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TV-Chain Headquartered HereHalf Willson Spent OnImprovements atby Lucille RogersThe new KMOM-TV,manager ofChannel 9.wasted no time in adopting Texas-style thinking.Frank Lokey says he considers Monahans “the hub of operations in a 500-mlle radius.Lokey came here two months ago from Bangor, Maine and seemingly climbed into the saddle like a hopped-up cowboy taking on a corral of broncs. For he has made several immediate changes in operations, programming and equipment replacements. Even while continuing the interview for this story, the agile manager kept one eye on thetelevision monitor, answered a long-distance phone call and pondered a network program change on which an imm nent decision had to be made.KMOM-TVwas purchased a little over one year ago by Grayson Enterprises, Inc. The owners recently decided to consolidate some of their operations in West iexas and plan to make Monahans the central headquarters for their stations in BigSpring, Abilene and I ub-boc k.The MOM” on the end of the call letters doesn’t indicate a mother image; it represents Monahans. Odessa and Midland and in that order.Grayson Enterprises, Inc. is a subsidiary of another corporation headquarteredin Dallas. The man at the top is Theodore “Teddy Shanbaum, a next - door neighbor of fellow multi-m'Uionaire Ross Perot.The station employs between 30 to 35 persons ifyou count supplementarypersonnel in Odessa, Lubbock and Dallas. About 75per cent of those working at the Monahans site are Ward County residents. Lokey estimated equipment and property investment here at better than $1 1/2 million. On a quick tour of facilities, he pointed at one color camerawhich in itself$90,000.costsEver wonder why reception sometimes varies according to weatherchanges? Lokey says this is one of the sample problems he has encountered since his arrival. Reception in West Texas is verysusceptible to sudden dropsin temperature and ofthese weathercourse,conditions are very com mon in our immediate area.Since Monahans receivesits signals from microwave relay stations to the northof us, weather changes uparound Amarillo or Lubbock affect television reception here.Even our native sandhills come in for blame on poor reception. During periods of high temperatures, Lokey says heat rising from the sandcreates difficulties such as fogging. But he says this has been corrected to a very great degree with some of the newly installedequipment.Lokey even indulged in some Texas bragging (he claims the prerogativesince he is a Texan by birth) . . . “We have truer color on Channel 9 than any of our competitors because we operate on avery high color band videowhereas they are on a very low band.Channel 9 viewers are urged to turn their antennas towards the transm'tter’s Notrees location rather than towards the studio location. This is confusing to many, Lokey said, but he suggests that viewers should note much better color and picture reception if they will position their antenna correctly.Also improved quality in the picture should be evident in view of equipment changes. He says more than $l/2-million was spent just replacing burned-out tubes at the transmitter site in recent months.Having lived exclusively in more metropolitan areas prior to moving here, the bachelor-manager admitted to some adapting problems but said he finds the job “challenging and is tremendously impressed with the growth possibilities ofthis area. Some of the extremes and remotenessarea were im-on him immed-of thispressed lately upon his arrival.« «FSenilthlt;FIpi,PagrurfoHi54Rlt;.v.v..*.v.viI couldn’t believe we had no telephone hookup to our transmitter site... but learned it was impossible because the cost of stringing wire to the location was prohibitive.Lokey solved the problem by installing two-way radio communication andisforCo10SU|tertiost aofseuniea18.sictheHi;attorPrgrarchm:Juagmlt;mobile phones.
Newspaper Details
Monahans News
Monahans, Texas, US
Thu, May 07, 1970
Page 1
Full Page
Clipped by
Sammi B.
NA 22 Nov 2022
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Monahans News
