[MUSIC - Luscious Jackson: Citysong]

Alison Stewart: This is All Of It. I'm Alison Stewart, live from the WNYC Studios in SoHo. Thank you for spending part of your day with us. I am really grateful you're here. On today's show, we'll talk about the revolutionary film, The Spook Who Sat by the Door. It came out more than 50 years ago and has just been restored and is being screened at BAM. We'll also kick off this month's full bio conversation about the life of artist Keith Haring, and we'll speak with Ellen Atlanta, the author of Pixel Flesh: How Toxic Beauty Culture Harms Women. That is the plan, so let's get this started with some news.

How many loyal listeners of WCBS News Radio 880 AM will recognize that music as a sign? We are going to get the latest traffic from Tom Kaminski in the chopper or the weather from Craig Allen. In the coming weeks, WCBS will be going off the airwaves for good. The station's parent company, Audacy, announced last week that it will be shutting down WCBS operations and will broadcast ESPN. This comes as unsurprising to those in the local news industry. It's no secret that news organizations continue to struggle for revenue.

At its peak, thousands of New Yorkers depended on WCBS for the most up-to-date live local coverage, or at least caught the broadcast from the back of a cab. Of course, there are more historic events to cover, like the 1977 and 1993 blackouts, 9/11, Hurricane Sandy and the Hudson River plane landing. With me now to reflect on the end of WCBS and to take your calls is Jerry Barmash, a veteran New York broadcaster and author of the book, Here Now the News: An Inside Scoop into New York's Best-Loved Anchors. He joined us a few weeks ago to talk about the book. Jerry, welcome back to WNYC.

Jerry Barmash: Alison, thanks again for having me.

Alison Stewart: As someone who worked in local news broadcast for years, what was your initial reaction to the news that WCBS was closing?

Jerry Barmash: Well, I wrote on Facebook as soon as I saw it. First of all, when I first saw it on Facebook, I actually had to read the article three or four times to make sure this is actually going to happen. It was, as I wrote, sad, but not unexpected, as you kind of alluded in the open there. This was something with the bankruptcy that Audacy went through and the change of ownership really twice between Entercom and into Audacy, it was really something. You could see the handwriting on the wall over the last two, three years.

It was not something that was completely surprising, but it was still shocking nonetheless. You also would see that on the news feeds, on Facebook, whether it was listeners or people in the business, it was really a gut punched.

Alison Stewart: When you take off your journalist hat and you put on your New Yorker hat, what did CBS mean to you? What did it provide for you, WCBS?

Jerry Barmash: You had two all-news stations. You had CBS and you had WINS. For the city, for the five boroughs, it was WINS, the coverage that they provided. For people who were in the suburbs, Long Island especially, it was WCBS. Another big difference that the CBS provided over the decades, we're talking 57 years, they provided more of, not just as a family, as a stability, but they were giving audiences this personality that you didn't get from WINS, and they made that conscious effort to do that, also because you had usually two anchors together, and they bounced off of each other flawlessly, and also, when they would bounce off with the reporter in the field.

That difference was dramatic, and I preferred that. Some people preferred it the other way, but I definitely was more in the CBS camp.

Alison Stewart: Let's take some calls. Jacqueline is calling from Port Washington, but grew up in Queens. Hi, Jacqueline. Thanks for calling All Of It.

Jacqueline: Hi, there.

Alison Stewart: Tell us what WCBS meant to you.

Jacqueline: It was growing up, since I was probably in the womb, it was the soundtrack that I grew up in. It was on every day, in the kitchen with my mom and dad. Then as I got older and was either living in the city in graduate school or even in Connecticut undergrad, I could still get WCBS. It was so centering for me. All the anchors and their voices, it made me feel like home. I am so sad, so sad that these voices that have been in my heart and in my home my whole life will no longer be there. I'm going to miss the station, but I am so grateful to have had it for 60 years of my life.

Alison Stewart: Jacqueline, thank you so much for calling in. Let's talk to Jerry. He's calling from Kings Point. Hi, Jerry.

Jerry: Yes, hi, Alison, and hi, Jerry. I began listening to the station back in the mid-1970s, so it's a long run for me. First class news organization. This is a big setback for local journalism, and I really hope that the Paley Center can acquire some of their audio archive before Audacy decides to destroy it or delete it like MTV and Comedy Central did with their great content. They just wiped it out without letting anyone know in advance. I wish someone would create an 880 alumni website so that we could find out where all these great anchors and reporters are working next so we can continue to follow their great work. Thank you.

Alison Stewart: Thank you so much for calling in. Listeners, we want to hear from you. Did you grow up listening to WCBS on the radio? What was the role of WCBS? What did it play in your life? Did you wake up 2:00 in the morning and listen while on the commute? Or were you a cab driver listen to CBS? 212-433-9692, 212-433-WNYC. Or maybe you worked at CBS as a journalist, producer, anchor, how did you react to the news? What are your prominent memories? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. Our social media is available as well, @AllOfItWNYC.

Jerry, while people are calling in, I want to read this post from someone from WCBS. Steve Scott said, "Today will be my final day. It hurts to even type those words." You were connected to a lot of the people who worked at WCBS. What have you observed about the general reactions of the veterans of CBS?

Jerry Barmash: Yes, I'm friends with some of them, including-- I know we have someone calling shortly who was a longtime reporter. There was really the sense, I think, gut punch, I said that before. I think that someone on the air had said that as well. I think it was Wayne Cabot, who's one of the fixtures of the station for, I don't know the number, 34, 35 years, something along those lines. It hurts. It really hurts because the listeners have had that voice of the station for decades.

The people who have been on there 30, 35 years, they are just-- I think the person that was on before just said it purposely or perfectly that it just has been so entrenched in their lives, whether they were a listener or they worked there. Somebody also wrote that this is the temple of Murrow on this is CBS. Another person who I know who had been there for many years said, while the station is going and format and all of that, that's hard enough, but to think that the station's call letters won't be there. The iconic WCBS, that hurt him even more.

Alison Stewart: Let's talk about the business developments of WCBS shutting its doors. How do we get to this point? What were the circumstances that led to this happening?

Jerry Barmash: A lot of this is, it's a simple thing, but really, it's a cost cutting measure. When you change ownership, that becomes the-- it's an issue about the bottom line. It's simple enough, but it really became-- it was CBS, it was Entercom, and then it became Audacy. You could see the two radio stations, the two news stations, WINS and CBS, which were together for a number of years. They were even consolidating at some points. It was a path that was not going to continue having the two stations. Clearly, they wanted to save money with that, and it was no longer going to be viable for them financially.

Alison Stewart: Let's talk to Frank, who is calling in from New York on line 5. Hi, Frank. Thank you so much for calling in.

Frank: Hey, thanks for having me. Wayne Cabot, who is the most recognizable news voice in New York City, he and I started in radio together. We started at a small radio station in the northwest corner of New Jersey. If you can believe it, and I'll tell you more about this, he was 17 at the time. He was an intern that came to work every day on a moped and I was 21 years old, and I was "the news director" because I was the only one in the newsroom. Wayne and I went on to great careers. I know he did. I did as well. I worked as a reporter at Channel 9.

I worked briefly at All News 88 as well, News12 New Jersey, where I hosted the morning show and so on. I must tell you, in those early days, and we're going back 40 years or so, he and I used to obsess about All News 88. What I remember distinctly is he used to tell me again and again, "I will be on that station one day, and I will be on All News 88." It was his dream to be on that station, and I'm so happy he was there for 30-some-odd years. He knew it even then at the age of 17 and 18 years old, he knew exactly where he was going.

With regard to the station going off the air, it is, as Jerry said a moment ago, a gut punch. I mean, we listened to All News 88 even when we started at that station. Every newsroom in America, I should say every news in the metropolitan area has up until next Monday, had All News 88 on in their newsroom. I mean, that and WINS were the two great stations. It really is, it's a great loss. I've texted with my friend Wayne, and I will talk with him. He's my oldest, dearest friend in radio, but I know he's got to be hurting as well, and we all are. Every New Yorker should be hurting with news like this.

Alison Stewart: Thank you so much, Frank. Let's talk to Deborah on line 7. Hey, Deborah, thanks for calling All Of It.

Deborah: Oh, thank you for having me. I can't believe I finally got on. I called so many times, I don't get in, so wow, thanks. Anyhow, I am devastated. My husband just told me yesterday that 880 was going off, and I couldn't really believe it. I always listened to you, Alison, and I'm like, "Oh my God, it really is happening." It is a gut punch. I'm 70 years old. I've been retired now for seven years. Now, I listen to it more, but truly, I listen to WNYC, I listen to Brian, I listen to you, but then when it's on the 8, most hours, I will switch and just listen to them, especially around rush hour.

I just love listening to traffic that I'm not in. I love the banter, and I really trust their weather more than I trust my iPhone. I don't know. I'm really, really going to miss them. It makes me think of my mom. She always had the radio on. She had that on all day long. It's just really sad. Really, really sad, and they're good reporters. It's really too bad.

Alison Stewart: Well, I'm glad you called and got on the air, Deborah. I'm talking to Jerry Barmash. He's written the book, Here Now the News: An Inside Scoop into New York's Best-Loved Anchors. We're reflecting on the closing of WCBS. Like Deborah said, they had great reporters. If you would just take a minute to reflect on what this means, the loss for the news industry, for local news.

Jerry Barmash: That is the worst part of this because these people are not getting replaced. You're not laying off people and putting in others or consolidating with another station. It's gone. As I said earlier, where it really hurts is in the suburbs, the Long Islands, the New Jerseys, the Connecticuts, and Westchesters, where there was much more of a concentration for the local news product than you would get again in the city, where WINS covers that, and you don't get that. You get that in the papers. In a Newsday patch, News12 on TV, but you don't get that in the way that CBS covered, so that is where it's going to hurt.

I don't know that WINS will pick up the slack. They may bring in more reporters that were on CBS, but I don't think they're going to be able to pick up the slack that you had from CBS covering those areas. That's really where you're going to see the problems. You're going to see the difference, and it's going to really hurt local news. For listeners, that's where you're going to feel the difference.

Alison Stewart: Our phone lines are lit up. We'll get to more calls about the end of WCBS. Also, a super caller, someone related to WCBS on the line. We'll have more with Jerry Barmash discussing the closing of WCBS. Stay with us. This is All Of It on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. Today, we're reflecting on the closing of WCBS, and we're taking your calls. My ride along for this is Jerry Barmash. He wrote a book called Here Now the News: An Inside Scoop into New York's Best-Loved Anchors. We have a caller on the line now who worked at WCBS for almost 30 years, Peter Haskell. He's nice enough to call in from. He's on vacation. Hi, Peter.

Peter Haskell: Hey, thanks for having me. I appreciate it.

Alison Stewart: Now, you left the station in 2022 for medical reasons, but you still put in a long time at WCBS. May I first ask for your initial emotions and reactions when you first heard the news?

Peter Haskell: It's just heartbreaking. I mean, it's a place that I put a lot of time, energy, and effort into, as did so many other people and radio people, especially people who made it to 880. This was not just a job. This was a career. This was a passion. This was a way of life where you want them to be on the big stories. You want them to be out there telling stories. People didn't just punch clock, they put in their heart, soul, their blood, sweat, and tears, so it's just absolutely heartbreaking.

Alison Stewart: When did you first realize, "I want to work there. I want to work at WCBS"?

Peter Haskell: I grew up as a kid and I always wanted to be on the radio. I started out, I wanted to do sports, and then as I got into the radio business and started working, I worked doing news, and I saw 880. There is no better place to do radio than 880. It was a place that was, honestly, I never dreamed that I would make it there, and somehow, I did, and lasted almost 30 years and covered some great stories, and frankly, had the time of my life.

Alison Stewart: Share one great story with us.

Peter Haskell: Oh my goodness, there are so many. I think the most important story that we told was post-9/11. I mean, I cover 9/11. We covered 9/11, which was hugely important. I think the 9/11 health story was one that I put a lot of time and energy into and covered a lot. It was really important to tell the stories of the responders who were sick to get their stories out there, to talk to elected officials, to get them to see how important it was to have a World Trade Center health program, to have a victim compensation fund.

Both of those programs were eventually passed and funded by Congress, but here's the deal. We went out and we talked to people. We pressed elected officials about this, and this is true of a lot of stories and this is true of a lot of local news. If you have an elected official who puts out a statement, doesn't answer questions, if you have people posting on social media, it's like screaming into the void. It is not the same as vetting and telling critical, important, accurate information in a fair way and a holding elected officials to account. Social media and press releases won't do that. Local news does that.

Alison Stewart: Peter Haskell, we thank you so much for your time and for your effort at WCBS. We appreciate it.

Peter Haskell: Thanks for having me.

Alison Stewart: Jerry, like many local news outlets, CBS covered historic events, the '77 blackout, the '93 blackout to 9/11. We do have an archival clip from WCBS from the morning of 9/11. Let's listen. We hear the voice of Tom Kaminski in the 880 Chopper trying to make a sense of what's going on.

Tom Kaminski: We are just coming up on this scene. This is easily three quarters of the way up. Whatever has occurred has just occurred within minutes. We are trying to determine exactly what that is, but currently, we have a lot of smoke at the top of the towers of the World Trade Center. We will keep you posted.

Jeff Kaplan: Tom, we just saw that smoke go up at about the same time you did. It was like one huge puff.

Tom Kaminski: That's exactly what we had seen. We had turned around with Jeff-- We were at the George Washington Bridge. We had seen a fireball. I can tell you, it appears as though something has gone into the World Trade Center.

Alison Stewart: Jerry, as you listen to that, what are historic moments, like what we just heard from that clip, demonstrate about what WCBS meant to the city?

Jerry Barmash: Well, for one, people knew whenever there was a crisis, among other times. When there was a crisis, you knew you could go right to 880 on your dial. The other thing is, just from that little clip, even though we didn't know exactly what was going to be happening, it was possibly a plane at that point and certainly didn't know it was a terrorist attack. There was calmness. There was no panic in those anchors' voices. That is the credibility, the depth of their knowledge, and their experience just on display.

That is what the listeners knew that they were getting every time that they listened. That was Jeff Kaplan, by the way, and Pat Carroll. I don't know if we heard her in that, and of course, Tom Kaminsky, who was the first person to report anything with the 9/11 attacks.

Alison Stewart: We got traffic here. It says, traffic and weather on the 8. I recently explained to my kids the meaning of the brilliant Fountains of Wayne lyric. We get together like traffic and weather. They had no idea the point of reference, and now, they'll never know for themselves. Another text. Remember that WCBS AM in New York City was the flagship station of the CBS radio network. This is also about the dissolution of nation old school media. That was about news before the news division had to show a profit. A great loss for democracy and accurate reporting.

Let's take a couple more calls. Let's go to Peter, who's been calling from Rego Park. Hi, Peter. Thanks for holding.

Peter: Hi. Thank you very much. For me, 880 was half of what I called approach control. Before our phones told us where to go and what to think, whenever I'd be coming back into the city, I had 880 and 1010 WINS as my one and two presets on the AM band. As I was coming back into the city, about an hour out or so, I toggled between these traffic on the 8s, then traffic on the 1s, and then I flipped back to 880 and got the news. Between the two of them, they got me set up to figure out the best path back into the city, and then also caught me up on all the local news.

I kind of was grounded again to know what was happening back home, and that's how I used it. It's a shame to see it go. I understand, in this day and age, some of the forces causing it to do so, but it really was a great memory that I share with other people all the time.

Alison Stewart: Peter, thank you so much. Let's talk to Kara, who's calling in from East Norwich, Long Island. Hey, Kara, thank you so much for calling All Of It.

Kara: Oh, thank you. I have to say, first of all, I always love the Tiffany Network, but I have not forgiven management for what they did to WCBS FM, where you could walk into any pizzeria in any area of the five boroughs and Long Island and hear the radio. As far as CBS AM, what are they nuts? This is ridiculous. I had CBS on morning when I would commute to St. John's, and every afternoon as I would commute back.

I also, when I started my employment, would turn it on when I was driving to Riverhead or Poughkeepsie or Staten Island, and I would know the weather and the traffic. Now, we're going to have to rely solely on WINS, which bless them, they're good reporters, but their power isn't enough to get you to hear it out in Riverhead or Poughkeepsie. You're kind of going to be stuck having to rely on GPS, which, as we all know, is not exactly the oracle of the ages.

Alison Stewart: Thank you so much, Kara, for your call. I want to bring in WINS into the conversation. You touched on this a little bit earlier. How were the broadcast styles different between the two stations? Between CBS and WINS?

Jerry Barmash: I mean, CBS was always, and I'm sure, and by the way, they were not always owned by the same company. CBS was CBS, and WINS was Westinghouse until '80s or '90s. I'm not sure the exact date, but WINS was always-- Also, the format was a 22-minute, they had three cycles where they would do the headlines. You give us 22 minutes, we'll give you the world and they would rotate and recycle every 20 minutes. CBS was every half hour, including the business news. Of course, on the 8s, they did the traffic and weather and the sports at 15 and 45.

CBS was always that personality driven, where again, they had two anchors usually, not on overnights and usually in the evenings they had solos, but during the morning drive and afternoon drive, two anchors and they could banter a bit. They could have a little bit more personality with each other. They also had personality. When I say personality, even just asking questions, they could just have a little bit more of a spark between the anchor and the reporter in the field. CBS would not usually do that.

They would ask if there was something serious on the scene, but it was more of a straight news anchor going to the reporter and you saw the difference. Certainly, WINS has been effective in doing it. I mean, they're a top station and they're going to remain on the air, but it was certainly a preference. Which one did you prefer? I just preferred the way CBS delivered the news. I listened since the '70s. I could just run off a few names. Pat Parson and Ben Farnsworth for afternoons were terrific combination. Jim Donnelly and Robert Vaughn in the mornings.

I was just listening the other day, preparing to speak today and just listening back to some of these air checks of them. They are just classic anchors. Just the way they sounded was great. I listened and I would get goosebumps. By the way, also Craig Allen, I think you mentioned Craig Allen at the beginning. He has been really, in a way, the voice of the station. He has been on there for more than 40, I believe it's 42 or 43 years.

Of course, whenever there's a storm, whether it's blizzards, anything, thunderstorms, certainly what we had in the last 24 to 48 hours, Craig Allen has been there and weather has been such a vital part of the city. It is really hard to imagine not having Craig Allen to hear the whenever there's bad weather.

Alison Stewart: This is from X. "Like so many news, Radio 88 was part of our family history growing up in New Jersey. I went to graduate school in Chapel Hill, North Carolina in '91. I was always astonished that I could pick up WCBS News Radio so far away. It was like a lifeline to the city in pre-Internet years." Let's talk to Robert. Is Robert there? Hi, Robert. Thanks for calling in.

Robert: I am.

Alison Stewart: Yes.

Robert: Thank you. I'm a belt and suspenders kind of guy, and I'm listening to you as I'm driving home from a dentist appointment. Driving to the dentist appointment this morning, I just had to look at both Waze and my car GPS and jump back and forth between the two of them to see the best way to get to my appointment on time. How does this tie into WCBS radio? Well, CBS was part of my Friday afternoon ritual as I drive from my home in Millburn, New Jersey, to the Upper West Side in New York City. Friday afternoons, I have the dilemma.

Gee, do I take the Holland Tunnel or the Lincoln Tunnel? Where is traffic going to be worse? At 4:08 PM, I could tune into CBS 880 and catch the traffic on the 8s. Then three minutes later, I catch the traffic on WINS 1010 at 4:11, and then do the same thing, 10 minutes later, just to see which one I believed. Oh, and then in between on the 5s, or at least the 15s, Bloomberg would do the traffic.

Alison Stewart: We got you there. Thank you so much for calling in. Let's talk to Bob, who's calling from Massachusetts. Hi, Bob. Thanks for calling All Of It.

Bob: Hi, Alison and Jerry. I worked in Vermont radio for 25 years. Long before that, when I was eight or nine years old, I became aware of WCBS. This is a blow personally. This is the second time I've been to New York City radio. A phone call, because the first time was on WCBS story here. There'd been a storm in Vermont, and I had a story that I had loaded into my local station's computer for the next morning. I worked evenings. For Crimson giggles, I thought, well, I'll decide to call the network newsroom and see they want what I have.

They said, "Sure, here's your audio and sent us your script," and that's it. I locked up my station, never heard from them again. Saturday afternoon, around 4:30, my phone starts buzzing. Boom, boom, boom. What the heck is this? I looked down, and it's friends of mine from all over the northeast because it was December, and 4:30 in the afternoon are telling me, "Bob, I heard your report on WCBS." It's from all over. There's a friend on the Cape, there's a friend in eastern Maine, there's a friend in Ontario, and there's another friend in the Carolinas.

Some random moment. Of course, they played it multiple times throughout the evenings. That was like, "Wow."

Alison Stewart: Yes, it's a great story. I'm sorry, I'm going to cut you off there because we're running out of time. I do want to ask-- Thank you so much for calling, by the way, Bob. Jerry, this is a difficult time for local news outlets everywhere, including New York Public Radio, which announced layoffs. As we look towards the future, what role do you think local broadcast news plays in the community?

Jerry Barmash: I hope it plays an important role still. I don't think that this is the be all, end all. I think that we will still have local news, and I think it's an important part of the community for gathering your information. People want to know what's going on, and they're not going to always just get it on the local news at 11:00 at night, unless it's rising to a level that will be a major story. I think that people still want their news and need to get their news. Hopefully, there will be more ways for people to find it.

Whether it's radio or not, I'm not sure, and I don't know that WINS will automatically be filling the bill, but hopefully-- and these reporters, anchors, staffers, and all of these people, hopefully they will be able to get more work. There's writers and the guild and there's producers in the union, and hopefully, they will all find work at some point. We've all been down this road, and I have, too.

If I could just add one quick thing on a personal note, I worked at CBS certainly not at any level of these people that we've been talking about these greats, but I got to do business reports, not directly for the station, but I was on the station through the Wall Street Journal, and that was such a thrill to be actually on the station with the history of it, just to get on there. I interviewed for an anchor position at WCBS in the last few years, and I've gotten jobs in radio. I've been on different stations, and I've also not gotten several.

It hurts and you move on. This was something different. When I did not get that job, that was my own personal gut punch because I wanted to be on WCBS just to feel that I was with some of the all-time greats to be on that station. That was something that just the fact that I got the interview, I'll never forget.

Alison Stewart: Thank you to all the callers who called in and folks who texted us, and thanks so much to Jerry Barmash for reflecting on the closing of WCBS. Thank you, Jerry.

Jerry Barmash: Thank you so much, Alison.

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