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This one’s for the crew of The Computer Chronicles, who heard it about 50 times.
In the summer of 1970, I was a vacation relief engineer at KGW-TV in Portland. One day, I was the sound man for the local evening news. Tom Craven was the director. “You’d better not screw up,” he told me. I nervously checked and double-checked all the microphones.
John Cardis was the anchor, with Jack Cappel doing the weather. Things went fine for the first 20 minutes. In those days, the sports guy ran downstairs from the newsroom to the set at the last minute so he could include late baseball scores from the East.
Pat Stuckey literally runs into the studio, and sits down just as Tom calls, “Open Cardis mic, fade up on camera 1.” John says, “Now with the sports, here’s Pat Stuckey.” “Camera 2, Stuckey mic,” says Craven.
I flip the switches to close Cardis and open Stuckey.
“Mmpsh rumble rumble.” Stuckey is indistinct.
Craven looks over his shoulder at me, sitting above him at the sound console. If looks could kill… “What’s going on,” he shouts to no one in particular. I reopen Cardis’ mic.
Even though he is only sitting four feet from Stuckey, it sounds like Pat is reading the sports from the bottom of a deep well and John’s breathing is as loud as Pat’s voice.
It seemed like an eternity, but was probably only 10 seconds before the floor director whispers into the intercom circuit, “He’s sitting on his mic.” Craven pushes his talk button and shouts, “Give him the hand signal for you’re sitting on your mic.”
The floor director responds, “What would that look like?”
Craven, suddenly cool, barks “Fade to black, Kill all studio mics.” With the microphones shut, he can use the PA system on the floor. “Pat, stand up. You are sitting on your mic,” says the voice of God from the control room.
A flustered Stuckey stands up and wraps the lavaliere microphone around his neck. “We’re starting over,” Craven says on the PA. Tom again calls, “Open Cardis mic, fade up on camera 1.” John again says, “Now with the sports, here’s Pat Stuckey.” “Camera 2, Stuckey mic,” says Craven. I again flip the switches to close Cardis and open Stuckey. And this time it works.