NAEB Newsletter (May 1958)

Joint Council of Educational Television, Ben Adler president of Adler Electronics, Inc., and Dr. Alexander J. Stoddard of the. Fund for Advancement of Educa- tion. The proposed bill, orginated by Sen. Warren Mag- nuson (D-Wash.), is of vital interest to educational broadcasters since it provides up to $1 million to each state for ETV. At its last meeting, the NAEB Board of Directors approved support for this bill and its companion House bill, the Boggs Bill (H.R. 9634). JOHN WEISS DIES IN CRASH The NAEB mourns the recent death of John K. Weiss who was killed April 6 in an airline crash near Mid¬ land, Mich. A hard-working educator and friend of the NAEB, Mr. Weiss was traveling from his home in Harrison, N. Y., to attend a conference at Central Michigan College of Education. He had served as vice-president of the Fund for the Advancement of Education since 1951, when it was founded by the Ford Foundation. Mr. Weiss was also a trustee for both the Horace Mann School and New York State University. PEABODY AWARDS RECEIVED BY EDUCATIONAL BROADCASTERS r Educational broadcasters were well represented in this year’s announcement of the George Foster Pea¬ body Awards. Half the television stations honored this year were educational stations which seems to indicate the spirit of educational broadcasting’s achievement. Of this year’s awards, one went to WGBH-TV along with WGBH-FM, Boston, for local radio-tele¬ vision news, one to WQED, Pittsburgh, for televised' education, and another to WKAR, East Lansing, Mich., for radio education. Louis M. Lyons, Harvard University news com¬ mentator, was responsible for the Boston station’s award in local radio-television news. He has broad¬ cast on WGBH-FM since the station went on the air in 1951 and simultaneously on WGBH-TV, when it started operating in 1955. His program, “Back¬ grounds,” offers an analysis of issues and events with interviews of national leaders in every field of current public interest. The award to WQED was given specifically for its “Heritage” series. The citation it received com¬ mended the station for “impeccable taste and in¬ tegrity” in originating its distinguished programs. The series was also cited as having “literally opened the eyes of American adults and students to the rich¬ ness of our intellectual life.” WKAR’s Peabody award is the first given to a university-owned radio station since 1942. Selected for this honor was the 15-minute, weekly broadcast, “You Are the Jury,” which originates at WKAR and will be distributed by the NAEB tape network. The Highway Traffic Safety Center of Michigan State University and WKAR share the honors for their outstanding traffic safety series which presents drama¬ tizations of traffic problems with discussion and an¬ alysis by motorists and Center experts. OTHER AWARDS A Public Interest Award for exceptional service to safety was given by the National Safety Council to KQED, San Francisco, primarily for its 13-week pro¬ gram series, “Safety On The Job,” which devoted each telecast to a different aspect of industrial safety. The series was presented in cooperation with the American Society of Safety Engineers. A half-hour television program, “We Proudly Hail,” brings the University of Texas radio-television department a George Washington Honor Medal and $100. The recognition is one of the 1957 Freedom Awards of the Freedoms Foundation at Valley Forge. A program combining patriotic music and a talk, “We Proudly Hail,” was televised on KTBC-TV, Austin. WBUR, Boston University, has received an award from the National Headliner Club for its doc¬ umentary series, “Impact,” which has highlighted DIRECTORY CHANGES p. i p. 10 P. 13 P. 17 P. 30 P. 33 MAY, 1958 7