[Narrator] People don’t get into the radio business without motivation.
The motivation arises from many sources;
technical interest,
passion about news or sports,
even the desire to become a local celebrity.
To be a success Harrison needed to make sure,
that in addition personal motivation,
that a new job applicant also possessed
the talent and intelligence to be successful.
Making the decision on a person’s qualifications for a job at WJMA
seemed as much of an art as a business skill.

I used to use ads in Broadcasting Magazine.
Which was something like We can't promise you
uh, what ever it was
But, we'll give you a good opportunity to learn something
in a nice small congenial small market station.
So I'm really grateful for the station being here.
And I'm extremely grateful for Arch for taking the chance.
Because had I seen me back in 1973,
I would have thrown me out.
And not looked twice.
And Arch looked past all that.
And Arch, there was something that Arch saw
that, that he wanted to go ahead and, and work with it.
And, and so, you know, everything that I, I ever achieved in radio
I got because
I got my ground, I got my roots here.
First of all, I'm amazed that I was ever hired.
Uh, because I still have my original tape
It sounds like my vocal cords are frozen. I mean it's just
just this horrible monotone and it's kind of
ruh, ruh, ruh, ruh, ruh, you know and I wonder how,,,
How did Arch ever see anything in that?
If I'd a been in his shoes, I think I'd uh
patted the boy on the head and told him
[chuckles] go get a job on a farm or something.
Cause you definitely don't want to do radio announcing.
I walked in one day and met Pat Watson.
And I walked in the front door
the green tile floor that sat in front of her desk
and, uh, she looked up over her glasses
and said, “What can we do for you?”
And Arch came walking out and
oh, it was music to my ears.
He says, “So I understand you might be the answer to our prayers.” [laughs]
Lookin' over my....who me? [laughs]
And I'd have to say that
In no other job I've had
have I found anybody who was quite
as inspiring.
or as
well regarded as Arch was.
He, he was a good reader of people.
I mean...you know, I, I can't say enough
I don't think this guy ever really beat me up about anything.
It's like, again, you know, he was always interested in his people
He was one of a kind.
He, um,
I never in all my days in radio met another guy like him.
There's nothing worse than, than
than bosses who only point out what's wrong.
and never give you an “atta boy”.
Uh, and I never felt that.
I felt that I was appreciated.
You're gonna mess up. Don't worry about it.
That's part of...you're, you're gonna go on the air
and you're gonna, you're gonna mess something up.
You're, you know, that's, that's gonna happen.
Uh,
Just try not to let it happen again.
You, know
Learn from you're mistakes and, you know, be prepared.
I don't think during the stretch
with JMA anybody was particularly afraid. I know I wasn't.
to make a mistake. We didn't like making mistakes.
But, we were never afraid to make a mistake, and thus
I think because when you're not afraid
then that whole creative side comes out in people.
And, uh, it's what makes if, makes it kind of special.
The environment for doing that anymore
I don't know that it exists. If it does, I'd love to find it.
And that's....I think why the memories stays so fresh in your mind.
I have a feeling that Arch was
you know, was cultivating...he was looking for people that
had some sort of a
an intellectual fundament,
Had some sort of a bottom to them.
I felt
uh,
getting the best people you could get,
tell them roughly what you wanted to do,
wanted to get done, and then let them go to it.
People were willing to give somebody a chance
And they, they knew...you could contribute something and it was great.
Whatever you gave them was wonderful.
You never felt like it wasn't appropriate. And that was true
throughout the whole station experience.
People took pride in what they were doing.
And you didn't just
uh, and I don't say this was 100% of the time
because there's were always people who get in a hurry, but
the, the overiding sense you got there was
it wasn't good enough to just throw it up against the wall.
You, you, you, you did it until you got it right and you
you took pride in what you did.
Mainly, I believe, it evolved from the
input of this very solid, reliable staff that we had.
People who were not afraid to express ideas.
Who had good ideas and we could work with them.
Uh,
I believe, the whole thing seemed to me a kind of learning experience.
I never came and said,
“This is what we're going to do.”
We just sort of
say “That sounds like a good idea. We gotta give that a try.”
Arch was a real
different kind of manager.
He was a manager in the sense, like an Army general.
He didn't, he wasn't like a captain or a lieutenant.
I mean he would talk with you about some ideas.
But, basically
it was up to you to do the...
and you would go to him with the ideas.
We didn't have much turnover.
And Arch hated turnover.
I recall him telling me, perhaps when I was tendering my resignation...once
Um...uh,
He said, “You know this is the hardest part of this job.
Is loosing people and having to find somebody else
that will fill the slot.”
He says, “I just don't like that part of the job.”
Arch was great.
You know he was...like
I don't know, right out of fairy tale or something.
He just kind of putter around in his cardigan sweater and, you know,
just [hums a tune] just get here and there and
And...but, he was really hands off.
You know, unless you kinda screwed up.
And then he would sorta
point you back in the right direction, but,
It's as if he had the wisdom to just let the crazies run the asylum.
You know, I mean he was very much in control.
It was no question Arch was the boss.
But he didn't meddle.
You know, he just had his nice glasses and his
grey beard and his red cardigan sweater and he'd just putter around.
And make everybody feel, you know, very at home.
My role, really, in this has been to be a teacher.
I certainly was not a gung ho, uh,
sales driven person. I was just a teacher.
and, uh,
If they understood that, and we got along fine,
I wasn't going to issue any grades
I don't thing I fired...more than...
one person that I can think of.
And I, it wasn't a case of “You're fired. Clean out your desk!”
[laughs] Because the guy that I do...
He wondered. He said,
“I wondered why you hadn't fired me before.” [laughs]
The line that
later I shared in conversations with Mitzi Clark
and Barbara Potter and Audibert.
We talked about Arch Harrison.
And the one common thing we could also say about him
was this was a man who had class.
And we wanted to be a part of that operation.
I would say that in general, um,
I never met as many
intellectually interesting cases
under one roof
as I did at JMA.
I just, there were some, a lot of interesting types there at JMA.
You know, in radio I've met
a lot of pot heads
and alcoholics.
There's a, Commander Cody has a new album called
um
Dopers, Drunks, and Everyday Losers
And it reminds me of a lot of stations I've worked at.
So JMA may have given me a little bit of a
unrealistic notion of what radio is like.
When Arch Harrison came to WJMA in the 1960s,
the broadcasting industry’s working population was primarily white males.
As the country dealt with the turmoil of securing fundamental human and civil rights
for people of all genders and colors,
the atmosphere at WJMA remained calm and quiet.
Without strife or protests of any kind,
WJMA’s staff makeup
gently evolved on the leading edge of a new wave in America.
I think he knew...he was taking a chance.
He had never had had a woman on the air.
At least not to cover a full air shift.
I think he may have had some women.
Who did news and things.
He was great.
We had a good
relationship
um,
I don't know why, but we just clicked along.
And he,
he was very patient with me.
Extremely...
Well, he's been that way all along, I think, with everybody.
Here were these
perfectly competent, intelligent people.
Why shouldn't they
if they wanted to do some broadcasting
come on in.
I didn't even consider it ground breaking
for heaven's sake. It was just a good idea.
He did not look at me
as a difference in color. He looked at
what I wanted to do.
And, and whether I was willing to put the work in to do it.
Because if I was willing to do the work.
He was willing to work with me on it.
I didn't do it to represent anybody.
I did it because...well cause it looked like it would be fun.
And, and later on I realized the importance of if because
Arch opened a door that,
and it wasn't because
he had any policy against it.
Nobody had ever asked.
Nobody had come and asked.
Because
I that that had somebody else had come in
with the same ability,
they would have been first.
Bob started with me as a high school
uh, part timer.
He was a really good spirited man.
He was.
A good sense of humor
He also had a
very clear speaking voice.
He didn't have any
accent of any sort.
He was just really, really good.
The time I spent here at WJMA is, is
probably going to be
what I'm going to consider to be the best times of my life.
[narrator] The 1970s was a new time
with new ideas,
new people…and new equipment.
Harrison needed a new engineer.
In fact, he reached a point where he was almost in a maintenance crisis.
He called upon a man to come out of retirement
and to the rescue at WJMA.
A man who had begun tinkering with radios
not long after Marconi broadcast
the first wireless signal across the ocean in
in 1899.

So he came in the
front door
with his box of tools.
Kinda shuffling along like that.
Man, I just knew
that
heaven had smiled on us in the form of Gene Bossieux.
He was a,
he was a tenacious engineer.
If we had a problem at, uh, sign on,
we'd call Gene.
If he couldn't fix it by telephone, he be over
as soon as he could.
To, to uh nose around and find out what was going wrong.
I couldn't get the FM transmitter up one morning.
And, uh, Gene, uh,
I called him.
And I said, “Gene, the FM transmitter won't come on.”
He says, “Open the door.”
I said, “OK.”
(Gene) “Look down at the bottom. Do you see 3 black boxes down there?”
I said, “Yeah.”
(Gene) “Count over 3 and hit that box.”
So I counted over 3 and I tapped it.
He said, “No, no, no. I didn't hear you. Really hit it.”
So I hit it and you could hear the relay snap
and the things just came up and every thing was fine.
I didn't have, ever have to worry
about engineering after Gene
uh, came and joined us.
Because I knew that we would be in good shape.
He was wonderful to work with.
Uh, he had no...
I think you get to a certain age and, and he had reached that age.
He had no, he wasn't trying to prove anything. He'd already proven it.
And so it this young upstart came in, he was glad to have the help.
That's the sense I got out of it.
And, uh, I think that once
in a 1,000 times I could
maybe, I told him something he didn't know.
And we both enjoyed that.
It was that type of thing.
It was a remarkable, experience.
He was a sweet man.
[laughs] He was so quiet.
He would come in
and do his whatever...technical work.
At that time all of us who worked there were pretty young
and lively and high energy, and running all over the place.
And drinking 10 cups of coffee a day.
So there was a lot of hustle and bustle around.
And then there was Gene who [laughs]
Uh, he was just very slow and steady and methodical.
Gene Bossieux was getting on in years.
He was a tall man.
He moved in a motion
similar to a combination of
Tim Conway on "The Carol Burnett Show"
and Lurch on "The Addams Family".
He was gettin' up there
You know, he was, um,
pretty old and slow, but um
he be fixin' this or fixing' that and uh...
a very nice man.
I do remember talking to him one time and asking him
how he got interested in radio...how he got into the radio business.
He said, “Well, when I was a kid,
a friend of mine told me you could talk down the block
without a wire.”
Like a lot of, probably a lot of our parents,
he was definitely somebody who came of age during the depression.
And so he was not going to spend any money needlessly.
And he would find a way to fix that equipment
with taking parts out of other equipment or duct taping things together.
He was really a magician.
In the way he kept the station running.
[Narrator] Gene Bossiuex,
with his decades of experience,
kept the station’s signal on the air…strong and clear.
But, at times, it seemed that WJMA ran…
not on electrons…
but on mountains of paper.
To deal with this challenge
another station hero emerged in the form of
Pat Watson.
Pat had been working
in a grocery store up on Main Street
and
I needed somebody to come and work in the radio station.
And before she could come on the job
she was working in the butcher shop
of this Orange Deli or something like that.
Chopped off a piece of one of her fingers.
Did that stop Pat?
NO! [laughs]
She was there with her finger all wrapped up in the
pecking away like that.
And she never stopped.
And that was what was really tenacious about her.
Was that, she was
a solid old country gal.
And she just knew this was what she would like to do
and she did it for years, and years, and years.
And knew everybody.
But, don't get on her bad side.
Uh, I got on her bad side for one week and it was a miserable week.
But, Pat and I really got along well. We got along great.
And she was so funny to Phil Goodwin.
And it, Phil has his stories. [laughs]
[laughs] which he will tell you. [laughs]
You went through 3 stages with Pat.
The first stage was when she was breaking you in and you were new.
And she would use your first name.
She would say, “Phil, this is not the way I need it.
I need it this other way.
Would you please do it this way because it makes it easier for me?”
Second stage was,
“Phil we've talked about this.
I've said it before, I say it now.
Do it this way.”
Third stage of Watson was
“Goodin, get up here. I got a bone to pick with you!”
Oh, Pat was a character.
Just a wonderful character.
She knew
how to run that thing
with her eyes shut.
Everything about that station she was in on.
And she would just tell everybody
what to do, when to do it, and how to do it.
And, um,
she didn't care if she stepped on your toes or not.
And would tell me
if
we had screwed up.
In somebody's name...
we didn't get a play right...
She would let us know, that you know, you should have done this.
On the whole, we got along very well.
And, I really admired her.
for, uh, her
just her concern.
She had a passion for that place I would call it.
Uh, she wanted everything right.
Patricia McArver
recalls doing a very fine
thoughtful story about
Madison County.
And when she came out of the control room
[chuckles] Pat said,
“McArver, what in the hell did that mean?” [laughs]
And that was a fine...that was Pat all over you.
She was a
really thoughtful
good hearted woman.
And, uh
She just, uh,
was the heart and soul of that part of the station.
Do you know where Uno is?
I remember doing a story about that one time.
Maybe that was the one Pat Watson said,
“What the hell was that all about?” [laughs]
She'd tell you what she thought
And if it wasn't good, that was just what she thought.
And I, myself, I like that.
I like people being honest and up front and stuff like that.
As you know, Pat was not one to mince words
And if she has some opinion about something you had done or
something you had said, she'd let you know in a heartbeat.
And her judgement was usually right on.
So, I
grew to respect her a lot.
Jay Kiernan
holds an award
that I
used to hold
and I hope I will never hold again.
I forget the newscast, but I do remember
I stumbled through the entire thing.
From the beginning to the end.
And she looked at me and said,
“Goodin, that was the worst damn newscast
I have ever heard in my life.”
And of course I was confident that
you know I, nobody would ever beat that.
And then I get to the part where it says,
“Among the gunman's demands
were that all white people leave the earth
within 7 days.”
[sustained laughter]
What could I do? [laughs]
And I fell out.
That was it.
Started the next record
Pat Watson [laughs]
and sweet as she always was.
She came into the control room
and gave me a look
like, you know, you moron.
And she says, “Kiernan
that was the WORST newscast I EVER HEARD.”
And I guess she called me “Roberts”.
She call everybody by their last name.
But I have no recollection
of Pat and I ever having a, uh,
head to head confrontation or
Pat being particularly, uh,
critical of my program.
I don't think she liked it.
So she didn't listen to it.
I remember
frequently seeing Pat
working at her desk with her head down
working on a paper or typing or something.
And you would play a piece of music
you knew Pat liked.
And you would see her hand just reach up
and turn up the monitor
And one thing that would always get Pat
to turn up the monitor was a Conway Twitty song.
Never failed.
Arch had given her some work to do.
And it was right toward the end of the day
and you know she like to get out of there on time.
And she was giving him up and down the river
right there in the front office.
And of course me being a big mouth
I came out and said, “Pat you can't do that he's the owner.”
Said, “I don't give a damn if he is the owner.
He knows better than this.”
When she got sick,
um,
I guess by that time, I'd left the station. But,
I remember calling on her in the hos, hospital one time.
And, uh,
her
old beau
Roger
He said, “I,
I don't, I don't know whether or not we're going to lick this,
but, we're gonna give it a try.”
And so I
I, I went to see Pat. I wanted to see her.
I wanted to uh, tell her
How much she had meant
to me personally,
and to the station
as a whole
and to the community as a whole
She was really something special.
So
when she died
the funeral service was attended
by
half the Town
over at, uh, Preddy's Funeral Home.
It was just a swarm of people there. It was just great.
