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Articles about Prometheus National Political Radio Host Offers Advice for St. Regis Students 
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| National Political Radio Host Offers Advice for St. Regis Students |
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National political radio host offers advice for St. Regis students by John Q. Murray Just as Mineral County commissioners were launching the lengthy public process to approve the final $6,000 in equipment for the St. Regis low-power FM community radio station, the host of a syndicated national radio show came through town on his Montana vacation. Bruce DuMont, host for the past 25 years of the political discussion show "Beyond the Beltway," bumped into Nicholas Schwaderer and family at Frostie's. Nick is the senior who has almost single-handedly brought the St. Regis High LPFM station to life, and who participated in the 2005 Montana legislative session as a Senate page. Because Nick was wearing a White Sox cap, and because Bruce is a season ticket holder at U.S. Cellular Field, they started talking baseball, and the conversation soon grew to include radio and politics—"the three things I like most in life," Bruce said. The Chronicle caught up with Bruce last Friday back at his home base in Chicago, where in addition to his weekly radio show he is also president of The Museum of Broadcast Communications. Did Bruce have any advice for Nick and for other St. Regis students who may be looking at radio as a career? the Chronicle asked. "The first thing is to find out what your passion is," Bruce said. "Granted, you need the base education and you have to be able to speak well, but you need to have some area of expertise that really enthuses you. Sports, weather, politics, drama—whatever the discipline is, you then hone those skills at the local radio station." The industry has changed considerably since he began back in the 1960s, he noted. With many stations being nationally programmed, there aren’t as many opportunities to break in through the local markets. But young broadcasters still have the opportunity to work on their skills at college radio stations. And some lucky students, such as Nick, even have that opportunity at the high school level, he noted. Bruce's particular passion was politics and political discussion. "When I was a young boy, my father would drive me to school every day," he recalled. "We would listen to the morning show, 'Paul Harvey News and Comment.' Before I would get out of the car, we would go back and forth and talk about things that Paul Harvey had talked about or I would ask questions about a comment he had made on the air. My father was very politically astute and loved politics," he said. "The principal bonding experience in my life with my father was listening to Paul Harvey in the front seat of the 1948 Plymouth." That not only sharpened his thinking skills, and his ability to talk politics on his feet, but it also launched a lifelong love for the medium of radio. When in college in 1966, Bruce started his broadcast career doing play-by-play sports for a Chicago semi-pro football team. He then became a producer at WGN before deciding in 1973 to do more on-air work. He went to WLTD, a small 1000-watt station in the Chicago suburb of Evanston, where he launched the show "I Am Curious Radio." "It was basically a question-and-answer show where you could call up and ask any question. My co-host and I would either have the answer or try to find the answer. It was a light and fun Saturday morning program," he said. Bruce also hosted a weekly talk program, which became a daily show, and then got syndicated. But it was that passion for politics that was the most important in helping his career take off from there, he said. In 1989, he started a program on Chicago public radio called "Inside Politics." The name changed to "Beyond the Beltway" when it was offered for national syndication in 1994. "The philosophy of the show is much like the name of the show—Beyond the Beltway—what people are talking about all over the country that isn't sent through the filter of the Washington, D.C. press corps or press mindset," Bruce explained. People can watch all the Sunday morning talking-head shows to get the official version of events from Washington, but on "Beyond the Beltway," the American people get a chance to talk back to the talking heads, he said. "The American people driving and listening in their homes from coast to coast get a chance to share their thoughts, their views, their passion about the issues of the day," he said. "I try to bring together three bright, passionate people every Sunday night from a wide variety of the political spectrum. Then we take calls. We can have a farmer in Idaho talking to someone driving down the highway in Maine. That's what makes radio great—to be able to connect people," he said. In some ways, our political discussion has become polluted in recent years, and many so-called political discussion shows have degraded into shouting matches. But over the last 25 years, Bruce DuMont has gained respect as one who has tried to keep civility and respect in public discourse. "I try to do my part in just doing the show every Sunday," he said. "The name of my show is also my personal philosophy, that political life and political discussion should be about all people from all walks of life, in all regions of the country, coming together to lower their voices and engage in conversation. It's sometimes lively, sometimes heated, but in the spirit of passion and respect, not hyperbole and personal attack." The show doesn't feature the usual suspects. Although there is the occasional famous person, that isn’t what makes it unique or special. That comes from the real people with real passion, calling in and offering their own perspectives, he said. The program is available to residents in western Montana through Spokane’s WXLY as well as through the Internet. The site www.beyondthebeltway.com offers streaming audio of the current and archived programs. The show is now heard in 65 cities all over the United States from the ABC 50,000-watt affiliate in Chicago, WLS—the same radio station on which he once listened with his father to Paul Harvey. "Paul Harvey was on the ABC radio network on WLS, and forty-plus years later, I'm talking politics on WLS," he said. In his day job as president of the Museum of Broadcast Communications, Bruce has become good friends with Paul Harvey. Paul and his wife Angel and son Paul Jr., a producer and creator of "The Rest of the Story," represent the first family of American radio, and all have been inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame, he pointed out. One of his great thrills, Bruce said, is having had the opportunity to fill in occasionally for Paul Harvey over the last 15 years. In considering the singular influence that Paul Harvey had on him and a whole generation of broadcasters, he considered the power of the medium. "I don’t think people on the radio have a full grasp of the influence they have and the power of their voice and their power of their persona to inspire people and to encourage them," Bruce said. "Most people on the radio don't get it. Or if they knew about it as young broadcasters, they tend to lose it and don't really grasp it as their careers mature. You sometimes forget that thousands of people, or hundreds of thousands of people, or in the case of Paul Harvey, that millions of people—are listening to every word you utter." Bruce had fond memories of his time in Montana, hitting an Osprey game in Missoula, and staying six days at the Isaak Walton Inn just outside Glacier National Park. As an added bonus, he ran into a transplanted Chicagoan running a Chicago hot dog stand in downtown Missoula. He is hoping to pick up an Montana affiliate that will broadcast Beyond the Beltway, so that he can return here to originate a show. And if he does, Nick Schwaderer is welcome to come help, he said. He is also welcome to help at the Chicago studios if he attends a university in the Chicago area, Bruce said. Mineral County commissioners recently started the public comment period for a proposal by the St. Regis station to acquire the last needed equipment, an encoder that would be used to connect to the federal emergency broadcast system. Last_revision_7/18/2005_13:46 |
