The boob tube isn’t for me

Back some 38 years ago I passed the exam to be a Navy Journalist. I was immediately transferred from the USS Seminole (LKA104) - the oldest cargo ship in the U. S. Navy - to Sangley Point, a base in the Philippines across the bay from Manila.

I was confident I was going to the base newspaper, but that was not to be. I was assigned to the American Forces Philippines Network,or something like that. The bottom line is it was a radio station and I had no experience in radio.

Made no difference to the Navy, but a whole lot of difference to Pete Holste. He was a liberal Democrat from St. Paul, Minn., and was in charge of the station's afternoon "Country Caravan" program. He thought I was the second coming when the first Southern syllable dripped out of my mouth because he knew he had been rescued from the pits of torment. I was a natural to be the new trail boss of "Country Caravan" because I liked country music and had the accent to fit the bill. I forgot about writing and jumped right behind that turntable playing such hits as 'I wouldn't live in New York City if they gave me the whole dang town," "The cold hard facts of life," "It's watermelon time in Georgia" and "Miller's Cave."

I brought all that knowledge back to the University of South Carolina with me, where I graduated with a degree in journalism after one session of summer school in 1971. But I almost didn't make it because I took a broadcasting course. I sailed through the radio part of the course but ran into brick wall when it came to the television part. I was much too self-conscious getting up in front of people and trying to act like a happy buffoon on the tube. The professor and I had words. Fortunately I passed the course with a B never to set foot in front of a TV camera again.

And I didn't until last week when I had to promo a page 1 Sunday story on WBTW. The story was about the atomic bomb minus its warhead that fell on Mars Bluff 50 years ago. I was nervous, but practiced my short spill. I watched the full version and thought I did a fair job, even if I didn't smile. Well, the five-second edited version that appeared on the air caught me looking down the whole time like I had dropped my teeth in my crotch.

I tried again this week because I have another page 1 story on the 133rd Military Police Company of the Florence National Guard. They went to Iraq in 2003 a month after Operation Iraqi Freedom was launched. Mackenzie Taylor of WBTW fame interviewed me this time. I even wore my new sports coat and a bow tie. Can't wait to see how I did the second time around.

But the bottom line for me is I'm a print journalist, apparently born and bred that way because my father was a good writer. I'll leave the tube to Cecil Chandler, who joined WBTW in 1973 - the same year I got my first reporting job with the Darlington News and Press. I'm more comfortable writing a story because it makes me think.

And I'm not all that uncomfortable spinning those old 45 rpm discs that were once the standards of radio. As a matter of fact, I'm in hot pursuit of getting my old Rock-Ola jukebox out of storage and putting it back in my house. I'll just drift into the past listening to "Almost Persuaded," "The Party's Over," "I Love My Truck," "I Do My Swinging at Home" and "Beer Drinking Music."

And if I'm lucky, I'll wake up listening to "I've Been Everywhere," "Mr. Walker, It's All Over, I Don't Like the New York Secretary's Life" and "Seat Belts on Bar Stools." Nothing like country music. I still get a hankering for it every now and then.

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