U. S. Radio (Jan-Dec 1961)

5,000 watts) approximately the same increase in hours, and the large stations (10,000 through 50,000 watts) two more hours ol all-news programs pei week. "Their increases in local programming devoted to news are even greater: tWO and a half horns more oil ( ied by small stations, one hour more by medium stations and three hours by large stations. All stations on the average have considerably increased their coverage of local area news. . . . Their increases . . . are substantiated by the fad thai 84 percent of all station managements reporting felt thai news programming is more important today than it was five years ago. . . ." The report goes on to say . . . "indications are that small and medium stations are making more extensive efforts to dig out local news, and this by reason of the findings that a larger percentage of small and medium stations have more reporters today than they did seven years ago. All in all, the indications are that the importance of news has increased rather than lessened." With medium and small stations, expanded local news has taken a leading role in the overall news picture. Indicative of the general concensus is this one comment submitted to the NAB by a broadcaster, "The value of local news goes beyond the sponsorship of such programs — to the building of our station's total audience, adjacencies, sales, etc. It builds respect for radio in its community; the station itself becomes an integral part of the community life." Representative of the current expansion in news is a report by WCCO Minneapolis. The station states it considerably increased its news output during 1960. It reports, "[we] now offer a total of 420 news and news-related programs per week. Of these, 283 are locally originated broadcasts and 137 are network programs. An important feature of WCCO news broadcasting is the extensive use of actuality tapes in news reporting. During 1960, more than 6,000 such recorded reports were employed in bringing a more direct account of the news to our listeners." An example of how a rural area station keeps its listeners informed is this account by KOEL Oelwein, Iowa. Because of the vast number of communities covered, local news is a prime concern of the station. As part of its service the news department contacts the 14 area hospitals for all admissions, discharges and births. In addition, they contact sherifl offices, highway patrol and police stations, conn house s, and city council meetings in 10 communities. I h< Itt lion leans towaid the longei ne wscast as is e videnced by "two half houi news programs daily, along with three 20-minuie shows, three 15-ininutc and three 5minute casts." Since weather is an important factot in fanning areas, the station stiesscs this aspect of news programming with "live separate weathe i shows daily, besides the weather report on the icgulai news programs." But news reporting is only one aspect of the overall picture. There is an ever increasing abundance of public affairs programming. This would include the interview, the discussion and/or talk and the documentary program. TALK' BROADCASTING One station capitalizes on the public affairs eon ception of news programming, airing seven hours of "talk" broadcasting a day. The KMOX St. Louis "talk" schedule runs on weekdays from noon to seven, but the main feature begins at three p.m. and is entitled At Your Service. Within these four hours is a potpourri of news programming that may range from a book review prepared and delivered by the station's news director, through a comic interview with a baseball star, to an in-depth documentary report on a medical plan for the aged. Throughout, the schedule is interspersed with news highlights reported by the station's local staff, its Washington correspondent and the CBS network. Because At Your Service encompasses so many varied facets of new programming, a brief run-down of the personnel utilized and a typical daily schedule will provide at least a partial indication of what KMOX accomplishes. To guide the general policy of the program as well as determine what specific material will be used each day, the station manager, program director, executive producer and promotion director gather for an hour every morning to plan the day's program and to consider leads for future programs. Assignments are given out to reporters who will conduct on-the-spot interviews via portable tape recorders. Personalities are lined up for future interviews, and special events features are assigned to designated personnel. In addition, lull-time contributors to the program include three announcers, one of whom acts as a $ THE SPOT U. S. RADIO • February 1961 29