READER COMMENTS: DOES PACIFICA’S “STINK” MAKE THEIR ARCHIVES WORTHLESS?

COMMENT ONE: VALUE OF THE PACIFICA ARCHIVES

Earlier this week we carried a story about the resignation of Sam Agarwal who was Treasurer for Pacifica Radio. Agarwal resigned from the embattled organization with a memo that said, in part:

…with each passing day, [bankruptcy] may be the only option left because of dysfunction in the Board, mismanagement and failure of leadership.

In the article I speculated on the impact of bankruptcy on the fate of Pacifica’s archives. In his/her comment, the Anonymous reader said the archives are worth nothing because of Pacifica’s damaged image:

I don’t see how the Archives are worth a single penny at this point. There is not a university in the land that would be crazy enough to touch anything associated with Pacifica with a ten-foot pole.

Universities are businesses, and they have images and reputations to protect. Even if they could legally and operationally take wholesale ownership of the Archives, they’d HAVE to know that the vast sea of crazies associated with Pacifica would endlessly make the University’s life hell for one reason or another.

Whoever ends up with legal control over the Archives will immediately face endless lawsuits about it. At least with the FM licenses, you could take them over, change the locks and post security.

KEN SAYS: I don’t buy the premise that the “stink” of Pacifica’s brand would keep a university, museum or a private collector from acquiring Pacifica’s archives. The historical merit of the priceless audio in the archives is not diminished by what Pacifica has become. Except for people in the biz like you and me, there is little awareness of Pacifica today.  Regarding the claim that …the vast sea of crazies associated with Pacifica would endlessly make the University’s life hell, a future owner of the archives would not have an obligation to anyone at Pacifica, assuming Pacifica even still existed.

The person who sent the comment is right, though, about the value of the station licenses. In September 2015 [link] I asked a friend of mine who is a media property broker for an outside opinion about the value of Pacifica’s five FCC licenses. The chart on the right from 2015 has the projected “stick value” of the stations.

COMMENT TWO: HYPING A STATION FEW CAN RECEIVE DOESN'T WORK

Every once in a while I get a comment on one of my older posts. This comment provided additional information about WAJC, a Christian noncom on the edge of the Twin Cities. There were two posts.  The first was posted on July 8, 2015 [link] and the follow up was posted on December 3, 2015 [link].

The posts tell the story of the Kevin and Jill Riche who dreamed of owning a Contemporary Christian (CCM) radio station in the Twin Cities. Kevin and Jill come from a Christian broadcasting family.  Jill is the daughter of the late Dr. Walter Martin, The Original Bible Answer Man, a well-known syndicated personality from the 1950s and 1960s.

Kevin and Jill applied for and won the FCC license and signed as The Remnant. Things didn’t work out so well for one major reason: WAJC covered only a thin slice of the Twin Cities metro. Though The Remnant was promoted as a “full power Minneapolis metro station” but reality proved this claim was total bullshit. They wound up selling WAJC for pennies. The reader’s comment extends the story:

NOTE THE SKYLINE OF MINNEAPOLIS IN THE LOGO

The Remnant’s [programming came from] a Northwestern student radio station (same college that runs KTIS). As soon as WAJC signed on even the kids at the school couldn’t pick it up.

It took years for this thing to sign on, and from pre-hype comments it was clear they had no idea what to do with it and no idea how to run a station. It was doomed from the start. - A church in Forest Lake bought it, which is another exurban town NORTH of the Cities. They can’t even get the station in their own city.

Dr. Walter Martin died in 1989. Sadly, since then he has had no ability to prevent or weigh in on the things done in his name. The efforts of the [Kevin and Jill Riche], although carefully packaged in the name of Walter Martin, never existed prior to his death, and are fully the products of their own dreams and aspirations.

COMMENT THREE: THE VOICE YOU HEARD WAS THE GREAT NORMAN ROSE

During the week of Thanksgiving I re-posted [link] the National Lampoon’s radio skit “Deteriorata,” a parody of Les Crane's 1971 spoken-word recording of Desiderata, a popular record at the time. I mentioned most of the cast and crew of the National Lampoon Radio Hour but I failed to name the voice on the hilarious parody. 

Then I got this comment from my friends at Kill Ugly Radio [link]:

Read by the great Norman Rose.

Norman Rose

KEN SAYS: Right as rain! Norman Rose was a legendary actor who was known as “the Voice of God.” In fact, Rose actually played God (the voice at least) in Woody Allen’s 1975 comedy film Love and Death. His voice also appeared in countless sci-fi films.