Skip to main content

Murphy's Law (Part 1)



As me and the Chief Engineer hired staff  our TV53 family was growing everyday.  Every space in Frank's insurance business office was occupied by my production staff trying to look busy in the boardroom - but we were running out of chairs and only one phone line was on the long meeting table.  The engineering staff was hanging at the studio location that was entirely empty.  They spent the time helping to clean out the trash from this long vacant building, fighting off panhandlers who used it as home and watching the massive crew of carpenters, plumber and electricians.

In one of my countless morning meeting with the "What About Boss" - was told, "Get these people out of my office and put them to work...I ain't paying people to sit around.  I replied, "Frank, I can send our news team out into the City to meet key people and news sources and when we get a handheld camera I have them shoot stock footage."  I had to explain then that they would be shooting buildings, fire trucks, beach and boardwalk that would be used in the newscast to add to stories that our minimal crew could handle in person.

We began to prove that building a TV station from the ground up was much more difficult than building typical structures and offices that Frank insured. (BTW Frank political standing in the AC area resulted in his firm securing contracts for the workmen’s comp insurance for all of the four casino and more to come - multi-million buck deals)

The following is a recounting of the most outstanding “glitche” (in no particular order as most of the incidents happen at the same time) as we faced the ever dwindling days until “53 Day”.    The architect for the project was local (except for the few TV technical pros most of the “contractors” had no broadcasting credits - they were hired because they simply were Frank’s friends.  Almost daily I went over his elevations and floor plans and he was lucky he had brought an eraser.  He and Frank had decided to put a large window in the corner of the production studio.  I had to explain that if they did it would not only limit how we could do multiple shows without striking each one and to their obvious chagrin I added, “Plus it that window remains then our touring guests will be a part of our shows!”  The window was removed.

And then disaster struck - our studios was in uptown AC two blocks from the beach.  Frank had convinced the city’s mayor that there was room on the land that was several miles west and housed the sewer plant on the road leading into the resort.  And most importantly getting this small parcel for free would be great “PR” for the town.  The work had begun with the new year when the financing was in place from the the primary and secondary investor (that Frank had made “offers they couldn’t refuse”).  They tower was completed by a crew of native Americans who traveled the country doing lofty jobs that made great living because they had no fear of heights!   (Backgrounder: Broadcast  signals in the 1980’s were all “line-of-sight” - in other words if one stood on the top of the tower and had a surveyors XX they would be able to see the rooftop dishes - because of the curvature of the earth that’s why TV towers had to be high and the strongest signals are generated from the tops of buildings like the Empire State building which is loaded with antennas).  The day the consultant was installing the microwave system that would shoot the broadcast signal to the tower a major problem was discovered when he peered through his “theodolite”  the telescopic device for measuring angles.  To everyone’s horror - he could not see the tower - there was a three story school building in the way!  A minor detail that none of Frank’s pal had bothered to check in their haste get the tower location - oops.  The only solution was to install a translator disc on top of a building that would bounce the signal from the studio to the transmitting.  Several days passed and Frank announced that he had secured permission to install the device on the roof of the school building - he had pulled one of his countless strings again and we were back on schedule.

( More Surprises? - to be continued)


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

THE FINAL CURTAIN

   The years floated by and like all things, familiarity bred contempt.  I started to bite the hand that fed me (add you own cliché here).  As my job became repetitive and routine, I started not to believe the slogans that I was promoting – making communications accessible to everyone became grabbing a buck from as many as possible.   Telecommunications was not mired in the old ways as evolved into an “entertainment and online store for the customers.  Many of the old guard were disappearing and the mantra for all of America’s blue-chip companies was “down-sizing.”  I used to quip to my secretary – “If my boss calls get her name!”  Then even those quips ended.  I became a “Self-Sufficient” manager which actually meant many of the support staff was laid off or reassigned.  Along with producing programs  I had to type my own contract letters,  make copies at Office Depot and stop by the post office – we no longer had company...
Post a Comment
Read more

MR CHAIRMAN

   During my 10 years of Corporate Television work I must admit I was called on to produce some real "boring" shows - but there were also moments that made me want to go to work.  Here's a brief list of the "highlights" of my time - that I can remember. Over the years I saw many changes in the stodgy old phone company as it expanded into a communication giant. Working with James Earl Jones was an event.  We shot a piece with him in his NYC Village apartment - what it was about I really can't dredge up but I learned an amazing fact.  Mr. Jones stuttered!  He said he lived with it growing up and he went into acting because when he memorized scripts he didn't stutter.  I also learn that he was paid $10,000,000 to exclusively do VZ commercials and $1,000,000 every time he made a new commercial.  Not bad for someone who was speech challenged. For another taped employee recruitment show which was going out to higher learning institutions I suggested ...
Post a Comment
Read more

A CAVALIER DIRECTOR

     I was happy working at the telephone company - but frankly I wasn’t a “Bell Head”.   Many of the 96 staff in media relations and public relations on my floor took a month to do simple jobs; three people produced a newsletter; two people produced the bill insert (by the way none of these people actually did the work, they hired freelance graphic artists and writer to fill their publications.  And we had a ton of informational products including a monthly newspaper that even had want and selling ads.  Frankly, I could have done all of their jobs in a couple of weeks.  But I soon realized that the phone company had a lot of non-wire stringers who did minimal work.  Why because if the company didn’t spend all of it’s money the government allowed it to make it would have to be returned to the rate-payers. An  incident that stands out as an example of the cultural climate at the headquarters is a shoot I was assigned to do with the preside...
Post a Comment
Read more