PMSimon.com

I ran out of time and energy to write anything here today.

Here, look at a piece of cake:

How about this one, from April 19, 1953?:

The St. Petersburg Times had a whole section welcoming TV to the Tampa Bay area for the first time. Wait... 1953? Wasn't that a little late? Well, yes, it was. There WERE some hardy souls with TV sets struggling to get stray signals from Jacksonville, but it wasn't until 1953 that Tampa, surely one of the last markets to get TV, finally saw a local station fire up its signal. VHF applications had been frozen, the channels 8 and 13 allocations were being hotly contested, and the City of St Petersburg decided not to wait, putting WSUN-TV on the air in 1953 with that very test pattern and an ABC affiliation. The Times section, too bulky to reproduce here but worth a look, had ads selling every TV on the market, plus articles about the programming people would see, the ins and outs of UHF vs. VHF, and much more. It was a novelty, and everyone seemed excited.

Soon enough, channels 8 and 13 would go on the air, and 38 would quickly become an also-ran. But when channel 10 was allocated to Largo and WSUN didn't get it, and the new WLCY-TV took the ABC affiliation away in 1965, WSUN was doomed. It tried going independent, but it didn't have the budget and was probably a couple of years early for that. By the end, the station was comically on for just a few hours, and the legend was that in the last days, it aired a close-up of a clock -- that's it. (I checked, and at least in the TV listings, the station was airing some westerns, "Highway Patrol," and wrestling in its final days). On February 23rd, 1970, at the end of the broadcast day, it went belly-up. The channel is now a successful, but separate, station unrelated to the old one.

Fran walked into the bedroom and found this:

That bed is HERS. You do not mess with Ella, the World's Most Famous Cat.

Go ahead, say awwwww. You know you want to.

This week's All Access newsletter plays off the day's news regarding Internet audio streaming to the car, and reissues an advisory for those in the line of fire:

Pandora's pushing into cars and building a sales staff. The Mini will have a dashboard display and USB interface so you can stream Net audio from your cell phone through the car's stereo system. On and on and on it goes, more ways for more programming to compete with you where you never had competition before.

Okay, I'm forgetting something, Let's think... well, Spring training's underway and Roy Halliday threw a couple of shutout innings... um... no, that wasn't it... hmm... Ah, yes, the Revlon Run/Walk for Women 2010, May 8th in Los Angeles. Once again, Fran and I are walking around the USC campus and into the Coliseum to raise money to fight cancer, and every donation will be greatly appreciated. If you're in a position to give this year, here's the link: https://www.revlonrunwalk.com/la/secure/MyWebPage.cfm?pID=533458. Thank you!

Hey, how cool is this ad from the Deseret News in Salt Lake City, circa 1963?:

Those were the days of the horror movie hosts and KCPX-TV, the ABC affiliate in Salt Lake City, had "FIreman Frank," a kiddie show host who doubled as the off-screen voice of "Nightmare Theater." On this occasion, the scheduled feature was the classic "Mothra." But I'm pretty sure it never aired.

I love this one, too, from the old WIIC-TV Pittsburgh (now WPXI, still an NBC affiliate):

What a lineup! Liberace AND Cassius Clay/Muhammad Ali in his youth, both on Jack Paar! You absolutely would have made time to see that one... but I don't think it aired.

Meanwhile, on a rival station:

The ABC lineup that night was a waning "77 Sunset Strip," "Burke's Law" before the Bond craze swept him up, "The Farmer's Daughter" with the late Inger Stevens, and boxing, followed by a late night showing of "Sayonara." You might have been tempted to watch, but those shows didn't actually make it to the air that night.

And here's a cool 1963-style ad for a radio station:

KBEE Modesto, with the call of the annual Big Game between Cal and Stanford. That game was not played as scheduled that Saturday. The Niners-Packers game was played, amidst controversy over whether the game should have been played at all.

Why these shows didn't air can be explained by the fact that these ads are all from the same day.

November 22, 1963.

The nation had other things on its mind.

Noted without comment.

In honor of the Oscars, I... I...

Oh, right, I don't much care about the Oscars. So forget it. Someone took a movie clip and synced it with the Sonics' classic "Psycho," so here it is, far preferable to "Avatar":

And, over 40 years later, here they are on shaky phone cams doing the song in London, 2008:

A little business:

Talk Topics, which is the column of news items for radio hosts' show prep that I do for All Access, is now on Twitter for your convenience: Go here and follow for updates whenever there's new material. And, while you're at it, there's always me on Twitter, too.

Another reminder, too, that Fran and I will be walking to raise funds for cancer research at the Revlon Run/Walk 2010 here in Los Angeles, so donations will be greatly appreciated. Not that I'm putting any pressure on you or anything. I know times are tight. If you can, please do. If not, that's okay. It's not a competition on my end. Every penny is better than nothing. Thanks!

Time has gotten uncomfortably tight this week with the launch of the Talk Topics Twitter feed. That's not because it specifically requires a lot more work; really, it adds only the need for a second, more descriptive headline in a new form and that's it. Patrick and Warren did a great job setting up the new system and adding the Twitter API so we can now feed all the stories right to Twitter with links that take users right to my moronic prattling. For radio people who need material, it's useful; the one feed cuts the clutter and just peppers you with talk radio-ready stuff. I'm happy we've finally got it working.

But it comes with one added feature: pressure. Self-imposed pressure, that is. Because the thing is out there and people are following it, there's even more pressure to feed the beast. I was already working long, long hours and pumping out copy all day; now, I'm constantly thinking that I'm slacking if there's not something new all the time. I think of the followers, and I think how they're looking for new stuff and disappointed if there isn't any since the last time they checked. So, for the last two days, I've been trying to extend the day, add more stories, start earlier, end later. Since the Topics column is only one part of my work day, and I have to write other material as well, I'm now getting afraid to even leave the computer for a few minutes, lest someone someplace check in and see nothing having been added in the previous five minutes.

But I'm the only one here, so to speak. There isn't a staff writing the Topics column. It's just me, reading hundreds of websites every day, all day, and not aggregator sites, either. I put in the work. And, as it turns out, I'm human. I need a break to do other things once in a while. If I can't do that, I'm toast.

I'm also not doing a BREAKING NEWS!!! column. My BREAKING NEWS!!! work is confined to radio coverage, and that goes on another page. The Topics thing is up to date, but I'm not claiming to be first with the big stories, just quick to find stuff for radio hosts to use.

So I should be easier on myself. I figure that I'll find the right pace soon enough. In the meantime, excuse me: I gotta get back to the Topics column. Mustn't keep my public waiting.

Sigh...

This week's All Access newsletter advises hosts not to forget that the really interesting stuff is happening right under their noses:

Are you a local talk show host? Cool. That's a good thing. See, the NAB is busy telling the FCC that there's no need for any kind of "localism" mandate, because stations are already fulfilling that role, and that means you, 'cause you're talking about nothing but local issues and leaving the national stuff to the big syndicated hosts, right?

I told you that I would be mentioning the Revlon Run/Walk for Women 2010 every week right up to the event itself May 8th in Los Angeles, and I'm sticking to that. Here's what it is: Lots of people gather at the Los Angeles Coliseum and walk in a big loop around the USC campus and into the stadium to raise money for women's cancer research and treatment. The walking is kind of beside the point, since the donations aren't related to how far you walk or run, but who's counting? Besides, it's always a nice day out and my wife Fran and I have a particular stake in the issue, so we do it every year. And we ask everyone who can donate to do so, understanding that, well, times are tough, but if you can do it, this is a great cause and all donations will be appreciated. Just go to https://www.revlonrunwalk.com/la/secure/MyWebPage.cfm?pID=533458 and enter your donation. Thank you!

So... I had to migrate this thing from a server overseas to one in the U.S., and it... didn't work. Oh, the site remained up, but I couldn't get in to post anything. That wasn't optimal.

After some detective work, it turned out that Movable Type 4.1 wasn't compatible with the new server setup. Okay, then, upgrade time. And... that didn't work, either. It kept hanging on "Upgrading Database." That was all day Friday and into Saturday.

Finally, with the help of an expert on a message board (thank you, Mihai Bocsaru), we're back in business. I think. Thanks for your patience.

How much do I love these ads from 1953?

It's May 2nd, 1953. The Pioneer League. Your Salt Lake Bees are taking on the Magic Valley Cowboys from Twin Falls, Idaho at Derks Field, and KDYL-TV has its cameras there for a live telecast.

Derks Field -- look at it here -- was built in 1947, so it was relatively new in 1953. It was pretty basic -- a sort-of art deco entrance, but a basic grandstand with no roof, that's it, built in a hurry after its predecessor burned down. It housed Salt Lake teams from 1947 through 1992, in the Rookie classification Pioneer League as well as the Triple A Pacific Coast League. In 1953, the Bees were in the Pioneer League, the Phillies' affiliate, and the park was tiny, a grandstand behind the plate and some bleachers down the lines. When the team moved up to the PCL, the place was expanded, first to seven sections between the bases, then by extending the concrete stands down the line.

The 1953 Bees had nobody of whom you've heard. The star hitter was first baseman John Moskus, .317 with 28 homers. Clyde DeWitt went 19-8 and 36 year old Burt Barkelew, briefly the manager, was 12-3. THe club finished 4th in the regular season but managed to win the playoffs and the league championship. Magic Valley's one star was Dolph Camilli, the former major leaguer, but he was the manager. The game the night before was postponed due to rain.

What happened? Who won?

I have no idea. I couldn't access a paper for May 3rd. Later papers don't mention what happened. There's no other evidence, unless I go to Salt Lake and check the microfiche.

Someday, I will find out who won that game. There HAS to be a record of it someplace.

I'm a fan of comic strips, and I've read a lot of them over the years, including some really, really obscure ones. But even I didn't remember "Biddie and Bert":

This appeared in the January 1, 1963 St. Petersburg Times, and a more perfect confluence between market, time, and comic would be hard to imagine. In 1963, St Pete still had the image of being a massive retirement community, and "Biddie and Bert" were, obviously, retirees. Bert, here, is returning from his shuffleboard game, and, yes, the image of St. Pete was of old codgers playing shuffleboard in the humid Gulf Coast afternoons while waiting to die. Bert, apparently, was trying to hasten his own demise by eating to excess, hence the fat joke his wife is lobbing at him in this strip.

"Biddie and Bert" was by a cartoonist named Bob Donovan, and was syndicated by the old Hall Syndicate in 1962-65. I've seen it in several old papers, including the Milwaukee Journal and the Lodi News-Sentinel. You would think that a comic strip about retirees would be huge, because, well, who's reading newspapers, anyway? And, ultimately, the success of strips like the current "Pickles" would bear that out, but "Biddie and Bert" didn't last too long. It was, naturally, an endless parade of old-people jokes, idleness jokes, fat-lazy-husband jokes... but what humor strip WASN'T like that in 1963?

Bob Donovan, by the way, had another job at the time; he was Fred Lasswell's long-time assistant on "Barney Google and Snuffy Smith," and also did a lot of comic book work and commercial art, including a McGruff the Crime Dog premium giveaway and "Summer Fun With The California Summer Fruits." Oh, and he drew this. He passed away in 2002 at 80; here's his obituary in the St. Petersburg Times. Strangely, it doesn't mention "Biddie and Bert."

October 8, 1973, and an ad appears in the Fredericksburg, VA Free Lance-Star:

69? What?

No, it wasn't anything rude or suggestive. (Well, maybe suggestive) The ad heralded the launch of Fredericksburg's very own TV station, WHFV-TV, channel 69, cable 11, at 6 pm that day. It was an NBC affiliate, a redundancy, considering that Fredericksburg, not far down I-95 from Washington, gets a perfectly adequate signal over the air and on cable from NBC's own WRC-TV in D.C. No matter, Fredericksburg, a city just far enough away to be a small market of its own, had its own TV station.

But not for long. On May 29, 1975, the station shut down. The article about the closing in the Free Lance-Star noted that the station had experienced "10 months of mounting bills and dwindling hopes." GM Ray McInturff pulled the plug at 5 pm that day -- 4:57:45, to be exact -- amid slim hopes that another company, Release the World for Christ Inc., would take the station over (although he said that the new company had indicated to him that they weren't taking over after all). WHFV was $200,000 in the red at the end, having cut staff and pushed all of its operations to one end of the building in an attempt to rent out the other end. And the staff said it hasn't been paid for the last three weeks of work. The end was a filmed travelogue followed by a taped message from Program Director Monty Smith.

Strangely enough, the paper did carry the program listings for channel 69 that evening, programming that never aired. NBC Nightly News at 6:30, local news at 7, "Country Place" at 7:30, NBC's prime-time lineup ("Sunshine," "The Bob Crane Show," the network movie ("Terror on the 40th Floor"), news at 11, and "The Tonight Show") after that.

One of the owners of the station was Jerry Wade Leonard, who, coincidentally, died on February 8th of this year.