CHAPTER 11
CASUAL COMMENT LEADS TO YEARS-LONG BATTLE
After Charlie Muren, WIDB GM, mentioned to Dean of Students Wilbur Moulton in May that WIDB would be selling advertising in the fall of ’71, Dean Moulton requested a written proposal with details about the operation of selling commercials. So Charlie and Robbie Davis (WIDB’s first Sales Manager) put together a many-page typed document explaining what WIDB was, what WIDB wanted to do and why, and some details how it would be done. A proposed rate card would be included.
Original WIDB Sales Proposal, 1971
Click here for entire Sales Proposal
It did leave some gaps. There was no proposed “sales contract” just a statement that “SIU Legal Counsel would have to prepare” the contract. It also argued that WIDB presented no competition with the local commercial stations. Bring that up to dismiss it handily was thought to be a stratagem to put the issue to bed early on. Instead it foreshadowed a major contrived controversy that dogged WIDB for years to come.
After reviewing the proposal, Dean Moulton suggested that area broadcasters be contacted to seek their opinion about WIDB selling advertising. So, before the end of spring quarter, Robbie dutifully visited or called representatives of the DE, the Southern Illinoisan, WCIL, WINI, and WJPF. All of them were positive about WIDB advertising. Some of these stations had already hired on-air people because of their experience at WIDB. It was thought that this would pave the way for WIDB sales to be approved. Robbie’s contacts were made in early June and then he left for the summer. Charlie left too. So, Joel was in charge.
Robbie’s report of his visit to WCIL with Paul McRoy Sr. & Jr., June, 1971
Robbie’s report p. 2
Despite the positive response of area media representatives in June, by July it was a different story. Local broadcasters, led by Dale Adkins of WINI, Murphysboro, protested to Dean Moulton that “since WIDB was subsidized by state taxes, it was unfair competition for WIDB to compete with local stations such as WINI.” The area broadcasters demanded a meeting with Dean Moulton, but he was on vacation. Joel took this delay to see if he could drum up some support.
Joel turned to Dr. John Kurtz, a respected R-T faculty member, whose area of expertise was sales. At that time Dr. Kurtz was also the SIU Broadcast Service Director. Joel was convinced that Dr. Kurtz would fully support what would be a broadcast sales lab so students could learn and practice a major broadcast skill, a lucrative employable broadcast skill – which was completely unavailable from the R-T Department or the Broadcast Service. In fact, at that time – 1971 – it could be argued that lack of a sales training facility was the main and only defect in an otherwise stellar R-T curriculum.
Joel was floored when Dr. Kurtz opposed WIDB’s advertising. Dr. Kurtz sided with the area broadcasters’ profits over student development and employability. He cited the “tax dollars” that “artificially subsidized” WIDB, which made it improper to compete with commercial business that had no such “artificial subsidy.”
Dr. Kurtz was a beloved professor and mentored many students into very successful sales and broadcast executive careers (many of whom worked first at WIDB). But it is astounding that a professor, whose central purpose is to facilitate student development, opposed student development, opposed student opportunities, opposed resume building, and discouraged student initiative because of his concern that a few thousand dollars in revenue might be lost to local broadcasters who had no connection to the university at all. This is another example of rogue university employees ignoring the university’s mission to serve student needs and instead advancing a secret agenda to benefit themselves and/or connected area locals. Dr. Kurtz was not malicious, just a company man who followed the rogue agenda set from his superiors. Years later, he came around and did support the WIDB Sales Proposal. But his 1971 attitude lined up with the university culture of ignoring student needs (even to the point of letting students die until it cost too much) and it seems painfully obvious that many university employees were involved in a cooperative effort to keep students controlled despite the employees’ wholesale perversion of the university’s state-ordained mission.
The argument that WIDB was subsidized by “tax dollars” and therefore unfairly competed was completely ridiculous and pure sophistry. It was argued that even if WIDB was subsidized by Student Activity Fees (so not “taxes”). the Building it was in (Wright I) was built with tax dollars and so WIDB was “tainted” and could never compete commercially. Dr. Kurtz stated that if someone had offered use of a building, and students contributed to a fund to buy equipment and operate a station. Dr. Kurtz would support sales, as that would not be “unfair competition.” But even one tax dollar made it improper.
Using this logic, all Illinois state universities must shut down because they are using “tax dollars” to compete against “for-profit” colleges, such as Kaplan, Westwood One and even private universities, such as Northwestern. But this argument was only applied to WIDB when there were student interests to suppress.
Only 30 days had passed since Joel became summer GM. Now he was astounded by Dr. Kurtz’s opposition, so much so that it was hard to frame the response. But Joel did his best in one of his first written arguments he presented in his July 23, 1971 letter to Dr. Kurtz.
Joel’s letter to Dr. Kurtz, 1971
Joel was only 19 at this time, and he did not have the skill acquired in later years to be able to zoom back to see what was really happening. Plus, no one at that time could believe that the SIU administration could be so proudly and notoriously disdainful of obvious student needs. Joel tried to explain and educate Dr. Kurtz so he would absorb the actual details and then understand. Of course the truth had nothing to do with any of this. Joel was learning fast, and he was starting to get irritated.
