Radio Memories Vol. 25

Just five days later, the Ikegami HL-35 would be back in the headlines. WIS-TV was in a race to be the first to use the camera dubbed the “Mini-Cam” with another SC Broadcaster live in a newscast. We had received our camera first and had it and all the required equipment ready to go, all except our Window-ledge Microwave system. Our vendor had a manufacturing blip and delayed the delivery of our system by a month or so. The other station would beat us until Joe Gill, our chief engineer, came up with a brilliant idea. We would use our RCA TVM-6 microwave that we use to carry the signal from the Carolina Coliseum for USC Basketball instead of the Window-ledge unit. The transmitter was in the prop storage area at the station, and the receiver was still up on the downtown tower, pointed southwest towards the Coliseum. 

So on Monday, November 17th, he called in a tower crew to realign the receiver towards wherever the news department wanted to do a live interview. Joe Petty, our news director, reached out to Richland County Sheriff Frank Powell to set up a live interview. At that time, the Sheriff’s office was on Huger Street, in the Vista, 10 blocks west-northwest of the studio. Joe assigned Tom Fowler to be the on-scene reporter, and Tom Bradford assigned me to set up the microwave at the Sheriff’s Office. The production department assigned Cathy Malone to assist me with setting up the gear. 

So Cathy and I set off in a rented utility van to the Vista around 4:30 PM, plenty of time for a 7 PM live shot. Or so we thought. When we arrived at the location, we discovered that we could not see the microwave receiver on the tower, due to the significant differences in altitude between Huger Street and Bull Street. Microwave transmissions are line-of-sight; they don’t bend very well around buildings or other obstructions. 

You may remember from a previous chapter that this microwave unit weighed 150 pounds and could be broken down into 2 roughly 75-pound units. Not exactly portable! Cathy and I set the transmitter up on the ground anyway, and sure enough, we could not get a signal through to the tower. Next, we tried carrying the unit to the roof of the Sheriff’s Office, but we had no luck there either. By now, it was approaching 6 P, M and the live shot was definitely in jeopardy. We had one more option, the top of the six-story county jail, which was about 100’ away. Sheriff Powell readily approved for us to try, but said that Cathy could not help because the stairwell to the roof was in the general population section of the jail. He assigned a couple of trustees to carry the microwave equipment to the roof, and I carried a two-way radio, a reel of video, and a reel of audio cable. 

Arriving on the roof of the county jail, I could clearly see the receiver dish on the tower and radioed the tower crew, and they said they could see me too. Twenty minutes later, we had a rock-solid signal. Cathy had set up the camera on the ground at the entrance to the Sheriff’s Office, and Tom had arrived to prep for the interview with Sheriff Powell. And I had connected the cables to Cathy. And that is how WIS-TV won the race to do the first live “Mini-Cam” interview in the state with Tom and the Sheriff on camera, Cathy shooting the video, and me nervously waiting for something to break. 

After the interview, Cathy and I went back to the station and parked the utility van in front of the station and crashed in the lobby. I claimed the couch and Cathy the wing-back chair. But we were not done yet. Joe Petty came out of the newsroom and said that we were going to do a second live shot that night from the front door of the WIS studios, complete with the white columns. Tom Bradford, our Studio Engineering Supervisor, was with him, and I asked Tom if we could do it using the audio and video cables to get the signal into the control room. It would have been nearly impossible to get a signal to the microwave receiver from that close to the base of the tower. Tom said yes! 

So Cathy set up the camera, and I pulled the cable, and we were ready to go. We were sitting on the front steps keeping watch over the equipment when Joe Petty came out and told me to “clean up as much as I could,” that I was going to be the interviewee on the 11 O’Clock Report in my role as the engineer in charge of the first live “Mini-Cam” shot in SC Broadcast History. I thought Cathy would be better as she was much prettier than me. But Joe said, “You!”

Cathy and I were paired up for four more live shots in the 7 O’Clock Report that week. On Tuesday, we were on the second floor of the Wade Hampton Hotel to cover a Chamber of Commerce Conference. That was easy; a microwave shot out the window, bouncing the signal off the wall of the Columbia Hotel a block away to the tower two blocks farther out. 

On Wednesday, we drove out to the Columbia Metropolitan Airport to broadcast a tour of the Weather Bureau’s facilities given to Joe Pinner by John Purvis, the Meteorologist-In-Charge. It was a long line-of-sight path, but no problem for the TVM-6. 

We were given Thursday off. 

Friday, we were sent to the Harry Parone Stadium at Spring Valley High School to cover a live show with Jim Forrest, our Sports Director at the time. That Sparkleberry Lane shot was the longest we attempted that week, but from the open window of the press box atop the east bleachers, it too was a clean path and a strong signal. 

Upon arrival back at the studios, I was told that we would do a live shot from Williams-Brice Stadium at the end of the big college rivalry game, Carolina vs. Clemson, which started at 1 PM the following day. 

The next morning, somehow, I got my wires crossed up. I thought I would meet our assignment’s editor, Chuck Drier, at the station to get my press credentials. It would be only me because only one set of credentials would be available. Around 10:30 AM, Chuck had not shown up, and someone in the news department told me that I was to meet him at the stadium. So I drove to the stadium, hoping that I would be able to sweet-talk my way in. Fortunately, it was still over two hours before game time, and the parking lot around the stadium was nearly empty. I pulled up to the gate next to the elevator to the press box and was greeted by a septuagenarian security guard who wanted to know what I had in the van. I told him that I had the “Mini-Cam,” and he responded that he had been watching us all week. I asked him if I could use the elevator to carry the gear to the press box camera deck, and he said, “No, but you can drive the van up the circular ramp on the southwest corner of the stadium and park it behind the camera deck during the game! SCORE! 

Sure enough, Chuck was waiting there with my credentials in one hand and a chicken wing from the press box buffet in the other. By the time the game started, I had set up the microwave and camera and had confirmation from the studio and tower crew that the signal was rock steady. Perfect timing in that the press was now occupied with the gam,e and I was free to raid the buffet. I have to say this about the buffet in the press box at South Carolina: I have enjoyed the buffets in every press box in the ACC in the 70s, and South Carolina’s was the best of them all. 

When the second half started, I went back to the camera on the camera deck, not too far from where the cameraman from our sports department was shooting the game on film. On a whim, I unlocked the camera from its wide shot and started shooting the game closer up, just for the heck of it. After about 5 minutes, I heard our Jim Forrest on the two-way radio asking who was shooting the game from the “Mini-Cam?” I told him that it was me and that I could lock the camera down on the wide shot if needed. He said, “No, please keep doing what you are doing!” So I shot the last part of the game from the south end of the press box camera deck. The game ended around 4 PM with Carolina defeating Clemson 56–20 to set a Gamecock record for most points scored in a football game against the Tigers.  I thought at the time that it was a shame that we would not be able to get the film shot by our sports reporter back to the station in time for it to be developed and edited for the 7 O’Clock Report. 

When I got back to the station, I discovered that Jim Forrest had been recording the video that I was shooting of the second half of the game on one of our 2” Ampex quad tape machines back at the studio. He edited that tape in time for the news, and that was the first time that videotape was used in a report of a college football game in a newscast in SC. 

In the early 2000s, a former WUSC-FM announcer, “Texas Pete”, Drew Stewart, was a producer/reporter for WIS-TV put together some videos for WIS-TV of significant sports stories that had been covered by WIS-TV. He was surprised to find that I was the one who shot the game video he used in that report.  That video can be seen on YouTube! The lack of video quality is due to the 30-year-old U-matic tape that Drew used.

Now, “sweet-talking” your way into a Carolina Clemson  Football game is something you can’t do today!