All hail Jim Gardner

Look, I worship Jim Gardner, but he recognizes (in the profile linked today) that having an overwhelmingly-white newsroom covering a diverse city was a problem.

You can almost smell the Sex Panther.

Dave Robert's from behind.

A More Perfect Union: Lights. Camera. Crime.

How a Philly-born brand of TV news harmed Black America. >The institution of local broadcast news is a young one, but among the most ubiquitous in the United States. It’s a pair of routines that unfold each night: As Americans gather to wind down their days, the medium has worked to deepen racial tensions and reinforce racial stereotypes about communities of color.

>This format launched in Philadelphia, first with the birth of Eyewitness News in 1965, and then with Action News in 1970. Over the next few generations, the pervasive and seductive twin broadcasts would spread to stations across the country — and with them, negative narratives about neighborhoods that would effectively “other” certain groups based largely on race, class, and zip code.

>More than half a century later, the impact of this efficient and pioneering approach remains, but continues to be condemned as harmful, as critics call for a reimagining of stories that tell a fuller story of communities, one that more accurately captures the humanity and dignity of all who live there.

A More Perfect Union >A special project from The Inquirer examining the roots of systemic racism in America through institutions founded in Philadelphia.

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l don't think they came on at 4 pm, like they do now, but the programming schedule at WPVI, from 5 pm on, hasn't changed in the thirty-five years since that picture was taken: Action News at 5, Action News, ABC News, Jeopardy, Wheel of Fortune, then whatever crap ABC fed the masses at 8. They had those three hours locked up. Compare that to KWY and WCAU