FTV: Thank You 2023
Every other year or so, we like to run a recap of WOAS-FM events from the recent past. This time it will be a little different as the year 2023 leaves us and makes way for 2024. We have a lot to look back on and are counting our blessings for what has turned out to be a remarkable year. . Don’t get me wrong, every year has special moments and memories, but 2023 will go down as ‘one for the books’.
Topping the list is the most personal event for yours truly. On Saturday morning, October 28, my wife woke up with discomfort in her chest. As she sat on the edge of the bed and prayed for some guidance, she heard a voice say, “You can’t do this any more.” It wasn’t her own voice saying, “I can’t do this anymore.” She immediately had me call the hospital to let them know we were coming as she packed a small bag to take with her. A retired RN with more than 40 years experience dealing with other people’s medical emergencies, my wife was not about to ignore her own symptoms.
The crew at the Ontonagon hospital took good care of Christine and got her to Wausau as soon as they could. Non-medical people are shocked when they hear it took all day to arrange the transfer, but it was not the hospital or ambulance service that took so long. It seems everybody in the northland decided to have a heart attack that weekend and Wausau was slammed with patients. They could not authorize her transfer until they had a bed for her. I can’t imagine being in the same situation with her background – as her heart attack progressed, she was well aware of exactly what her symptoms were and what kind of damage was being done. I got a brief phone message from her early Sunday morning after she was settled in at the Wausau hospital. When we connected by phone closer to noon, she said they had her in que for the cath lab but with the volume of patients on hand, she wasn’t sure if they would do her procedure Sunday or Monday. By early afternoon, I was on the way south.
Late Sunday afternoon they confirmed her trip to the cath lab would take place ‘sometime Monday’. With the type of sedation they used, she has a vivid recall of everything they did during her procedure. She said the team worked like a well oiled machine finding (and then stenting) the 99 percent blockage of the artery commonly known as ‘The Widowmaker’. The surgeon commented the rest of the vessels were ‘clean’ with no signs of long-term cardiac disease – her blockage was more likely in response to ‘a recent inflammatory event to her pulmonary system’. The relatively mild case of COVID 19 my wife had in October 2022 might qualify as that ‘recent inflammatory event’. He also commented that being in excellent physical health (she frequently walks and swims) no doubt worked in her favor and helped her survive the Widowmaker. The unit nurses concurred and told her they had been seeing similar cases in normally healthy patients half her age. The medical books will have more to say about the effects of ‘long COVID’ as studies are done in the future. There is still much to learn about this world altering pandemic.
After the stent was done, the unit nurses kidded her that they would like to just keep her around for a couple of weeks to hear more stories about her RN adventures. Being poked and prodded every few hours for four days isn’t exactly restful, but my wife thoroughly enjoyed talking shop with her nurses. Christine has always made it a habit to ‘see people’ so anyone who dropped by with a food tray or to clean her room got to share their stories with her. Without talking to him, how would we have known the guy sweeping the floor had just returned from a trip to Nashville where he got to enjoy the sites and sounds of ‘Music City’?
By the time all the exit interviews were done and I had visited the pharmacy at the other end of the building for her prescriptions, it was late afternoon. During an abortive attempt to find a coffee shop for some road snacks (someday I will come clean about my driving adventures in Wausau), we decided to head north and pick up something in Merrill. As we headed back to the freeway, she looked out the window and asked, “Why are all these weirdos walking around in costumes?” I knew she was running low on energy from the lack of sleep and the physical toll the heart attack had taken on her because my wife does not normally describe other people as ‘weirdos’. We had a good laugh when I reminded her that it was Halloween. Four days in the hospital can disrupt one’s sense of time.
There is a long road ahead as she goes through cardiac rehab. So far she is making good progress and is taking it a day at a time. We had a joyful Thanksgiving at home and have eased back into some normal church activities. Our Christmas gift to ourselves was to get back to doing our cat care shifts at the Ontonagon County Animal Protection shelter (OCAP) starting on Christmas Day. Looking back, Christine says she was calm during her ER and hospital stay because she knew God would see her through whatever came next. We are thankful she survived and postponed her joyous Heavenly journey – apparently there are still things in this life He needs her to accomplish.
While I do not subscribe to Facebook, I do occasionally check out the postings on some of the local community sites. One thread of discussion that comes up from time to time is the local hospital. Yes, I know everyone has different experiences, perceptions, and opinions of our local medical facility, but we are thankful to have them here. Privacy laws do not allow those employed at the hospital to respond when someone has a gripe or refers to the facility as a ‘band aid station’. I can say without hesitation that there are many who owe their lives to the skilled care they received here. Our local hospital isn’t as primitive as a M.A.S.H. unit (as some would like to believe), but the care patients receive before being transported elsewhere is also top notch. My wife is a retired R.N. and a long serving member of the SONCO ambulance board. I have always known what skilled care is available in our area and my wife’s recent medical event has underscored my opinion.
The rest of the year’s excitement (for me, anyway) revolved around our efforts to locate a new home frequency for the school radio station, WOAS-FM. While not a life altering event like my wife’s medical journey, this pretty well consumed my time from mid-April until mid-October of this year. If you haven’t been following this mini-drama, it began in the spring of 2022 when we were notified that a Class A non-commercial radio group in Marquette had bought our 88.5 FM frequency at a Federal Communications Commission auction in November of 2021. Five months after the fact, I received an email from that group explaining the purchase. I had only two questions: “Why 88.5 (which we have occupied for 45 years)? You sent us a list of the (many) other frequencies available for us to apply for, but why didn’t you apply for one of them instead of 88.5?” (See FTV: WOAS – Where Are You Now – 9-6-23 for the full story.)
Eventually, they did send an involved description of how they use their translator stations to cover the Upper Peninsula, but the only answer they gave us (‘why 88.5?’) was, “Our consultant said it was the best one for us.” They said, “We thought the FCC would notify you of this purchase,” but a competent consultant would have been aware that the FCC does not do this. We contacted the FCC to find out the details we had not been aware of in regard to Class A stations being able to take over the frequency for a Class D non-commercial station like ours. It was the FCC who provided us with the help we needed to plan a path forward to keep WOAS on the air.
Again, as I followed the Facebook chatter, it was interesting to read how people took sides on this story. Many blamed the FCC, but it was not their doing – as I said above, they have been tremendously helpful. Due to the religious nature of the broadcast group that bought our frequency, some wanted to make it a debate about religion. As I have been deeply involved with church matters my whole life (for heaven’s sake I am married to a church organist), I can assure you that this was nothing more than a business deal. As I have explained previously, I am not a professional radio person. I inherited the manager’s position here in 1997 and (as the 88.5 drama illustrates) there is still a lot for me to learn about the business of running a radio station. I have been fortunate to have knowledgeable people around me who have helped every step of the way.
Someone pointed out that the Marquette group, “Delayed taking over 88.5 so [WOAS] would have time to find a new home.” The truth be told, we fully expected to be off the channel by the summer of 2022 but they kept putting off their construction for a variety of reasons. Yes, they did offer us help in the form of a used transmitter, but by then we had already moved on. Applying for our own Class A license when an application window opens is one option before us. They seemed surprised when we said, “Thanks, but no thanks – we have a plan and will continue to broadcast at 88.5 while we apply for a new frequency.” If they do not follow through by February of 2025, we may not have to move at all (but of course, we can’t wait until then to find out). Applying for a Class A license will secure our spot on the dial wherever WOAS lands. We have had several folks involved in the radio biz offer to help us move forward and at present Todd from commonfrequency.org is working on our frequency search.
Back in April, it became apparent we would need to purchase a new 100 watt transmitter. This made sense because we would need to broadcast at 100 watts to be considered for a Class A license. Our old transmitter had failed back in the fall of 2020 and having spent more than $800 to ship it to San Diego for repairs, we began to question how much shelf life it had left. Back then and under those circumstances (with the COVID 19 pandemic causing disruptions in everyone’s lives) we could not justify running a fundraiser to repair the transmitter. We explained our problem in the newspaper and simply said, “If you have any spare change you could donate to the cause, we will try to get back on the air ASAP.” Within three weeks, our loyal listeners and readers had sent enough donations to cover the transmitter repair and a couple of bills that had accumulated during the six weeks we were off the air.
In April of 2023, it was apparent the school district was also having financial troubles that would carry into the next school year. Our request for $3,000 for a new transmitter was denied with a suggestion that we could pursue some sort of fundraising on our own. We again turned to our supporters, explained the problem and our plan for the future in the local press, and then hoped for the best. The first donation arrived in less than a week. A local donor who wished to remain anonymous sent us a note of encouragement (calling WOAS a ‘true community asset’) and a check for $1,000. Others followed suit and we had met our goal, again within three weeks of reaching out to the public.
At the time, I thought, “Wow, we got it covered quicker than I ever imagined,” The day after we passed $2,000 in donations, I got a call from John Carlisle at the Detroit Free Press. John explained he would be in town near the end of the month and wondered if he could do an article about the station. John said, “Maybe it will help with your fundraising.” When I gave him the good news about us nearing our goal, he simply said, “Well, you can always use more, right? Besides, it would still make a good story.”
The day John and photographer Ryan Garza visited the school was chronicled after the Freep article went to print on July 13, 2023, so I won’t rehash the whole story here (see FTV: Free Press Visit 8-2-12). Let me say it was an enjoyable experience watching these two veteran news hounds at work. Little did I know the wide-spread coverage we would receive from the article. The extra donations generated by the Free Press article allowed us to expand the improvements we needed to make in the studio. The article also produced three more contacts we had no way of anticipating when we first mentioned our need to fundraise back in April.
The first was a call from a showrunner on Mitch Albom’s WJR 760 AM radio show in Detroit. He arranged for me to do a ten minute on air interview with Mitch and his partner. It was a lot of fun talking about school radio stations and how they serve as a conduit to get a lot of young people (including Mitch Albom) into the business. The second contact was from a lawyer named Dan Makarski who has ties to the Ontonagon area and still summers here. He offered to post our story to his network of colleagues and friends. Little did I realize that when I said, “Sure, that would be great,” we would soon be getting checks from law firms and other ‘friends of Dan’ from all over Michigan. By the end of September, our war chest had grown to over $19,000.
In a recent FTV (Selling Mags 12-13-23), I explained why fundraising has never been one of my favorite endeavors. When the whole 88.5 drama began, I was at first confused, and then angry. After researching a path forward, I became less angry and more resigned to the fact that fundraising was going to have to happen whether those skills were in my wheelhouse or not. It now appears we were handed the ‘golden goose’ of fundraising opportunities and have been gob-smacked by the generosity and good wishes extended to WOAS-FM in our time of need – I can only say ‘thank you’ over and over.
John Carlisle’s article brought another unexpected contact that set in motion yet another amazing event tied to the 88.5 story and the local area. Kinjal Patel from NBC Universal in New York City called to ask me some questions about WOAS-FM. At the end of the conversation (again, I will refer readers to FTV: NBC that was published in the Ontonagon Herald on 11-22-23 and can be found on our web site at www.woas-fm.org), Kinjal said, “I see this as a ‘feel good story’ and I want to pitch it to our team to see if we can do a feature about WOAS.” One thing led to another and as the FTV: NBC article chronicles, we had a wonderful time hosting a film crew from NY and Chicago. Their story aired on the NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt on Nov 9, 2023 and an expanded version can be found by searching for WOAS on YouTube. In the wake of my wife’s heart attack, I am still getting emails from Kinjal and Ramon (the field producer) inquiring about her health and how things are going in Ontonagon.
We had one set back in November when we lost the audio feed to our website. Our broadcast board had taken a lightning strike in 2010 that required us to replace the right half of the computer board that controls the studio monitors and earphones. As we worked on the problem, the solution became obvious: if there are a cascade of failures about to happen (typical for electronic devices that get fried by lightning), then it is time to replace the broadcast board. Thanks to the generosity already previously alluded to, we have the resources to do just that!
Indeed, 2023 has left me with a bucketful of things to be thankful for. My wife, Christine, is still here and recovering – the list topper for sure. Secondarily, an event that started on such a down note in 2022 turned out to be one that produced positives in the hundreds (if not thousands, dollar-wise) of ways. As an educator, I always said, “You can learn something new and expand your horizons every day.” I must say that 2023 did that and much, much more. Thank you, 2023 (and to everyone who participated in it) for making the year one for the books.
Top Piece Video – Could not help but end the year with a joyous romp courtesy of Sly and the Family Stone – Have a great new year!