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C       2 4  To Today 1979– You’re listening to Wisconsin Public Radio. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, WHA and the state stations moved more toward NPR programming. In January 1979, the organizational title Wisconsin Public Radio was adopted, a more marketable name than state stations, Wisconsin Educational Radio Network, or Wisconsin State Broadcasting Service. Two major developments occurred in late 1979. On November 5 National Public Radio unveiled Morning Edition as a morning drive-time companion to the afternoon program All Things Considered. That same month NPR began using the Westar IV satellite to distribute its programs instead of the land line loop in use since 1971. WPR activated its satellite receiver on December 13.1 Still, the development of local programs continued. One of the most notable was Simply Folk, which debuted in January 1979. In the 1970s the state network had carried some NPR folk offerings and a program called Kicking the Dog Around, produced at WLFM in Appleton. WHA had also produced a ninepart series called Canadian Folk Songs that aired in 1970. In 1978 WHA aired a local program called Simple Folk, the brainchild of producer Tom MartinErickson . For Simply Folk he was joined by producer Becca Pulliam. She had earlier coproduced a series called Women-Made Music. When Pulliam took a leave of absence in 1980, Judy Rose joined the program and remained after Pulliam’s temporary return. Rose took over as the solo host of the program after Martin-Erickson became the network’s operations director (he returned as program host after Rose’s retirement in 2005). Rose also produced a series for incorporation in the program that drew on the recordings that folklorist Helene Stratman-Thomas had collected in the 1940s as part of a project for the University of Wisconsin and the Library of Congress. The new thirteen-part series, 302 The Wisconsin Patchwork, remastered the original 1940s recordings and was funded in part by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.2 At its peak Simply Folk was on both Saturday and Sunday evenings, and over the years the program recorded and aired hundreds of live folk performances from venues throughout the Midwest. In March 1979 the network’s program guide listed the first on-air underwriters , short verbal statements acknowledging financial support from businesses and foundations. While some special programs had corporate support in earlier years, these underwriters were for the regular program schedule. Two of the underwriters from the first group remain supporters of WPR: American Family Insurance and the owners of Paisan’s and Porta Bella restaurants in Madison.3 A format added in the late 1970s would become a central part of the WPR service: call-in/interview programs. The network had made some attempts at the format earlier. Starting in November 1967, a Saturday morning program called Colloquy featured university administrators and faculty members who fielded questions phoned in by listeners,4 and the program ran through May 1968. That fall, some on-air candidate interviews included call-in segments, with distant listeners told to call collect.5 WHA producer John Powell, who would become a state government reporter for WPR, also took calls from listeners during some weekend public affairs programs from Radio Hall in mid1972 .6 Starting in September 1975, WHA had also carried American Issues Radio Forum, a National Public Radio call-in program that aired once a month on Saturdays.7 The program was later carried on the entire state network. Listeners could also call in to a special series of programs over WHA for Health Week in November 1975. The first regular statewide offering featuring the present-day call-in/interview format debuted on Sunday June 5, 1977.This public affairs program was called Wisconsin Issues Forum and was hosted by Richard Wexler. The show was originally one hour, noon to 1 p.m., and soon expanded to 12:15 to 2 p.m., and, later, to 10 a.m. to noon on Saturdays. The serious tone of the program was set from the outset: the first topic was “Public Employees: Should They Have the Right to Strike?” The other programs that first month looked at the taxation and regulation of mining in Wisconsin, the state’s right-to-privacy laws, and the juvenile justice system.8 In April 1978 Wexler had the two candidates for state supreme court on the air, in the tradition of WHA’s Political Education Forum. Another...

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