To think what was and what is now? How criminal.
How could a once-mighty TV station become so horrid. It's beyond the worst industry decision in modern times. Way way so. Hard to believe almost two decades ago (2002) when egos got in the way of common sense. NBC, you screwed up. And you too, Young Broadcasting. See now what happens when you do what they did. It's too lengthy a story to tell what happened in '02, suffice to say, KRON was a legacy station that turned into a joke.
The days of Bob Jimenez and Evan White. Of Pete Wilson and Terry Lowry and Sylvia Chase. Of Jim Paymar and Roberta Wong. Of the mighty Herb Dudnick and Wayne Shannon. What happened? Never mind. More apt: what could have been. Like KGO Radio, KRON was BIGGER than a mere TV News station. Much bigger, hello Hampton Pierson, circa 1979
Its iconic building at 1001 Van Ness is now no more. How fitting. How appropriate. How symbolic. KRON wasn't perfect but damn near. The great talent that came out of that building. Even the not-so-great. I had trouble at times, watching the novelty that was Wayne Shannon, but I watched. How odd and horrible was "Fletcher the Weather bnny?" But it made for observation. KRON was the little engine that could, the KGO/Circle7 before Happy Talk was even in vogue.
*KRON was an institution. Again, the names. They not only delivered the news but built up a real brand, before brand was even legit. A news and TV station whose call letters was short for "KRONicle." That's a story worth telling one day soon also.
Great names and faces. Memories linger. I wasn't part of the scene back then but I watched in amazement. Even the non-news programming, like the local variety show, "SFO" was bigger than life with a studio audience to boot. (Hosted by Steve Jamison) KRON wasn't so much a TV stationas it was a force. It was the envy of the industry. And it didn't make waves like today. It just kep on doing what it could do. No matter what.
Proud to have worked there. My years of service were 1997-2004. I would've stayed till retirement, but Young Broadcasting (and NBC) fucked that up for me. Was laid off and finished up at KPIX instead. Oh, well. It was magic before the internet crushed the importance of local news. That's bad flipside of the march of progress I guess. Nice piece, Rich.
ReplyDeleteThat "Terry Sylvia Chase" was really something, never saw her though I remember Terry Lowry.
ReplyDeleteEven the KRON on its worst days is way better than the current version. It's a shame Bay TV didn't take off. It was an offshoot of KRON 4. But when Young Broadcasting went out of its mind to buy KRON 4 at a ridiculous price and NBC wouldn't play, well that was the beginning of the end. Instead of quality we're stuck with Darya Big Boobs and the high school journalism students doing sports. We can't even turn on CNN or Fox News as an alternative as they're too far one way or the other. Sigh.
ReplyDeleteWhat happened to KRON? De-regulated markets, cutting costs and maximizing profits for a handful of people and at the same time pee on everyone and everything else is what happened to KRON and other TV and radio stations like KRON.
ReplyDeleteL. Ron...don't forget the internet. The internet ruined EVERYTHING. Newspapers? Gone. Local news? Gone. Objective reporting without opinion bias? GONE.
DeleteI grew up watching KPIX, McElHatten, Tokuda, Walker, Bartlett at 6 and Richmond and Corral at 10. I started watching KRON in earnest during the 1991 Firestorm. I was a junior at Tech and was working at Target in San Leandro. I left a baseball camp earlier that afternoon at Laney and went home in Grand Lake/Lakeshore. I had to work that evening and KRON was playing in the breakroom. I recall a KRON reporter (I forget who but he is in all of the old videos) standing in an intersection detailing the ongoing damage and I recall Pam Moore and Evan White (I think), and Janice Huff doing the weather. As a 16 y/o, I feel in "love" with those two women and watched KRON from then on out until the station's demise in 2002.
ReplyDeleteI met Wayne Shannon in the late 1980s at Cal when he was speaking. (It was shortly after he was gone from KRON and it sounded like he was let go.) I loved his mocking of Jim Bakker and the PTL/sex scandal that Bakker was involved in. To me, Shannon was "must see TV".
ReplyDeleteAny chance you could do a nostalgia piece on Ray Jacobs of KTVU? I loved his editorials after the Ten O'Clock News back in the 1970s and 1980s.
The Pete Wilson Era was KRON at its peak. When Young Broadcasting beat out NBC to buy KRON from the Chronicle, Wilson knew it was time to leave, and he would go on to spend a way-too-short 5 years in his second stint at KGO-TV.
ReplyDeleteBay TV was never well managed, and because of Evan White's own off air nature, they were never going to get the promotional help they badly needed. White knew that going out of his solitary nature wasn't going to do any good. So he just gave impressive prime time hourly news updates plus a 9PM Bay TV half hour. Then Bay TV folded, and White spent a few more years at KRON before retiring for good just around the Young Broadcasting acquisition. Like Wilson, White had the intuitive timing to leave.
Channon and Shannon. I vaguely remember Rita Channon. When Channel 4 staff went on strike in 1982, we never really saw her again as she moved on elsewhere. As for Wayne Shannon, he was KRON during the 1980s, no matter what his commentaries were.
From the functional newscasts that Wilson led at the start of the millennium to the dysfunctional smiles that the lesser weathermen show in front of the person perfectly described by 12:52 (another RL fan used a four-letter "s" word to describe the obviously persuasive flirtation and beyond that the non-Karnow men have to endure) these days, it is a most disappointing crash to the ground as KRON's respect has long since ended in a loud thud.
To be fair, there’s a lot more at work than just budgets, money and even technology. There’s taste too. In 2005 when Johnny Carson died, late night hosts made note of the ‘King’s passing. David Letterman was off the first week, but upon his return the next week, he too noted Johnny and completed with the prophetic line: “We all (all the late night hosts of today) don’t add up to one Johnny.’ Ain’t that the truth David !
ReplyDelete"How could a small, little KRON nab a bigtime network star from ABC and "20-20?""
ReplyDeleteWell it helped that 20/20 canned a story she was working on so she (and Geraldo Rivera) resigned.
Sylvia Chase, the Chase is On!
ReplyDeleteLOL!
DeleteEddie Alexander!
ReplyDelete