This is a first person account of a really unique experience on the day Kennedy was shot. Its by John Alexander. He posted it on his status page, but when I tried to share it I couldnt due to some setting he didnt realize he had that kept me from sharing. I asked him if it would be ok to pass it on this way and he was delighted that I asked. THIS IS HOW KNOXVILLE LEARNED ABOUT WHAT WAS GOING ON BEFORE A LOT OF OTHERS DID. HERES WHAT JOHN WROTE: When President Kennedy was shot: I was at work at Scripps-Howard radio station WNOX in Knoxville, Tn where Id recently been promoted to News Director. Ive never heard wire service bells sound as frantic. Everyone within ear-shot of the wire service room ran toward it. The Program Director and I looked at the bulletin that cleared the United Press International newspaper wire as the bells went off again.This time it was the UPI radio wire reporting the same flash. We were in disbelief. I dont recall any words being spoken that are repeatable. I do remember glancing at the Associated Press wires. They were silent on this subject. Well, having made a snap decision, I immediately tore off the UPI short report, and rushed to the studio to interrupt the programming. By the time Id finished reading to bulletin over the air, the Program Director had established a phone connection with a station in Houston. All lines were jammed into Dallas. Houston was his next try. Hed worked in that city and had contacts at the leading news station. His instincts were right. The Houston station had been lucky and was in phone contact with a Dallas station. For the rest of the afternoon, we supplemented our wire service coverage with eyewitness accounts gathered by the Dallas station, fed to the Houston station, who relayed them to us. At that time United Press International was owned by the newspaper giant Scripps-Howard who also owned WNOX. UPI had an audio news-feed network that was fed to subscribing affiliates all over the country. UPI-Audio had no luck getting through to Dallas and no Dallas affiliate had called them. So as our relayed Dallas reports came in another of our reporters stayed on the phone with UPI-AUDIO feeding these accounts to them so they could get the stories to other affiliates throughout the country. This was the circuit traveled before many Americans listening to their favorite radio stations at home or in their cars or at work got the news: Originating in Dallas, fed to Houston, fed to Knoxville, fed to New York, fed to all UPI Radio affiliates. That kept up until the wee hours of the next morning. UPI had scooped Associated Press with the actual news of the Presidents shooting because Senior White House correspondent Merriman Smith with UPI, riding in the press pool car not far behind the Presidents limo, dove from the backseat for the car telephone mounted on the front center floor hump before the AP reporter, who was sitting in the front seat next to the phone, could react. A few years later when I was working in radio-TV in Washington DC I had the privilege of having lunch with Merriman Smith. He was nearing retirement. I persuaded him to talk about that day and how he scored the biggest scoop of his long, distinguished, professional career. Yes, there was a hefty struggle to pry the phone from Smittys locked hand, but to no avail. I have many memories from my broadcasting career. None are as sad those November 1963 recollections.
Posted on: Sat, 23 Nov 2013 03:23:34 +0000
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