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THE JOURNEY'S FIRST STEP

And so my journey began - not on tape yet, that would take another year.  But I was on my way to realize my dream and it only took one job interview to get started.  This was a cinch I thought (I would soon learn it wasn't as easy as it first seemed.)  

     Tri-State Broadcasting did not produce instructional television programs; it was a consortium of public school districts that purchased them from stations mainly in the Eastern Educational Network (EEN).   This was new territory for education members, using the airways to deliver supplemental instructional material via TV rather than the traditional film library services.  Our show came with a variety of  accompanying workbooks (many that we printed without color and on newsprint to save money).  

I learned that we "rented" air time on the Philadelphia Educational Television Station to broadcast our schedule  - WHYY Channel 12 and WUHY channel 57 (which was owned by the School District of Philadelphia).   Our programming was selected by the needs of our partner educators to fill in gaps in their daily curriculum.  

We have come a long way since those early days - with streaming video, and instant access to a vast world of information now on the actual desktops of students.  The Internet changed the entire delivery system form broadcasting to technology far beyond what we could have imagined.  Many of our shows were still in black & white in the ITV dawn of the 70's.

Bob Maull was a former history teacher and my main job as his "Administrative Assistant" was to carry his briefcase.  We would attend countless meetings together visiting PTA groups; selling board members on our budget; flogging the value of TV in the classroom to the 35 school districts we served in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware.  He peppered our drives with a constant flow of little known historical trivia.  Our whole operation was housed in the Ridley Park Board of Ed. headquarters, Office Manager, Mary Jane filled me in that our modest digs were a contribution in lieu of the regular sustaining membership fee.  

Bob had a nice office - very educational looking. There was a workroom where we boxed and shipped the thousands of materials books to the various teachers that enhanced the programs that our teachers were free to pick from our daily schedule to use in their classrooms.  Math - Geography - Dramatize Classic - Current Events.  We offered a variety of subjects to fit our many requests.

Shipped was a euphemism I would soon find out - for most deliveries were going to be made by me driving them all over the Delaware Valley.  A hoped-for cost savings over the post office for our tight budget.  I had given a small space in what I think used to be a utility closet - it smelled a lot like the wax used in high school hallways.  But it was my new daytime home and I was very happy to get it, along with a new briefcase.

This was what I learned on those first days between Bob's puffs of cigarette smoke - He lit one Pall Mall on another.   At the close of my first business week Bob stopped by and said, "Monday you don't have to come here, I want you to take these contracts to our Board President, in Bucks County Super's office  - get them signed, all copies...

...AND DON'T GET LOST !!! "

And then he hustled out the door to his car - once a teacher, always a teacher as he left our building with the other educators everyday at 3:30 just as he did for the past 20 years.

I drove home with mixed emotions - this "job" wasn't exactly what I thought it would be.  However, as my Temple University benefactor had warned..."It's a start Calvin, it's a good start."  And I was much closer to my goal than I imagined.

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