Let Ron Stone and Big 2 News take us back to 1978 when microwave signals and videotape were new to TV news, and the tape deck and camera were separate units.
Stone highlights the latest in electronic news gathering at the time and how Channel 2 got the news on air every evening.
The KPRC 2 Houston mini-doc from decades ago, just posted by the Texas Archive of the Moving Image (TAMI), features Cindy Martin, George Caldwell, Ray Miller, Larry Weidman, Doug Johnson, Phil Archer, Jack Cato, Jon Burkhart, and Steve Long.
(Houston, TX) July 22, 2024: The Texas Radio Hall of Fame (TRHOF) has released the names of the fifty (50) nominees for its 2024 Induction Class.
The voting portal will be open and accessible to voting members via www.TRHOF.net through midnight on Monday, August 5th.
“We’ve been continually working to refine, streamline, and demystify the nomination and voting process” observes TRHOF Executive Director Doug Harris, “and each year we continue to make major steps forward. Once again, we have a group of outstanding broadcasters for our voting members to consider with a balloting platform that includes their photos and biographical information for review.”
Over two hundred broadcast professionals with ties to Texas radio were nominated for consideration by the TRHOF Review Committee, which reached a consensus on the final fifty. Voting members of the TRHOF will now determine the twenty individuals who will be honored in the TRHOF’s Annual Induction Ceremony at the Texas Museum of Broadcasting and Communications in Kilgore, TX.
“We are very pleased with this slate of nominees, which spotlights the depth and breadth of Texas radio talent,” says Harris. “From the tower to the boardroom to the conference room, this list of nominees touches the geographic boundaries of the state and connects to a variety of markets, formats and virtually every position of service in the broadcast world.”
Those selected for the 2024 Induction Class will be honored during the organization’s Annual Induction and Reunion Weekend, November 1-2, 2024, at the Texas Museum of Broadcasting and Communications in Kilgore, Texas. Information on becoming a TRHOF voting member is available on the organization’s website and interested parties may still join—and vote—in this year’s selection.
Jim Kovacik joins Houston Public Media as executive producer.
Anna Bauman leaves the Houston Chronicle, where she covered education, children and families, to join Open Vallejo in California.
Michael Murney joins the Houston Landing as a healthcare reporter.
Maria Todd co-hosts the nationally syndicated Todd Newton Morning Show and has been featured in the "Women to Watch" Radio Ink section.
Traffic Master: KSBJ’s Bill Ingram recalls years in radio broadcasting.
The UH Alumni Association will honor Mark Berman ('78) as the recipient of its Distinguished Alumni Award for its 69th Annual Alumni Awards in April 2024.
Fox 26 KRIV anchor/reporter Chelsea Edwards was featured by The Defender as a Houston professional breaking barriers with Black hair.
CW39 KIAH "Houston Happens" host Maggie Flecknoe received the President's Volunteer Service Award for community service.
Rowdy Reaches the Beaches! “Carolina Country” WYAY 106.3 in Bolivia/Wilmington, North Carolina and WGLD 93.9fm Conway/Myrtle Beach, South Carolina are the newest affiliates for SuiteRadio’s “Ridin’ with Rowdy.” With these new additions, Rowdy’s daily shows are now heard on 46 signals across the nation, and will likely see significant expansion in 2024 as the program will be repackaged and offered to other formats later this year.
Advertising and Marketing account executive Marilyn Acosta celebrates 10 years with abc13 KTRK.
KVUE Wins Prestigious 2024 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Awards.
Mike Capps is resigning as the radio voice of the Round Rock Express.
“Voice of the Longhorns” Craig Way named the Texas Sportscaster of the Year by NSMA Sports Media.
John C. Moritz joined the Austin American-Statesman as chief politics reporter.
Kevin Baskar joins KXAN Austin as a video journalist.
University of Texas scholar Iris Chyi has been saying for more than 10 years that digital news reports are an “inferior good” to a daily print summary and largely fail to draw a paying audience or advertising.
A meteorologist from a rival station called out KXAS over a video wall background on Sunday, Dec. 3, 2023.
Audacy’s La Grande 107.5 Raises $304,689 for Children’s Hospitals in Dallas-Fort Worth with Radiothon.
Cumulus Media’s DFW Country Stations New Country 96.3 and 99.5 The Wolf Team Up to Raise $1,071,096 for Fort Worth’s Cook Children’s, a Children’s Miracle Network Hospital.
Alejandra Matos named Houston Chronicle managing editor, is first Latina to hold post.
Houston Chronicle promotes Joy Sewing, who becomes first Black news columnist in paper’s history.
KPRC 2 Investigative/Special Projects EP Ana Lastra named Assistant News Director after Aaron Fernandez-Wische leaves for FOX 26 Houston VP Content Creation and Distribution position.
Felicia Mason leaves the Houston Chronicle where she was Assistant City Editor.
Features Digital Manager Julie Takahashi leaves the Houston Chronicle.
Leah Vann hired by Chron.com to over the Houston Astros. Fansreacted.
Tegna’s WFAA to leave Victory Park street side studio.
Dallas forecaster answers weather questions, Lucy style, from behind AR booth inspired by ‘Peanuts.’
Chance Horner becomes WFAA 8's Director of Photography.
Cumulus Dallas Taps Bruce Collins as Program Director for NewsTalk WBAP 820 AM and News & Information KLIF 570 AM.
Alec Drake, Director of Sales, Cumulus Dallas, will retire at the end of August. Dawn Girocco, Director of Sales for Cumulus Dallas’ three music stations, 99.5 The Wolf/PLX-FM (Country), Hot 93.3/KLIF-FM (CHR) and New Country 96.3/SCS-FM (Country), will rise to Vice President, Sales, Cumulus Dallas, overseeing the entire sales effort for the six-station group.
KCBI/Dallas-Fort Worth moves Doug Hannah from afternoons to mornings.
KTFW (92.1 Hank FM)/Dallas-Ft. Worth Picks Up Jeremy Robinson For Nights.
Dallas Mavericks radio broadcast to move from 103.3 ESPN to 97.1 The Eagle.
Former KHOU 11 reporter Norm Uhl covering Branch Davidian standoff outside of Waco, TX.
As we approach the end of the Branch Davidian siege on April 19th, I wanted to make sure you read my "oral history" or actually emailed interviews with Texas TV journalists that were on the ground just outside of Waco in Satellite City near Mt. Carmel.
This is a fascinating look at what it was like to cover a story, that lasted from 2/28/93 to 4/19/93. And think, back then there was no Internet, LiveU units, social media or iPhones.
We get a perspective from the network level to the local TV stations in Houston and Waco.
Also check out the archived video that covers what was happening as you scroll through the many interviews with the likes of:
Minerva Perez - KTRK abc13 Houston
Mike Capps - CNN Network Correspondent
Ann Harder - WACO 100 news anchor (later KXXV anchor)
The legendary Houston reporter has covered it all, including being stabbed and knocked unconscious during the Moody Park Riots coverage (which is now the subject of a Vox Media podcast called the Chicano Squad.) More on this in a minute.
"Phil’s the guy you send when your own reputation is on the line," former NBC News Bureau Chief and KPRC reporter Larry Weidman told mikemcguff.com. "He always delivers and he has for nearly half a century. Plus, he’s also from Wichita Falls."
Phil Archer's early life
The Wichita Falls, TX native graduated from S.H. Rider High School in 1969 and headed to Houston to attend the University of Houston.
"I’ve been fortunate enough to make my career in Houston, which is one of the best news towns in the country," Archer said in his bio. "I’ve worked with some of the most talented journalists in the business; folks who pursued the craft with honesty, accuracy, and passion. It is more than a job – it’s a calling."
Archer got started in the Houston news business with the Houston News Service which was owned by Jack Cato and George Nelson.
That led to a job at Big 2 KPRC in 1976. Archer replaced Mike Capps on the Channel 2 night police beat.
"From the time he walked in, he became a sponge, using his biting wit, his raucous sense of humor, and good ole boy Wichita Falls, Texas charm, learning the rudiments of our craft as quickly as he could and as a result won over all of us in the newsroom," Capps, who later worked for WFAA, ABC and CNN, told mikemcguff.com.
Moody Park Riots and Phil Archer
In 1978, Archer and Cato, who was also working for KPRC, were covering the Moody Park Riots, sparked by the death of Joe Campos Torres by the actions of Houston police officers.
"There was a car on fire and ambulance supervisor's car on fire," Archer told KPRC in 2019. "And so we went past the police line to get video of that. When we we're doing that, we got jumped. And so that's that's how it ended for me. We were...Jack was stabbed. I was knocked unconscious and stabbed. We watched the rest of the rioting lasted another two days, three days from our hospital rooms."
"Their camera gear was cut up and news car destroyed along with several police and fire vehicles," retired KPRC 2 photographer John Treadgold told mikemcguff.com. "Both Phil and Jack went right back to covering the same stories afterwards, sometimes going in before police or firefighters. They were the best in the city in this regard."
In the KPRC history book, "The Fault Does Not Lie With Your Set - The First Forty Years of Houston Television," Archer described his face looking "like hamburger" with cuts, bruises and a particularly nasty gash on the top of his head. He recalled police officers believing he had been stabbed in the crotch. So they laid him on the hood of a patrol car. An officer, who has previously been a nurse, ripped open his pants to examine if he had been castrated.
KTRK photographer Dave Davis, who later became WABC New York's General Manager, caught the moment on camera.
Archer was stabbed in his rear end and bleeding profusely - turning his blue pants red.
Fortunately, some kids nearby dragged Archer out of harm's way.
"And and if those kids had not gotten me out when they did, I might very well bled to death because I lost...I was close at the time...I lost a lot of blood," Archer recalled in his 2019 interview with the station. "So a lot of things luckily happened in the right order for it...to prevent it...from being a really bad day for my mom."
"He obviously laid it on the line in Moody Park, and I think that reportage from Phil and Jack Cato that night pretty much summarizes who Phil Archer is as a news reporter," Capps added. "He offered an intrepid attitude, a no nonsense demeanor and thoroughness beyond reproach as his reportorial tools. Professionalism personified, an unbridled passion for his craft and the stories he reported, and a respect for those who watched his work, simply sets him apart from most and he did it for more than 40 years."
When Archer woke up in the hospital, he was concerned about the whereabouts of his expensive TV news camera, especially when his news director Ray Miller came to visit. He was also concerned about not wearing a tie while covering the riot, a must for Miller who had a rule all news photographers had to look professional.
For his coverage of the riot, Archer received the Perringer Award from the Texas Association of Broadcasters.
That would not be his only award on the shelf. According to his bio, Archer has received more than 50 awards from the likes of the Associated Press, Texas Association of Broadcasters, Houston Press Club and other organizations.
In 1983, Archer was selected as a William Benton Fellow at the University of Chicago which was a program designed to "advance the work of midcareer radio and television professionals, enabling them to bring greater depth and understanding to their work."
The Moody Park Riot story will always come up in Phil Archer retirement goodbye pieces. But Archer's journalistic career is so much more than that one moment.
What fellow journalists say about Archer
He has been that steady voice on KPRC for four decades, who can cover any story with grace and ease, no matter the difficult subject matter. Sources trust him, the Houston television news community respects him and as you will read below, his co-workers liked and looked up to him.
"The only thing I could add is that Phil was one of my ethical policemen in the newsroom," former KPRC news manager Rich McFarland told mikemcguff.com. "You always need watchdogs asking journalists in the room, 'Why are we doing this story?' As a manager it can be a pain in the ass but you appreciate the question. He was also a great coworker, mentor, and friend."
"Phil Archer was a veteran reporter when I was born, so this news is depressing," former abc13 KTRK investigative reporter Wayne Dolcefino told mikemcguff.com. " His knowledge of Houston is irreplaceable. The consummate tv reporter. He has done this town proud."
For this blog post, I reached out to those reporters and anchors who worked with Archer throughout his career. They enthusiastically shared their respect and stories from their time with him.
“You could do an entire blog on 'Phil moments' at KPRC, but among my favorites are Phil riding the trail to Houston with the Rodeo cowboys," former KPRC anchor Linda Lorelle told mikemcguff.com. "On horseback. Every year and loving every moment. Whether covering the Rodeo or Hurricane Katrina, Phil is a consummate storyteller whose passion and perspective give Houston viewers a bird’s eye view unlike any other. It’s a privilege to have worked with him during my years on the anchor desk at KPRC. Happy Trails, my friend, as you enjoy your well deserved retirement!"
"Always loved talking about Texas history and folklore with Phil," former KPRC reporter Ron Stone, Jr. told me. "We’d talk about our love for J. Frank Dobie’s books or he would quote an obscure Western Swing song lyric and it was just a great way to stay sane in the midst of the chaos of a TV newsroom."
“It’s the end of an era," former KPRC reporter Mary Benton told mikemcguff.com. "Phil Archer is a consummate professional and a wonderful person. Full disclosure - it took time for me to warm up to him when we first met, because I assumed we would not have anything in common. Over my 20 year tenure at KPRC, we sat near each other in the newsroom, and I got to see Phil for who he is - decent, sensitive, hilarious and a great storyteller. He has earned his retirement and I wish him all the best!”
"Phil is a reporter's reporter. An absolute legend in Houston news," former KPRC morning anchor/reporter Rachel McNeill told mikemcguff.com. "I learned so much from watching him work. His tenacity, his dedication and his wicked sense of humor are unmatched. You could always count on his support from your very first day in the newsroom and he always kept us laughing with his classic Texas quips!"
Former KPRC reporter Suzanne Boase Honeycutt shared these great moments which I am including in full:
"Phil will hate me for saying this, but I watched him on TV as a kid when my family moved to Houston from Australia. He looked like a cowboy, seemed larger than life, and told amazing stories. He was just so good at what he did - a great writer and reporter. I desperately wanted to make it to the Houston market someday like Phil.
When I first started working at KPRC in the mid 90’s, I was excited and a little intimidated to get to work alongside him. Phil was the senior reporter – he’s always been the senior reporter! - and has a wicked wit. I quickly learned though that under the zingers is a very sweet man.
I shared a desk with him. I’ll never forget his kindness to me, offering suggestions and sharing potential sources for stories. His knowledge of Houston and its history is second to none. But he zinged me, too: I remember Phil noticing a zit on my face one day - that was carefully concealed, so I thought - and asking me about my third eye! Whenever I wanted to get him back, I reminded him that I was watching him on TV when I was in elementary school.
Phil is simply the best at what he does. He has covered every important story in SE Texas for the past 40 years. What strikes me is he has never lost his zeal to chase a story and tell it better than anyone else. Phil makes complex stories – like the collapse of Enron and the Arthur Andersen trial – understandable. But what I remember most is how Phil lights up every year at rodeo time. He is a real cowboy and loves every minute covering the rodeo and enjoying the festivities after.
Phil is the consummate journalist. I cannot even begin to imagine how many stories he has told! His very well-deserved retirement is a true loss for KPRC and for Houston."
Former KPRC 2 reporter Brendan Keefe shares his thoughts with me concerning Archer:
"Phil Archer is the dean of Houston TV news. Phil IS Texas. You know those people you see at rodeo who clearly just bought a brand new Stetson, as if it's about dress up? They're the opposite of Phil Archer. When we say Phil is hanging up his spurs, it's not a figurative description of his retirement. Phil literally hangs up his spurs because he has one of the best antique spur collections in all of Texas.
When I was a cub reporter at KPRC, I absolutely relied on Phil for both pronunciations of Houston streets and Texas towns, but also for his encyclopedic knowledge of history. Phil's institutional knowledge was absolutely indispensable.
Some reporters and anchors would get on a horse for a brief on-camera appearance during a trail ride -- Phil actually quietly and humbly participated in the trail ride every year. Real cowboys don't have to show off or brag. Phil is a real cowboy, though I can't believe he gave in and shaved the mustache.
Phil Archer is the real deal. He is also kind and generous. No one since the great Ron Stone, Sr. is worthy of the title The Eyes of Texas. Phil has earned that moniker one story at a time over decades."
Now Archer will spend more time with his wife Joy and look back at a fantastic career.
"I never wanted to do anything else," Archer wrote in his bio. "Working as a journeyman reporter has given me a front row seat to the major events and personalities of our time, and the chance to provide a vital public service."
The mikemcguff.com blog is 15 years old, plus I'm going on a blogging break
As noted earlier, this week is the 15th anniversary of the mikemcguff.com (can't believe I am writing that statement).
Thanks for reading all of these years and helping me guide the coverage.
I didn't name it the Houston TV blog or anything like that originally because it wasn't about TV in 2005 or even the immediate years after that. Back then, it was my personal blog about Houston news that wouldn't make the mainstream media, technology news, music or whatever I found interesting at the moment.
Since I somewhat knew the broadcast media biz, the posts I started writing about TV or radio really started to take off. Hence, what you have today for better or worse.
Believe it or not, I even had a podcast back in 2006 tied to the blog!
Blogging pros would tell you I made a big mistake staying on the free blogger platform all these years. What I got was blogging with no monthly hosting bills to pay and less technical hassles. What I gave up was the pro look of a WordPress site that advertisers and marketers would be more interested in advertising on.
But the contrarian in me loves the fact that I (with the help of my readers) have already reached nearly 1.2 million unique pageviews readers in 2020 on a free blogger.com blog!
I really appreciate how some readers get mad when I take a blogging break, but that is what is happening now. People who are celebrating...TV news managers.
If there is some major Houston or Texas media breaking news story, then by all means, contact me. I'll come back for that.
Also, if you have the desire, support my McGuff Media2020 Walk to End Alzheimer's team. If not my team, then support another one until we don't need an Alzheimer's walk anymore because the disease has been defeated.
If you want to catch up on some recent stuff that I think was a notch above the usual posts, please take some time to read the following:
Mike Capps is the play by play voice for the Round Rock Express, but you should hear about his reporter life before baseball working for KPRC 2, WFAA 8, ABC News and CNN
We are celebrating 15 year of the mikemcguff.com blog this week if you can believe that.
So to honor this anniversary, we talk to legendary journalist Mike Capps who worked his way up from KPRC 2 in the 70s, to WFAA 8 in Dallas - Fort Worth, ABC News and CNN.
All the Round Rock Express fans who now listen to Capps's play by play work, might not realize his deep history in broadcast journalism.
Mike McGuff: Take us back to the early days of your time at KPRC (please include dates when you were there). From your memory, how did the three stations rate back then?
Mike Capps: Hi Mike, thanks for the invitation and for spending time with me. I feel honored you thought of me. Ray Miller hired me out of the CBS affiliate in Beaumont, Texas to become the night police reporter in August of 1974. I spent the next six years at Channel 2, mostly under the tutelage of Miller, then Larry Weidman before a fellow named Mike Casserly took over and purged the place. I was asked to leave by Casserly almost 6 years to the day from when Miller hired me.
As much as I hated to leave, it turned out to be for the best career-wise, but the beautiful thing about all that is...we still have those friendships and camaraderie from those days at Channel 2. As a result, Lyn Salerno a former staffer, heads up Channel 2 Reunions in January of each year and we really, I am afraid to say, behave a lot like we did when we were kids. Joyous reunions they are. And so many great stories, most of which are true, always fly back and forth amongst us.
Look, Mike, in those days when you're 23 years old, and a young reporter in Texas, everyone like me already knew what a kick-ass legend Ray Miller was in that great town, at that great station...AND ANYBODY WITH ANY SPARK OR SALT WANTED TO WORK FOR HIM. When he hired me, the hiring ranks in the top three biggest thrills I had in my 22 year news career. I mean died and gone to heaven thrilled!
Legendary begins the tale of Miller. Consummate, demanding, relentless, tireless, hot tempered, fearless, but as competitive as they come, and always looking for ways to improve himself and all of us. In those days, we found ourselves in a nose to nose battle with KTRK, Channel 13 and Marvin Zindler. Back and forth and back and forth in the ratings, and talk about pressure. Wow! Every single time we beat them on a story meant bragging rights for us and vice versa. Big time rivals, BIG time! But so much fun.
Remember these years featured the Joe Campos Torres death at the hands of the police, riots at Moody Park where our Jack Cato and Phil Archer were stabbed covering violence during Cinco de Mayo, police officers and some police brass in trouble for various and sundry things. Police chases, mass murders, I ran at least two dozen drug raids with Houston Police and Harris County Sheriff's officers, discussions, sometimes heated with one of the best human beings I ever met, former Houston Police Chief Harry Caldwell, Skylab's return to earth, and a thousand other stories I was so fortunate to cover.
Great people to work around, besides Ray and Larry Weidman, like Archer, like Cato, Napoleon Johnson, Alan Parcell, Ted Shaw, Doug Johnson, Fred Edison, Paul Flannagan, the late Bob Brandon, Charley Scott, John Treadgold, Ron Stone, Larry Rasco, Bill Worrell...what a great group of top flight professionals for a young kid like me to work around. Hard to hang with the likes of those folks at first, but being with them made so much of a difference in the way my career played out, and the competition with KTRK was a huge part of the fun of being there in those days.
What was it like working for the Hobby family?
I had the good fortune to work for two of THE greatest families in the history of Texas television; the Hobby family at Channel 2, and the Dealey family that for years ran WFAA in Dallas. I thought Olveta Culp Hobby was such a dear, wonderful and supremely accomplished woman, who supremely valued journalism as witnessed by the Hobby ownership of both the Houston Post and KPRC.
There's a great story about one of my ALL TIME greatest screw ups and unfortunately...or fortunately it involves Mrs. Hobby. Early, early one summer morning a fire broke out in downtown Houston at a chemical warehouse, where Toyota Center now stands. Fire went to four alarms quickly, then got completely out of control. I was using a film camera in the days right before Channel 2 went all video cameras, and when help arrived, I raced down the Southwest Freeway to drop off film for processing for the morning newscasts. I pulled into the breezeway housing the huge trucks used for football games at the dome, parked my news car and ran inside. Was not in the station for more than ten minutes and as I came back out, someone in a big black Lincoln Continental (I believe) had hemmed me into the garage and I couldn't escape. I was probably 25 years old, with a spring loaded case of the red ass and a temper to match and at that point of the morning was adrenaline charged because of the fire, and needed to get back down to the action. I threw open the door of the station screaming something like, "Who is the______hell was so stupid they parked their_____, _____vehicle behind ME???" Mrs. Hobby stuck her head out from behind the door to the newsroom and said, "My, my Michael, are we a little upset this morning? "Well, excuse me, but it was me," she said, "and I will have the car removed so you can get on with your business." No sarcasm, not upset, not riled at me and my fit, and the next time we saw each other she laughed as she talked about it. But boy, I tell ya. When I left the place that morning and headed back to the fire, I just knew she'd get me fired..but no sir, she didn't. WHEW! No one like Mrs. Hobby. Ever.
When you worked at WFAA, it was one of the top stations in the country. Based on your website resume, it looked like you travelled to wherever the stories were (even if not in DFW that day). You also appeared to supervise a large staff. Talk about the legacy, resources and news ratings that station had.
Mike, WFAA went through years of news doldrums in the 60s and 70s because the CBS affiliate in Dallas at that time, KRLD-TV had a terrific staff led by a fellow named Eddie Barker who was a dear friend of my dad's, and along with Bill Mercer who was a reporter there, and later the original voice of the Texas Rangers and Dallas Cowboys...those two guys were great newsmen and great people and even greater friends with my dad. Their news shop was first rate, and they hired the first female anchor in Texas, I believe it was in 1967, a lady named Judy Jordan who is no longer with us, but a great reporter and news reader and a ratings hit.
BUT...WFAA's fate changed in 1973 when they hired a fellow from CBS in New York, a news manager and University of Missouri grad named Marty Haag. Haag went to work recruiting the best news people he could find, gave them beat reporting assignments just like newspapers in those days. He also, insisted to management that not only would his people cover Dallas - Ft. Worth news like a blanket, but because of WFAA's cable penetration all over Texas, into Oklahoma, Arkansas, parts of New Mexico and Louisiana, they'd compete all over the southwest and chase stories that involved people from the southwest all over the world. And that's what happened.
Haag first brought in a group of people from the CBS affiliate in Oklahoma City who had investigative reporting experience, and he hired anchors both male and female that were really first rate, and they all went to work building what turned out to be a juggernaut. George Foster Peabody and duPont-Columbia awards out the wazoo...and by the time I got there (my first day was the day Reagan was shot in DC), in early 1981, they were rolling. We'd send crews to stories all over the U.S. in Learjets, just like the networks and often beat the networks on stories we were covering alongside them.
As intense as Ray Miller was, Haag was just as intense if not more so. Reporters were required to generate their own stories from their beats. Haag created competitive tension in that shop and while some folks didn't like it, I thought it was a huge motivating tool and apparently it worked. Some pretty well known names from that shop, 22 of us in all, went to networks from WFAA. And gosh, the reputation just built from that.
After you were the first affiliate reporter to lead ABC World News Tonight on both coasts for your WFAA Hurricane Alicia coverage, how much did this play into your hiring at ABC as the Deputy Bureau Chief/Assignments Manager of its Midwest Bureau in the mid 80s?
After that Hurricane Alicia coverage, I received a phone call from Peter Jennings who was extremely laudatory about those pieces from Houston I did. And then two days after I got back, a dear fellow and then ABC VP for News, George Watson, flew to Dallas and took me to dinner. And we came close to a correspondent's deal, but for one reason or another, it never worked out.
That said, I think the real key to me going to CNN had to do with Marty Haag's relationship with a fellow named Ed Turner (no relation to Ted) who ran CNN's day to day operation at that time. Ed, had seen my work, the ABC piece on World News Tonight, and because WFAA was also carrying an affiliation with CNN then, saw me on some of the stuff I did at WFAA.
When I went to Atlanta to sign my deal with CNN, Ed mentioned the Hurricane Alicia story and wanted to tell me some details about it...but I have to be completely honest here: Had I not worked at KPRC, Channel 2 for those years as a cop beat reporter, and had I not known the streets of Houston and Galveston like the back of my hand, that report that played on ABC might never have happened. The ABC charge producer happened to see my piece being fed up to Dallas from Houston, took me aside, had me record a "Mike Capps, for ABC News, Houston," tag line and that was that. I don't think it was great reporting that sent that piece to air on ABC as much as it was the luck of having worked at Channel 2 and knowing my way around. Lucky more than good. Wow. That's the REAL story.
As far as the ratings went...television news in those days was so different from what we have now. Essentially in markets like Houston, Dallas-Ft. Worth, St. Louis, Minneapolis-St. Paul...you had three network affiliate news departments competing for ratings superiority. More importantly, our viewership wasn't watered down by 200 cable or internet channels running dozens and dozens of different types of programming 24 hours a day. Local news in those days carried a huge amount of import in cities across the country than it does now. People watched and talked about it...called in to complain. If people had a gripe about something, we heard about it, and sometimes while having dinner at local restaurants. I just have the feeling that local anchors especially were bigger celebrities in our day than now. Both local newspapers in Dallas-Ft. Worth had TV and radio critics and they covered all of us like a blanket and fired salvos at us whenever they disagreed with anything they saw on the air.
Here's the other thing...the ratings battle in Dallas- Fort Worth in those days was essentially WFAA leading, but early in my years there (I was in Dallas-Ft. Worth, at WFAA, off and on for 10 years), the race involved us and KDFW, formerly KRLD-TV, the CBS affiliate then (now it's FOX). They had Chip Moody as their main anchor, and folks remember him fondly from his days first at KXAS, the NBC affiliate at DFW...then with us and then to Houston. We had Tracy Rowlett, Iola Johnson and John Criswell as the main anchors...and the ratings were always close...the audience percentages were high....sometimes we'd have a 40 share and win it by two points....sometimes they'd win...and sorta like in the Houston days with channel 2 and 13...always extremely competitive. But the audience percentages were huge then given what they are now...toward the end of my run...right before I left for CNN...KXAS really became more competitive and that fact really tightened the race.
CNN was growing fast when you worked there. What was that explosive growth like as a reporter working there?
Mike, it was exciting. When CNN first got started a lot of folks in the industry used pejoratives, calling it "Chicken Noodle News," etc...but I will tell you this, I knew it was special when Ed Turner told me their mission statement on the day he hired me, and once we hit the road (first story was a tanker explosion off Galveston...another great, 'Capps lucks out deal,' because I knew all the folks in Galveston who could lead us to the right spots, to the right people, and the story became better because of it).
And then, that same year, going to Wichita, Kansas and Baton Rouge for the abortion-anti abortion battles on the capital steps in both cities...was a huge eye opener when dozens of people would come up to me the next day making comments (some printable, some not) about "CNN's coverage."
But one more exciting factor that told me CNN was there with the big boys, came on my first junket overseas covering the runup to the Gulf War. At the airport in London...CNN on all the terminal television sets. In Saudi Arabia--CNN.. Amsterdam, Paris...people coming up to me asking if I was going into or out of the war zone.
Hey, I never got in the news business for the self aggrandizement, but these people knew who I was...which told me two things. 1). They knew who I was because they were watching CNN ALL the time, and 2) That meant CNN was on people's minds all over the world.
CNN really became a big news player during the first Gulf War, talk about your experiences covering this.
Mike, I went to Saudi Arabia in November of 90 during the runup to the war called Desert Shield. We travelled all over Saudi doing stories on U.S., Saudi, and Egyptian military preparations for the war, spent nights in the desert with shave-talk Marines, some 19 years old, scared to death.
We had a run-in with the Saudi social police who tried to harass the female producer and the female photographer who was working with me. We somehow avoided an international incident after I had grabbed a social policeman, when he tried to push one of the females to the ground. He went to the ground. Flat....but I guess the Ministers of Information who accompanied us, decided we were not going to put up with such, and I never saw another one of those guys again. We covered stories about Saudi families preparing for war, small, quaint little towns getting ready, kids in schools.
Then I was mustered out in January, missed the 44 hours of the war itself, but was sent back less than two weeks after I came back to the states, to the mountains of northern Iraq, covering the plight of the Kurdish refugees who had been forced out of their homes by the Republican Guard, and onto those mountains. It was cold up there...a lot of older people and babies died...and we did stories on all of that with Medicines San Frontiers.
And then there were numerous pieces on the Kurdish Militia, the Peshmerga. These young Kurdish men, trained by the British Royal Marines, took on Republican Guard in firefights...wild and wooly. In conversations with these kids the Pesh, they'd tell us how much they valued helping freedom come back to their mountains, how they loved Americans and wanted to become Americans...some of them died, unfortunately, but all extremely brave. Then on the last day in theatre, several of us from different news organizations showed up at a northern Iraq town that supposedly had been liberated, but when we arrived on the outskirts of the town, we were stopped and turned around by Republican Guard.
Probably twenty of us...me and two others from CNN, NPR, BBC, Sky News, CBS, CBC and others...we all met up on the main road, and within minutes, two truck loads of Republican Guard, with bayoneted AKs, surrounded us, and I thought for all the world we'd be killed or taken captive. Over one of the hills came two WartHog, tank fighter jets, scared those guys away...we got in the car and hauled ass to Ankara and headed home. End of the story of the Gulf War for me....and lucky to still be alive.
Please talk about your broadcasting career for The Round Rock Express. What was it like moving from hard news to sports calling?
Mike, I suffered some extremely serious stress issues as a result of seeing people blown apart for years and it finally caught up to me.
I woke up in the middle of the night, with the bed post in my hand, and had busted my head wide open. I had suffered from stress, anger issues, etc., and needed help. If you think there's not a God in Heaven--the therapist who helped dig me out of the mental morass was a 4 tour-Vietnam side gunner on a helicopter, and licensed Presbyterian Lay Minister. We had to break it down to basics, mentally, and start all over.
In another life, I played baseball in junior college and the game never really left me. I worked as a part time scout for Red Murff, the man who discovered and signed Nolan. I helped him with tryout camps, and took assignments looking at players, when he needed me and I had time off from news. I repeatedly told him that one day I was going to shut it down in the news business and write a book with him.
After I got into therapy, I left CNN, wrote the book, The Scout: Searching for the Best in Baseball, with Red, and away we went. Promoting the book in Spring Training '96 in Arizona, we had Red on the air with Bob Starr, the late Angels broadcaster and Bob did a magnificent job working Red's interview in and out of the play by play and I swear I kept hearing a voice in my head..."you can do this, you can do this." In between innings I asked Mr. Starr, I said, "I love your work, I'm 45 years old, and I too old to get started?" His response, "you are a puppy at 45, no you are not too old."
Two phone calls later I got a job broadcasting Independent ball in Tyler, the next year I was in AAA in Nashville, the next year, 1998, I started doing fill in MLB work on ESPN and I worked in Sioux Falls, SD, '99 Independent ball again in Atlantic City, and started in Round Rock in 2000 and have been there since.
The work fits me perfectly. I dearly love the game, the players, coaches, managers and fans...and have developed tons of friends throughout the years...Have done fill in work for both the Rangers and Astros and still at my advanced age (70 on December 19, 2020) dream of that full time MLB chance.
But you know what...I still have the greatest baseball life ever. My wife Karen, 3 daughters, 1 step son, 7 grandchildren between the ages of 17-4 all love the game, love Cappy's role in the game, and along with spending time with them, taking care of two dogs, Archie and Molly and two cats, Penny and Lylah...and supporting Fellowship of Christian Athletes, Austin Sheltie Rescue, Austin Pets Alive, Austin Humane Society and RBI Austin, is what we do.
