Broadcasting Telecasting (Apr-Jun 1958)

o o o Distinguished Winners of the Broadcasters Open o In the past 10 years these broadcaster-golfers have won the annual Broadcasting tournament, held in connection with the NAB convention : 1948— Pete Watts. KYOR San Diego, Calif., low gross. 79; Don Fedderson, KLAC Los Angeles, and Max Everett, EverettMeKinney, tied for low net. 1949— Joe Higgins, WTHI Terre Haute, Ind.. low gross. 78; Bruce Bryant, Edward Petry Co., low net. 1950— Merrill Lindsay, WSOY Decatur, 111., low gross, 79; Rolston Fishburn, Edward Petry Co., low net. 1951 — Lew Green, Green Assoc., low gross, 78; Robert Stoddard and William Ware (deceased). KSTL St. Louis, tied for low net. 1952 — Joe Higgins, low gross, 79; Steve Roche. NBC Chicago, low net. 1953— Sil Aston. KMBY Monterey, Calif., low gross, 76; Andy Jarema. WKOP Binghamton, N. Y., low net. 1954 — Joe Higgins, low gross, 73; Henry B. Clay. KWKH Shreveport, La., low net. 1955 — Joe Higgins, low gross, 73; Marshall Pengra, KLTV (TV) Tyler, Texas, low net. 1956 — Joe Higgins and Merrill Lindsay tied for low gross, 79; FCC Chairman John C. Doerfer, low net. 1957 — Mark Schreiber, Mark Schreiber Adv. Agency, Denver, low gross, 72; Merrill Lindsay, low net. 1958— IT COULD BE YOU. This year's tournament will be held Monday, April 28, at Los Coyotes Country Club, a half-hour from downtown Los Angeles. Buses will leave the Biltmore Hotel at 8:30 a.m. and return in mid-afternoon. There'll be prizes provided by Los Angeies stations and silver trophies provided by Broadcasting. Golfers will be guests of Broadcasting at a buffet luncheon and at the 19th hole. Reserve your starting time now with your nearest BROADCASTING representative. Or check in at the BROADCASTING suite Sunday, April 27, in the Biltmore Hotel. TRADE ASSNS. SALANT TELLS BROADCASTERS TO ADMIT THEY'RE IN BUSINESS • CBS v.p. advocates frank stand against detractors • Colorado jurist defends free access for radio, tv • Broadcasters should get off the defensive and come right out and say they're in business — that they can't serve the public interest unless they get audiences and advertisers in the first place," Richard S. Salant. CBS Inc. vice president, said in a speech prepared for delivery Friday before the Ohio Assn. of Broadcasters, meeting at the Hotel Carter, Cleveland. (Other speakers: Colorado Supreme Court Justice Otto Moore and attorney Wayland Cedarquist, debating Canon 35; Ben Sanders, KICD Spencer, Iowa, on small stations; FTC Comr. Robert Secrest, on advertising; Gerald A. Bartell of the Bartell Stations, on management and programming — see below). "We get so carried along with defensive attitudes that when we do get around to the real backbone of broadcasting — entertainment— we say it in a whisper, if we say it at all," Mr. Salant asserted. "We act as though we were ashamed of it. And we rarely seem prepared to admit out loud that outs is a business which depends on revenues— dollars — from advertisers for survival." "I'm not suggesting that we turn our backs on our functions in the non-entertainment fields," Mr. Salant continued. "We have greater responsibilities than ever before in the areas of information and nonentainment. But I do suggest that there may be some merit in re-defining our functions in our own minds so that all of us can make it clear that our system of free competitive enterprise in broadcasting means just that — free competition for audience and for advertisers." He warned, however, that "if we should ever go this route of re-emphasizing the nature of our business, we must always remember that the key is programming." Mr. Salant said broadcasting is "suffering from a galloping case of Washingtonitis." Counting off the various investigations conducted in Washington since 1954, he noted that between then and now eight CBS officers have appeared in formal hearings 15 different times as witnesses before nine different federal investigating groups. "And there's no end in sight," he added. During the Barrow hearings, he said, CBSTV officials in Washington to testify were called continually from headquarters about "crises with talent, crises with programs, crises with sponsors, even crises with crises" — and "all we could do was stay in Washington waiting for the next day's testimony, while we were trying to continue the business of running a network by remote control." He continued: "There was the guts — or some of the guts — of the organization in Washington, not trying to do anything constructive like getting new and better programs on the air, or finding new sponsors, or doing something that would mark the day well spent. Instead they were pouring all their energies — day after day from 7:30 a.m. to 3 a.m. — just in trying to stand still." Mr. Salant summarized his views thus: "( 1) It's a mess in Washington; (2) There are no easy answers; (3) Nobody loves us but the people; (4) We're in business; let's admit it (5) Let's do the best job of programming we know how, and (6) If we're ever to be led out of this Washington wilderness, you, the individual men and women in the broadcasting business, are the ones who will do it." The American Bar Assn. ban (Canon 35) on radio and tv coverage of court proceedings "cannot be supported in fact or in law," Judge Moore, Chief Justice of the Colorado Supreme Court, said in debating the ABA ban with Wayland B. Cedarquist, Chicago attorney. The ABA's committee that recommended retention of the radio-tv ban with minor changes in language failed to conduct a thorough study of the problem, Judge Moore charged. The committee's report was laid aside at the February meeting of the ABA's House of Delegates. There is no competent evidence available to prove facts assumed by the committee to be true without proof, he argued, recalling the extensive hearing held by the Colorado court before it decided to allow broadcast coverage of trials. "I can give you the names and addresses of at least 1,000 competent witnesses to testify that the assumptions and conjectures upon which proponents rest their case are absolutely false," Judge Moore argued. He continued, "These witnesses to facts within their personal knowledge would stand up under all the rules of evidence which we enforce in determining the truths in the trial of cases under law. In administering justice in the courts of America we don't deny constitutional freedoms on assumptions, on fears, on conjecture or the guesswork of any individual or group of individuals. We base our judgments on the evidence — competent evidence." Mr. Cedarquist defended Canon 35 on the ground that the right of each person to a fair trial is more important than a few moments of entertainment. The rights of the individual should prevail when they come into conflict with a privilege of the multitude, he argued. Ben B. Sanders, president of KICD Spencer, Iowa, told how that 250 w station has built sales to $224,000 a year in a town of 7,400 population. "We built an audience and then went after sponsors," he said. The station has two salesmen. Five cars are equipped with shortwave transmitters and radar weather equipment has just been installed. Robert Secrest, member of the Federal Page 82 • April 14, 1958 Broadcasting