late one weekend night. I was cleaning out a small closet at home, and there it was at the bottom of the pile. There were no identifying marks on it, nothing to go on, really. There were no interesting clues on the box either, except a Scotch-3M label someone tried to tear off and a smudged note scribbled in bad handwriting that looked like “At Wx 66.”

I keep a small archive of historic videotape at home—things like Nixon and Khrushchev’s Kitchen Debate, Kennedy’s Cuba speech, FDR, Lindberg, Ike and other historic people—all from old television or newsreel footage that I’ve gathered over the years from the National Archives or other sources during research. But most of that footage is on VHS tape. This was different, not one of mine. I don’t know how it got there—probably, I thought, it was part of my collection of “stuff” I’d been collecting and carting around for years and forgotten about. It was large format—the tape itself was two inches wide—a throwback, an early version of broadcast videotape that in the 50s and 60s was wound on large, heavy metal reels and hung, recorded, played and even edited on what were called Quadraplex videotape machines. They’re relics now.

When you find something like that…something that’s hidden treasure, you just have to find out what it is. So I had the tape dubbed.

What was on it was a great surprise: a weather segment from Harrisburg’s WHP-TV’s 11 o’clock news taped in October 1966. Presenting the forecast for the next day – the man who would years later host Maryland Public Television’s national Aviation Weather series in the mid-70’s. That’s Jim English, my father, but in the 60’s he was known on Harrisburg television as The Atlantic Weatherman. He started in radio playing jazz at WKBO-AM, and made the jump to television in the early 60’s. In those days, WHP—Channel 21 in Harrisburg, Pa.—was in the penthouse offices of the old Telegraph Building on Locust Street, which is to say, the fourth floor.

One thing I remember fondly about my visits there when I was a kid was the elevator. Inside it was all dark wood paneling and polished brass and run by a tiny, white-gloved old man named Carl. He’d invite us in with a slight crook of his hand, gently request our destination and close the ornate brass and glass door. His white glove skillfully rotated the brass control, and the motor jumped to life and hummed deeply as floors two and three came and went. He always thanked us as he opened the glass gate to let us out.

We’d step onto the fourth floor—the place where television came alive—and meander down the narrow hall to WHP’s tiny broadcast studios. Huge RCA cameras stared at the TV-21 news sets, and heavy, black lights reached down from the ceiling. Thick cables snaked across the scuffed hardwood floor. Pushing open the newsroom door released an explosion of clatter—CBS teletype machines from United Press, AP and Reuters and their endless, rhythmic clack-clack-clack, bump, clack-clack-clack-clack, bump. News from the world. Phones rang, cigarette smoke hung in the air and muffled voices occasionally rose and fell. I sat, listened and watched.

Even as the state capitol, Harrisburg was always a sleepy news bureau. But the excitement of broadcast news was alive at channel 21. Every afternoon, a black-booted motorcycle courier marched into the Telegraph Building’s lobby, stepped onto Carl’s elevator, rode to the fourth floor and hand-delivered the latest news films from around the world for that evening’s newscasts.

At one time or another during his time at ‘HP, my father did it all on the air – news, sports and weather, though not at the same time, of course. His tenure as The Atlantic Weatherman lasted only a few years—we left Harrisburg in ‘67 when he was hired to do the weather for WBAL, Channel 11 in Baltimore. He left the on-air business just a few years later, but always savored his time in front of the camera, especially his tenure at what then was called The Maryland Center for Public Broadcasting, now MPT.

Unfortunately, the quaint Atlantic gasoline ad that appeared on the tape during the weather segment didn’t make it; my Mystery Reel was so old that the engineers couldn’t save that piece of it. The tape was good for one pass, no more, and so the commercial is lost forever. Gratefully, one night’s worth of WHP’s Atlantic Weatherman did survive. Now, it’s great to watch a piece of television history from a time when all that weathermen had to work with were magnets and bowties.

It’s even better when it’s your dad.


Michael English
Executive Producer, Outdoors Maryland

Grambo!

Wow, I feel so hip! My first blogging experience! What a thrill.

When asked to write for this blog, a moment shared between my 94-year-old grandmother and I kept coming to mind. When I started this job about a year and a half ago, everyone was thrilled for me. My parents would tell people they had a “daughter in TV.” Well, that’s partially true, but I am not on TV, nor do I produce, edit or work on the shows. I work elsewhere, but that’s not the point. People were excited to have a friend, sister and daughter working for a local public television station. And no, I was not going to be seen “on air,” but eventually they got over that.

This is where “Grambo” comes in. Grambo is the loving nickname I bestowed on my grandmother a few years ago when she fell and broke her arm. This petite, amazing woman (under 5 feet tall) proceeded to carry on her daily tasks like Rambo and “take it like a man.” Hence, Grambo was born. (For those of you who don’t know who Rambo is, trust me, he was a physical stud.) A month or two after starting my job, I went to visit Grambo and she asked about my new job in TV. Before I could get out an answer, she flooded me with compliments about MPT’s programming, on-air talent and gushed about an episode of a “touchy-feely” spiritual program that really tickled her fancy. Could it be that Grambo’s soft side was slowly seeping through? Keep in mind, she only watched “other” public TV stations until she had a “granddaughter in television.”

Her satisfaction that day, combined with my pride for what I do, made for a lovely little chat about my job. Purpose, passion and pride are words that come to mind when I think about my work here and the station as a whole. Nothing has really changed in a year. The coffee here is still average, the fish pond is still beautiful and Grambo still raves about MPT programs every time I see her. She even bought a flat screen TV to enhance her viewing experience. Her not-so-hip granddaughter, on the other hand, has yet to buy a flat screen. She’s one step ahead, as usual. Meaningful, fun work never gets old. The same can be said about Grambo—age seems to evade her.


Leslie Adler
Marketing Manager, Education Projects