WOSU: FOUR DECADES OF PUBLIC TELEVISION
WOSU-TV is a longtime beacon of educational entertainment and it has cornered the local market on award-winning documentaries, too.
President Lyndon Johnson signed the Public Broadcasting Act on Nov. 7, 1967, announcing to the world that "our nation wants more than just material wealth; our nation wants more than a ‘chicken in every pot.' We in America have an appetite for excellence, too."
Ohio State's WOSU-TV had been feeding that appetite since the station came on the air in 1956. In 1968, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting was formed, and WOSU joined what was intended to be a strong and active alternative to commercial broadcasting.
"This was a national system for the first time," said WOSU general manager Tom Rieland.
Also for the first time, public television stations were broadening their scope of offerings, moving from formal educational programs to include civic and cultural enrichment shows such as Nova and Evening at Pops.
But President Johnson clearly had seen the potential for public television in the nation's classrooms. By 1969, children around the country were learning letters and numbers from the denizens of Sesame Street. Fred Rogers, whose now classic show had begun several years earlier on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, was welcoming viewers to his neighborhood. Kids were clamoring for The Electric Company and Picture Pages with Bill Cosby. Puppet theater "edutainment" created in local television studios was disappearing.
"They were all real people. We have very little of that today," said WOSU station manager Edwin Clay. Over the course of nearly three decades at WOSU, Clay has seen firsthand the transformation of children's shows from character-driven action to animated programming.
While adults often wax nostalgic about the early PBS programs they enjoyed as kids, Clay contends that children's programming is "by far" better today. "I think the producers are a lot more creative."
Today's shows, such as Curious George and Maya and Miguel, also include more activity and multicultural features. With the proliferation of computer-animated characters and action, children no longer seem to have the patience for watching friendly Mr. Rogers put on his sweater and sneakers.
Although WOSU lacks the wealth of funding enjoyed by major PBS stations, such as the New York outlet that sponsors Sesame Street, Rieland contends that through national programming, central Ohio's young audiences are getting higher quality experiences than they would through locally produced shows-no matter how fondly their parents or grandparents may remember, say, 1963's Kid's Stuff, hosted by Ted Pritchard.
"[Today's programs] are research based, and they are teaching something to your children that is very important to them," he said. "It's very expensive to do."
FINDING THE FUNDING
The Public Broadcasting Act pledged to financially support public television, but within five years of its passage, WOSU already was facing federal cuts. "At that time, federal funding was a much greater [percentage of] our funding than it is today," Rieland said.
The Friends of WOSU support group sponsored the station's first "Friends-a-Thon" in 1973. The organization has since grown to 22,000 supporters, and pledge drives continue to be a staple of WOSU's programming to the tune of four or five each year, Rieland said. "We see the pledge drives as an opportunity to talk about our mission."
Rieland estimates that currently, about 15 percent of WOSU's $10 million annual budget comes from federal government sources. The budget covers the TV station as well as WOSU's FM and AM radio stations. Half the funding comes from private donors and the rest from state and federal funds as well as special grants, he said.
With that, WOSU covers everything from salaries for 75 employees to new technology and the costs of producing local documentaries and television shows. About $2 million annually goes for NPR and PBS programming, Rieland said. "It's a very tight budget."
Even with those limitations, WOSU has been a pioneer in local television technologies, starting with the purchase of a videotape recorder in 1959-the first Ohio station to do so. In 2004, the station was the first in central Ohio with digital transmission.
WOSU's weekly audience of more than 400,000 surpasses that of specialty cable and satellite networks such as the History Channel, Rieland said. "You come to us and know you're going to get quality and variety right away."
THE 'BEDROCK OF LOCALISM'
Many local Buckeye fans reaffirmed their "Friend"ship with WOSU during the 2006 presentation of The Pride of the Buckeyes, a documentary about The Best Damn Band in the Land. "It was the biggest pledge night in WOSU's history," Rieland said.
For more than two decades, WOSU's local programming has been defined by documentaries. Many of them have an Ohio State angle, such as Echoes across the Oval (1996) and The Birth of Ohio Stadium (1999), which Clay called "a tremendous story."
Clay credits his team of producers for creating documentaries that are not only well researched, but also well told. WOSU's documentaries have all had an educational impact, attracted high viewership, won awards, or claimed some combination of the three, he said.
The Ohio Valley Chapter of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences gave a nod to the station's efforts with four 2007 Emmy awards, including a human interest program award for The Pride of the Buckeyes and another in the same category for Applauding Appalachia, which follows the stories of five southern Ohio artists.
ArtZine, a television magazine program featuring the local arts scene, also won two Emmys, one for arts/entertainment program and the other for the host, Charlene Brown.
"Most of the programs, when we were finished with them, we looked at them and said, ‘Yeah'-which means you've got good people working for you," Clay said.
WOSU's focus on local documentaries and discussions of public issues beyond the scope of daily news have made it the "bedrock of localism," Rieland said. Along with ArtZine, the station produces Columbus on the Record, a weekly roundtable discussion of local issues; In the Know, a high school quiz show now in its 25th year on WOSU; and Viewpoint, a weekly public affairs series.
SCIENCE MEETS STUDIO
Children play on computers outside the entry to WOSU's newest studio, creating digital video effects and exploring tricks with light and color.
Since its debut in September 2006, WOSU@COSI has been engaging young minds in learning, not just through watching television programs, but by understanding how they are produced.
The digital media center, consuming some 12,000 square feet on the ground floor of COSI, is downtown Columbus' first television studio and the country's first public broadcasting station site within a science center. "We've definitely gotten national attention," said COSI president and CEO David Chesebrough.
Chesebrough said the development of WOSU@COSI was "opportunistic." The station wanted to improve its community presence, and COSI was struggling to do the same following a 2004 levy defeat.
WOSU@COSI's "inverted fishbowl" design gives visitors an up-close look at a functioning television studio. There is space for audiences and community forums. "Every local TV program we do now is from there," Rieland said. Previously, all local programming had been produced at WOSU's studios at the Fawcett Center on Olentangy River Road.
Visitors also can experiment with media production in the WOSU mediaLab, which gives them access to software for developing such things as Wiki pages and media clips.
This year, students enrolled at the Ohio State-affiliated Metro High School--a public school emphasizing math, science, and technology--will work alongside WOSU's producers and operations crew at the mediaLab. For the first time, public television will involve hands-on learning.
"They are just so knowledgeable in this media landscape," said Clay of today's youngsters.
In many ways, the mediaLab is the embodiment of what Lyndon Johnson intended when he invited observers at the signing of the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967 to be "participants with me in this great movement for the next century."
It was a movement the president considered necessary for keeping pace with television's rapidly advancing technology. "Yesterday's strangest dreams are today's headlines," he said, "and change is getting swifter every moment."
Learn more:
www.wosu.org
- by AMBER STEPHENS
This story was published in the March/April 2008 issue of Ohio State Alumni Magazine. The magazine is a benefit of membership in the Alumni Association. To get your copy when it's hot off the press, join now.
