We all know this story. Public media’s traditional programming has a waning appeal to younger audiences (part of the largest generation in U.S. history).
Finances are a mess, station operators and networks face accusations of political bias, NPR has a revolving door of senior leadership, and activists in Congress are calling for defunding us. Are these today’s headlines? Nope. Try 50 years ago.
Then, against that familiar litany of challenges, a small group of bold programmers charted a path to growth that we still follow today.
At NPR, Bill Siemering wrote a bold mission statement that put audience service at the center of programming decisions and launched “All Things Considered” (ATC) at a moment when “radio news” equated to “two minutes at the top of the hour.”
At WNET, Joan Ganz Cooney insisted that children’s programming could be more than the cartoony violence of Tom and Jerry; it could blend academic research and thoughtful production to prepare kids for school.
At WQED, Fred Rogers produced a quiet little show about feelings — and gave a powerful, passionate defense of public funding for public broadcasting.
AT WGBH, Russ Morash, who died on June 20 at 88, combined unusual characters — a 6'2" former OSS operative who could teach the mysteries of French cuisine and a master carpenter with a nearly impenetrable Woonsocket accent — with cutting-edge production tools to invent the “how-to” programming category. Today, we rightly venerate those three (and many others).
That adulation politely ignores a truth. At the time, the media establishment thought they were crazy. Some educators and psychologists insisted that television could never effectively teach young children; it could only expose them to shallow pop culture. Deep South racists derided Sesame Street for showing an integrated neighborhood and Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood for daring to show an African American police officer dipping his overheated feet into Fred’s wading pool. An NPR board member commented on “All Things Considered,” “Our child has been born, and it is ugly.”
Memories like that sometimes elicit a chuckle from Siemering. He’s 90 now and long since retired — but an active listener and observer of the media scene. He’s also someone who freely shares insights with college classes and foundation leaders. To him, the solutions for today’s challenges are much the same as when ATC launched in 1971 — start with the audiences’ needs.
“We wanted to have the country hear itself and create a sense of community,” he recalls, “and not be driven by the other standards that NBC and CBS had.”
For 1971 NPR, it meant letting pieces run to unheard-of lengths (four minutes!) and putting women on the air to cover hard news. At the time, the bosses “felt women could do the soft features — but they didn’t have the authority” to cover Congress or the Supreme Court. Tell that to Cokie Roberts and Nina Totenberg.
To his ears, many of today’s troubles can be traced to a certain sameness — “the conventional stuff that you hear, which can be quite boring.”
“The bigger you get, the more inhibited you are in trying anything new. ... It’s harder for NPR to be fun and playful than it was then.” That was the magic of public media in that more creative time, and there are still flashes of it today.
Siemering says, “I was in the food co-op the other day with my NPR cap on, and a young Black man in the produce department came up to me and said, ‘Oh — that’s a good company. They have the Tiny Desk Concert!’”
His point? Tiny Desk’s underproduced but utterly authentic showcase reaches different audiences in unexpected ways — building loyalties that traditional broadcasts can’t.
Siemering doesn’t offer a litany of solutions to today’s challenges. “If I had the total answer, I’d be a consultant,” he laughs. But he still finds power in a line he wrote in the original NPR mission statement: “National Public Radio will not regard its audience as a ‘market’ or in terms of its disposable income, but as curious, complex individuals who are looking for some understanding, meaning and joy in the human experience.”
Then, as now, the answer starts with a deep understanding of the audience — not just the existing listeners and viewers — but the tens of millions we could reach if we met them where they are.
Those problems we face today — persistent layoffs, declining membership and aging audiences — won’t be solved by retreating to the familiar. Of all the hand-wringing after this spring’s Uri Berlinger kerfuffle, the criticism that resonates with me is “We’re too cautious.”
“Focusing on the core” and “returning to audio excellence” do nothing to expand our appeal beyond the white, wealthy, suburban and aging traditional public broadcasting audiences. The solution lies in understanding and serving the needs of millennials and Gen Z (the two largest generations in U.S. history) — people who are used to finding what they want (on-demand content that does not mimic traditional broadcasts) when and where they want it (streaming on a wide array of devices).
That means finding this century’s versions of Siemering, Cooney and Morash and, more importantly, giving them the support and air cover they need. That’s true even when traditionalists declare that it’s crazy.
Tom Davidson is professor of practice in media entrepreneurship at the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications, Penn State University, and was a longtime journalist, business leader and product developer in commercial and public media. He can be reached at tgd@tgdavidson.com.
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