The photo with David Witherspoon, Paul Montgomery and Fred Fletcher was probably taken in the late 50s or early 60s. Fred was the President of WRAL-TV, Paul was the legendary “Uncle Paul,” and David Witherspoon was WRAL-TV’s first Promotions and Public Relations Director. These guys used to perform live on television all the time and this was an example.
Over the last ten years or so various CBC employees have worked to gather materials and information about CBC history. Among them – legends like former CBC Vice Presidents Paul Pope and the late Ben Waters. Upon his return to CBC last year, now Corporate Director of Special Projects John Harris took over the job and he’s leading the effort to create a website devoted entirely to CBC’s history.
Some of the major steps of the project are already underway. Last fall we sent off more than a thousand legacy videotapes to a company in Atlanta that specializes in transferring old media to digital files. We just received 650 files back containing everything from old children’s programming to long-forgotten interviews and specials.
We’re working with a web design company now to create the look and functionality of the history site.
“The history site will be laid out in four general content categories: People, Programs, Community Involvement and Technology,” explained Harris. “CBC has some wonderful stories to tell in all those areas.”
We’ve been recording “Oral History” interviews with former employees who can tell the CBC story from a first-hand perspective. We plan to shoot a lot more of these in the months to come.
“The history site will be a living, breathing database of content that we’ll update and build on into the future. CBC covers history in the making every day, so this is just a starting point for a wonderful archive that will continue to grow.”
We’re gathering old photos, scripts, documents and mementos from anyone who has them. If you have anything you can contribute, please contact John Harris at jharris@cbc-raleigh.com.
“It’s been exciting to work on the CBC History project. It’s a great fit for an old WRAL News Director who loves history and storytelling.”
Stay tuned for progress on this important step in archiving and preserving CBC’s history.
