Scribe: Bruce Pacht
In attendance: A guy who looked and sounded an awful lot like Dan Nash who said that after Covid, he’d lost the habit of attending: here’s hoping he will get re-hooked.
Also, Jim Damren, Tim Guaraldi, Phil Rentz, Cal Wolfe, Phil Bush, John Yacavone, Marion Steiner, Ernst Oidtmann, Rich Wallace, Dean Cashman, Dave Crandall, Bill Secord, Bill Babineau. (I apologize if I missed others.)
- President Dave opened the meeting around noon.
- 4-Way Test of the Things We Think Say or Do was recited by Bill Babineau.
- Singing the Rotary “Welcome Song” and “Skip To My Lou” were led by Ernst Oidtmann tickling the ivories.
- President Dave regaled us with the terrible pun of the day.
After lunch, we listened to an exciting and interesting speaker: Jim Schachter, President and CEO of New Hampshire Public Radio
Jim studied journalism at Columbia University in New York City, where he then worked in public radio. He and his wife live in Concord now.
Jim has come to appreciate lunchtime Rotary during the four years he’s been at NHPR, though the 7 a.m. Rotaries are a strain on his system.
NHPR has many sponsors in the Lebanon area. They did a feature recently on Lalo’s Tacos. His VP of audience strategy (how to turn listeners into supporters) is from the Upper Valley.
New Hampshire Public Radio is dedicated to providing independent journalism rooted in community, trustworthy news, and information that is as vital as clean air and water.
In NH, we have 70% fewer reporters and editors than in 2000. The resulting decline in local reporting has coincided with the rise of the Internet dominated by ideologically driven sources. Most television and social media sources feed us content that reinforces our worst instincts and rewards our biases, supporting ideas that we already adopted regardless of whether they are the truth. The business model for most for-profit “news” entities is to get as many eyeballs on as many ads as possible to make as much money as possible. This business model contains little incentive to weed out falsehoods.
NHPR is mission driven. In order to understand complex issues of the economy, education, housing, childcare and others, society needs a common and trustworthy set of facts on which to base our opinions.
Holding presidential aspirants accountable requires local reporters demanding credible answers, not just pap for social media bubbles. NHPR’s reporters and producers seek to follow “the citizen’s agenda” for our questions.
Together with the Valley News and other outlets, NHPR is offering candidate forums; we partner with local media to bring together local traditional Republican voters. Vivek Ramaswamy was the first to agree to one of this forums; we hope it will prompt his competitors to sign up as well.
NHPR is thriving, growing our staff of journalists slowly by having embraced change in how people use media. NHPR podcasts are so successful, that we are in the top 2% in numbers of episodes produced. (National Public Radio and the NY Times are the top 1%.) We’ve managed to create an “export industry” in media.
Our “Civics 101” podcast has been downloaded 2.6 million times. The natural environment-focused “Outside In” podcast was downloaded over 1.5 million times last year. Our newest podcast, “The 13th Step,” covering abuse of power and sexual assault in the recovery community, has been downloaded 729,000 times since June. Its reporting won a prestigious Edward R. Murrow Award.
In the wake of our reporting incidents of racial and religious prejudice, four men were indicted for intimidating reporter Lauren Chooljian. Bricks have been thrown through windows in Hanover, with cowardly spray-painting on their homes. NHPR’s security and legal costs have mounted into six figures.
NHPR strives to meet audiences where they are. We produce a set of e-newsletters reaching nearly 45,000 NH folks. We encourage you to try one or more of them. We are a 42-year-old station committed to open-minded inquiry, curiosity and questions – we do not start with conclusions.
Our challenge for the immediate future is that we move into a new election cycle in a world seemingly spinning out of control. We urge our audience to seek out trustworthy media, and to avoid sinking into a mire of opinionated social media.
QUESTIONS—
Bill Secord: “I love Julia Furukawa.” (Host of NHPR “All Things Considered.”) There are sections in West Lebanon and Hanover that cannot get WENH broadcasts. Is there a remedy?
Jim: New Hampshire’s topography is like an English muffin with nooks and crannies and a granite bottom that radio waves bounce off of. He suggested using their streaming service instead.
Dave Crandall: Do podcasts compete with radio?
Jim: We try to bring substance from the podcasts into the news broadcast and then follow the podcasts as they build on the story. “Outside In” couldn’t find a way to have both a broadcast show and a podcast, so we settled on podcast as the area of growth.
We premiere a new music show tomorrow—“Live from the Word Barn,” a music venue in Exeter, with fresh programming every Friday night.
Jim wants us to tell him how NHPR can better serve the communities in which we live, or the industries in which we work. Are there things you wish media organizations would do to build more bridges, more community?
Phil Bush: Vermont Public has a classical music channel; what about NHPR?
Jim: We have Classical NH—it transmits in Concord and Nashua and also streams 24/7. We are working to build “The Folk Show”/Americana music with additional music shows; we now broadcast “The Folk Show” twice a week. Every music genre has a following—Bernie Taupin said, “We all prefer to listen to the music genre we loved when we were 16.” We have been ramping up cultural content in “All Things Considered” by talking with artists. Our “Weekender” highlights non-news activities.
Cal Wolfe: Can public radio provide “progressive programming” that takes people from a “two-cent” introduction to a topic and gradually builds a deeper understanding of the issue?
Jim: This is a really interesting question and challenge.
Right now, the one place we take that approach is “Civics 101,” which we built for general audiences and also for use in middle and high schools. We create lesson plans and work with teachers to create activities. The show is specifically designed to be accessible to younger people. It’s not news, but it often takes off from the news of the day. Ex) When Roe was overturned, we did a series on the Supreme Court, how cases get there, etc.
We’ve applied for a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting—to make “short-form vertical videos” that teach people how the system works. Sort of taking our lead from the old “Schoolhouse Video” series on early television.
Jim welcomes folks to write to him at president@nhpr.org.
Bill Secord presented our usual à propos gift of a book to Kilton Library’s Children’s Section in Jim’s name. The book is The Young Teacher and the Great Serpent by Irene Vasco and Juan Palomino, ilus. by Lawrence Schimel.
A stunningly illustrated fable about cultural humility and the transcendent power of stories.
A young teacher sets out for the Amazon rain forest, eager to share geography, science, and math with the remote community of Las Delicias. The town’s children love the books the young teacher brings, and yet they keep repeating legends about a great and dangerous serpent. The young teacher can’t believe her students still care about that nonsense. But as the river rises, those stories don’t seem so strange anymore. Maybe books aren’t the only way to discover the wisdom of past generations…
The Young Teacher and the Great Serpent is a poetic, thought-provoking exploration of how stories can protect and guide a community. Bold, dynamic art and lyrical writing will open unforgettable conversations about cross-cultural relationships, the importance of indigenous knowledge, and what it means to be a lifelong learner.
BRAGS
- Bruce Pacht bragged that VoxStars, one of the two choruses of the Hanover Chapter of the Barbershop Harmony Society, captured 5th place (out of 19 competing choruses) at the recent Northeastern District Fall Convention.
- Hank Clarke tried for hours to install a new Xfinity router. After he had called for help a number of times, they finally told him to drop in and get a different one. He did and it installed in minutes.
- Tim Guaraldi had a very successful moose hunt during which Anna and he harvested a big (750 lbs. dressed) moose in the woods near Erroll, NH. They hunted in pouring rain and received a phone call announcing the birth of their 6th grandchild while on the way home with the moose behind them. The youngster’s name is Jennifer Scout Barry.
- John Yacavone was in Concord for lunch last week. He stopped at Einstein’s Bakery for bagels. The door sign said “CLOSED” but the door was open. He asked for six sesame bagels and one cinnamon-raisin bagel, but they’d run out of cinnamon-raisin. The woman didn’t charge John for the half dozen bagels because, she said, he was so gracious when he was told they were out of cinnamon-raisin.
- Phil Bush said the Styrofoam collection volume was much greater than anticipated. They filled two 24-ft U-Hauls plus about another half a truckload, which Bruce Bergeron stored. Phil and Bruce drove the two U-Hauls down to Gilford, the first time in a long time Phil had driven such a large truck. He said it was beautiful new country for him. Cash donations of $1,300 were received. On the ride, Phil was able to hear a public radio station all the way from VPR to Hanover NHPR to Concord NHPR. He had a great time driving.
- Ernst Oidtmann's grandson Henry, a Paul Harris Fellow living in Munich, was scheduled to sing in a production of Mozart’s “The Magic Flute” when Linda was visiting. She was able to document Henry’s performance.
DRAW
Marion Steiner tried for the queen of hearts but pulled the king of clubs instead.
The free car wash went to Bill Secord.
ANNOUNCEMENT
President Dave went to RLI Session One, at which he realized he is proud of our club. Many of the other attendees spoke of difficulties dealing with “problem members,” who, for example, might hijack meetings and misbehave in many other ways. Jim Damren said, “Challenge accepted!”
President Dave rang the bell and closed the meeting with our motto: One Profits Most Who Serves Best.
FUTURE MEETING SCHEDULE
November 9 Rob Roy McGregor, Executive Director of Listen Community Services
November 16 Club Business
November 23 NO MEETING—Happy Thanksgiving
November 30 Carl Gross, Manager Lebanon Municipal Airport
December 7 Aaron Rivkin, Hopkins Center for the Arts
December 12 Holiday Party at the Quechee Inn
December 14 Club Business—2024/2025 Election of Officers and Trustees
December 21 Ernst Oidtmann Piano Recital
December 28 NO MEETING—Happy Holidays
January 4 Jon Chaffee, President of Sustainable Lebanon
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