The Money Room: So What?

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John Kerr: The corporate officer I saw was eager to learn about ways to fund PBS programs. John Carver then sealed the deal. That visit led to a grant to WGBH of $300,000 to help fund NOVA.

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The Money Room: Cold Calls Pay Off

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Sam Tyler: Whom do I call? Why? Is this the right person? Can I wrangle a meeting? That was always the key – get yourself into an office and you might have a chance.

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The Money Room: How I Got Back to ‘GBH

John Kerr

John Kerr: We selected a large, sturdy golf umbrella with a wooden handle. Our brilliant new Yale-trained Design Director Chris Pullman and his colleagues Doug Scott, Gene Mackles and others helped make it distinctive with its blue, green and white panels and WGBH’s new drop-shadowed logo.

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The Money Room: How I Got There

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John Kerr: Having finished college in 1960, I locked my Ideor racing bike to a post near Tech Drugs and climbed the stairs at 84 Massachusetts Avenue in Cambridge.  

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How much does PBS reflect the audiences it was intended to serve?

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In 1967, amid widespread civil unrest, CPB was created by an Act of Congress “to expand and develop a diversity of programming dependent on freedom, imagination and initiative on both local and national levels.” … Fifty-one years later, as we undergo another societal breakdown and racial reckoning, how much does PBS reflect the audiences it was intended to serve?

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It was short, but what a ride!

WGBH Election Coverage 1966

From Dave Svens: This short film clip was taken during WGBH’s election coverage in November, 1966. Host Bob Baram is interviewing the newly elected US Senator from Massachusetts, Edward Brooke, who was the first African-American senator elected by popular vote.

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Jean Shepherd tells his first WGBH story

Jean Shepherd

From Fred Barzyk: I first heard Jean on the radio in Boston. It was 1961. I was babysitting my young son and, while idly scanning radio stations, I heard this person, this intense personal voice, talking to me.

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Remembering the original WGBH

84 Massachusetts Avenue

From Art Singer: Fifty one years ago this past September, on several late afternoons a week, I would take the twenty minute walk from BU across the Charles to the station’s studios on the MIT campus for a night’s work.

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