by Brad Willis
I jumped into my van and blasted back down the highway. I rolled into the parking lot with my gas tank on empty, ran into the station, loaded the film in the processor, and grabbed some script paper. I furiously pecked away at my story and then, with Michaels’ help, recorded my report on a bulky eight-track cartridge, editing the film to go with my words. I finished less than two minutes before we went on the air and ran everything into the Control Room just in time. It was an initiation by fire, but I made my first real deadline. I was transfixed, and in that moment the news business became my whole life.
I soon turned myself into an investigative reporter, using pictures and words to peel back the veneer of society and expose corrupt business and political practices. I caught drug detectives falsifying evidence, local council members taking bribes, timber companies illegally cutting down virgin timber in Redwood National Park. Covering the news was what I was born to do. I lived it, breathed it, ate it, and made it my way of crusading against the society from which I had felt so alienated in my earlier years. I was relentless, just as I’d promised Don Michaels I would be.
Within two years, Michaels retired and soon I was named news director, running the small news department, filming and reporting stories throughout the day, anchoring the six and eleven o’clock nightly newscasts, and even cleaning up and taking out the trash before the long drive home to my cabin. It was around-the-clock, usually seven days a week. I made a whopping $600 per month. Far less than I took home from a weekend job painting a house, but I wouldn’t have traded it for the world.
CHAPTER 3
Moving up
AT THE END of my third year at KVIQ, I was beginning to understand something about the business of being a broadcast journalist. The market size of a television station was based on its audience size. I was working in one of the smallest markets in the country, something like number 198 out of 206. If I wanted broader horizons, bigger stories, and more opportunities, I’d need to land a job in a bigger city. But I had no idea how to go about it. Then one morning I received a call from a man introducing himself as Pete Langlois, the news director of KCRA-TV in Sacramento, the twentyfirst market, and the state capital to boot.
“We want you to fly down and discuss taking a job with us,” Langlois said in soft monotone of a voice.
“Sure, yes,” I said with surprise. “But how did you hear about me?” I couldn’t imagine anyone outside of Humboldt County even knowing about our little news operation.
“Your competitors,” Langlois droned. “They want you out.”
There was only one other station in town and they had always been number one in the news. My commitment to investigative reporting had helped turn that around, and after I became news director and anchor, we captured the number-one spot in the ratings and kept it. As Langlois would later explain, the general manager of our competitor station knew the owner of KCRA and had asked him for a favor—to get me out of town.
The job that KCRA offered me wasn’t what I expected. I’d be in management as the executive producer of the station’s prime-time magazine show, Weeknight. It was a light, fluffy show that mixed feature stories from the news department with entertainment and show business reports. They wanted me, they said, because the show needed someone who had been a news director to provide more organization, focus, and leadership than the previous producer. But it meant, they added, that I would no longer be a reporter. I told myself I didn’t care. It was a huge jump up in market size, incredible pay, and the only offer on the table. What a mistake it turned out to be.
I gave the show everything I had, always trying to minimize the fluff and inject the investigative journalism I loved. But I was trying to turn a lamb into a lion. The longtime cohosts wanted to keep it soft and light. The reporters only wanted to make the hosts happy. For me, it was like overdosing on candy and I could barely bring myself to even watch Weeknight. I argued, sweet-talked, and bullied the staff, trying to make the tone more substantial and journalistic. It was all to no avail. After less than a year it was clear to me, and everyone else, that this job was not for me. When Pete Langlois called me into his office one afternoon, I figured I was about to be fired.
“I don’t think you belong with Weeknight,” he said when I’d barely sat down.
“I know I don’t,” I answered with a huge sigh, feeling equal jolts of abject fear and complete relief. “I’m not happy. The staff isn’t happy. This isn’t what I was meant to do.”
I confessed to Langlois that it was painfully obvious to me that I was wired to do hard-hitting, investigative news reporting. That’s what had come so naturally to me in my first TV job. My passion for the news is what had made me so successful in Eureka.
“I agree with you,” Langlois said, sounding as detached as ever. Here it comes, I thought, the end of my career. Instead, he said, “I want you take over our Call Three. Bring your intense focus and energy to that and there will be no stopping you.”
I was stunned, elated, and profoundly relieved. Call Three was an institution at KCRA’s Eyewitness News, dedicated to seeking justice for consumers who’d been wronged. Staffed by a group of highly skilled community volunteers, it handled thousands of consumer complaints every month that poured in by phone and mail. Call Three would document their cases, determine the validity of their complaints, and then become their advocate with the merchants or businesses in question. KCRA’s designated Call Three reporter would then comb through the resolved cases and pick the best success stories to report on twice a week. The reporter who had handled Call Three for several years had just been hired as a news anchor in another city, and now the segment would be mine.
“I’ll take it, Pete,” I said so loudly I thought the whole newsroom might hear me. The producer under me at Weeknight took over my duties as executive producer, and soon I was off and running with my new gig.
Once I became familiar with the Call Three staff and procedures, I immediately conspired to make it something unique and more substantive. Call Three helped consumers with things like getting shoddy repairs fixed or a refund for a faulty product. The reports would focus on how happy the consumers were that Call Three helped them resolve their complaints. I chose to focus instead on exposing the consumer fraud and went after the perpetrators with my cameras. Once I began peeling back the veils, what seemed like small cases at first often became big stories.
One viewer contacted Call Three to complain that he had been denied medical coverage for his one-year-old daughter who was dying of cancer. Digging into it, we uncovered a billion-dollar construction firm falsifying its payroll records on government-funded housing projects across the country, paying the workers less than half of what it billed the Department of Housing and Urban Development for their labor. This way, the corporation, whose president had close ties with the Republican Party, could skim millions of tax dollars.
The worker highlighted in our story was told that his government-backed health insurance was invalid because he failed to report his full income, which, of course, he never received. I discovered hundreds of other workers in the same boat and, as a result of our reports, the government ultimately forced the corporation to fully compensate them. The health coverage for the little girl whose father first contacted Call Three was validated and she received her cancer treatments.
Viewers soon began calling us with tips. Whistle-blowers came forward. We exposed the local Air Force base polluting the groundwater of its surrounding communities with highly toxic solvents, heroin rings with ties to law enforcement, and even the highest ranking Nazi War criminal ever located in the United States—Otto Von Bolschwing. We found him living in a rest home not ten miles from KCRA.
Although I loved my work and went at it with everything I had, every night I was watching Tom Brokaw on the NBC Nightly News, dreaming of being one of his reporters in the field. Not a correspondent at the White House or on Capitol Hill, not based at the New York or Los Angeles bureaus, but a foreign correspondent reporting from
the front lines anywhere in the world where there was conflict and turmoil. I didn’t know how to make it happen, but I thought continually about getting to network news. It was an obsession.
One day, as if on cue, a stranger named Ken Lindner walked into the newsroom. Tall and lean, with an expensive Italian suit, flashy tie, and a paisley silk muffler scarf tossed casually over his shoulders, Lindner caught the attention of everyone in the newsroom as he shook hands with Langlois and ducked into his office for a meeting. When Lindner emerged a half-hour later he headed straight for my desk and, with a million-dollar smile, said, “Hi, I’m with the William Morris Agency and we want to represent you. Can I take you to lunch?” I glanced toward Langlois’s office to see him leaning against the doorway with his arms folded, quietly nodding his approval.
“Sure, let’s go,” I said, having never heard of William Morris Agency and not having a clue what representing me meant.
Lindner took me to the most expensive restaurant in Sacramento, where all the lobbyists at the state capital dined, and soon explained how it worked. Top market and network reporters had well-connected agents who negotiated their contracts and supported them throughout their careers—for a percentage of their salaries, of course. Lindner said he had been watching me for more than a year and met with Langlois to seek permission to represent me. “I think I can get you into a top ten market right away,” he said with a gleam in his eye.
It felt suspicious to me. He seemed a little too slick, and being an investigative reporter, I was cynical about anyone and everyone’s motives, never taking anything at face value. “Give me one day, okay?” I responded.
“Sure,” Lindner answered as he handed me his business card with his private number handwritten on the back. “Take all the time you need.”
Back in the newsroom I rushed into Langlois’s office. He immediately read my mind. “It’s the real deal,” he said. “William Morris is a major agency and Lindner is a pro. You’re in good hands. We’d like to keep you here, but it’s easy to see your ambition and I’m not going to hold you down.”
“Thanks, Pete,” I said, shaking his hand hard then heading back to my desk to call Lindner immediately and say, “When do I sign?”
A few months later, as promised, Lindner negotiated a new job for me in a top ten market, at WFAA-TV in Dallas, an ABC affiliate and one of the most respected news organizations in the country. It had a consumer unit similar to Call Three, but it was flagging. I was the perfect person, Lindner convinced them, to re-energize it. Before I knew it, I was off to Texas.
I quickly turned the consumer unit into an investigative one. We exposed racial discrimination at several of Dallas’s posh nightclubs, where the city’s rich and famous gathered. The clubs had secret policies of requiring a second photo identification from African Americans, then denying them entrance even if they managed to comply. We used hidden cameras and microphones to expose them turning away a black woman who happened to be a lawyer in the attorney general’s office. Subsequent lawsuits shut down several clubs.
Just as it had been in Eureka and Sacramento, corruption and white-collar crime were plentiful, and I was more aggressive than ever. Only in Texas, the conservative establishment pushed back hard. Business and political leaders began complaining to WFAA management, and the station started trying to tone down my work. I pushed back even harder, refusing to dilute a story and standing my ground. Marty Haig, the news director, was a legend and a man of incredible integrity. But he was on the spot and did his best to walk a fine line between management and news.
When I began working on the plight of a Dallas oilman locked away in a Caracas prison after being framed for a major oil scandal involving the Venezuelan government, the station declined my proposal to cover it. Bullheaded as ever, I took two weeks’ vacation, hired a freelance cameraman, flew to Caracas, and shot the story anyway. I even managed to smuggle a camera into the prison on visitors’ day and recorded a secret interview with the Texas oilman.
Returning to Dallas, I pitched the story to ABC’s primetime network news magazine show 20/20; the show agreed to buy it. When I shared this with Marty Haig, he was upset and quickly decided WFAA wanted the story. He grudgingly agreed to pay me for all my expenses plus a hefty freelance bonus. The reports, which I titled Petrospies, created a sensation in Texas, got the attention of diplomats in Washington, D.C., and ultimately the oilman was freed. But my relationship with Marty Haig and WFAA would never be the same. I distrusted and resented them, and vice versa. My next story proved to be my last.
It was 1984 and the Republican National Convention was about to be held in Dallas, where the delegates would nominate President Ronald Reagan to run for a second term. As it turned out, the construction company I had exposed in Sacramento was based in Dallas and played a major role in Republican politics. The federal government was still investigating them, so I updated the story and produced a five-part series. The night before it was scheduled to run, Haig called me into his office to say the station’s legal department was killing my stories. “They say the reports don’t pass legal review,” he said matter of factly. “They’re libelous and will get us sued.”
Furious, I demanded to meet with the legal department and challenge its position. To his credit, Haig supported me on this. That afternoon, as I rifled through all my files to defend my work, I discovered something I had never noticed: WFAA’s law firm also represented the construction company my reports had exposed! The next morning, I tore into the legal team, defended my work, pointed out its obvious conflict of interest, and promised that if the reports were killed I’d take it to the Dallas newspapers and expose the whole thing. When it was over, Haig said, “We’ll air one report tonight, and one only. You’ll have to cut the series down to something less than three minutes. That’s it.”
Haig didn’t have to say anything more. I knew this would be my last report for WFAA. I went back to the station and worked right up to the five o’clock evening news deadline, then walked onto the set to give the lead-in live and answer a few softball questions from the anchors when it was over. The next morning when I arrived at the station, Haig called me straight into his office.
“It’s time to cut the sheets,” he said, looking down at some papers in his hands.
“You mean not working here any longer?” I said, as if clarification was necessary.
“Yes,” Haig said, finally glancing up. “We’re letting you go.”
“No need,” I shot back, “I quit.”
I stood up and shook his hand, and thanked him for everything. He was a good man in a tough spot. “See you around,” I said and walked back to my desk.
In less than a minute, a security guard tapped me on the shoulder and stated with authority, “Please give me your station identity card. WFAA has the legal rights to all of your files. I’m here to escort you to your car. A settlement on your contract will be negotiated with your agent.”
I opened my wallet, handed over my identity card, and walked away, saying politely but firmly, “I can show myself out.”
It was the first time I’d ever been fired from anything. I had occasionally wondered if something like this might happen one day, and the thought had always made me shudder with fear. Now, I was surprised at how great it felt.
“Don’t worry,” Lindner comforted me when I called him from my high-rise apartment overlooking the Dallas skyline. “We’ll find a better spot for you. Just give me some time.”
“Okay,” I answered. “I’m going back to California as soon as I can book a flight. I’ll be in touch from there.”
It took a few days to arrange for the packing and shipping of my things, then I was off to a small island in San Diego Bay called Coronado, where I had relatives. I rented a condo overlooking the bay and began catching up with family and friends. The settlement on my contract paid my salary for another year. Surely, I thought, Lindner would come through in a flash. I could just relax, sun myself at the beach, and have a good time
. But before two weeks was up, I was going stir-crazy. I had no idea what to do with myself without reporting. It was like having no identity. No reason for being. I was completely lost.
The weeks turned into one month, then two, then three. After half a year, I thought I might explode. That’s when Lindner finally called. WBZ-TV in Boston, an NBC affiliate in an even bigger news market, liked the reel of my reports that William Morris sent them. I soon had a new contract and an even higher salary. I could breathe again; I was back in the game.
I leased a grand old apartment in the historic Back Bay overlooking the Charles River and the verdigris dome of MIT. It was thrilling to be in this sophisticated city with its rich history, but I knew, even at this prestigious station, local news would never be enough. Going to Afghanistan was just a start. I had to pitch more global stories, stretch the limits, make a mark. I was thirty-six years old. By the end of my three-year contract at WBZ, I’d be close to forty. After that, I told myself, I had to be at the network or I’d be past my prime. Ambition was consuming me again.
CHAPTER 4
Tropical Storm
THE OCTOBER SUN BREAKS the morning horizon and bathes us in golden light. It’s already freezing in Boston, but it’s sublime here in the Bahamas. Warm breezes carry the rich aroma of the salt air across the tiny island. Gentle ocean waves roll in a soft song, lapping onto the white sand. Pelicans, gulls, and kingfishers soar above us, then splash into the ocean for a meal.
It’s the end of 1986, and it’s my first vacation in years. I’ve always been so obsessed with my career that I haven’t wanted to take a real holiday since the day I began. There was only the break between the Dallas and Boston jobs, and that was all stress. Now, after being on the road airing my reports from Afghanistan at our other stations, followed by weeks of investigative work at WBZ, I need the downtime. And I’m actually interested in really getting to know someone: Mary Beth, the graphic artist at WBZ who I’ve always found to be a little mysterious and intriguing in her graceful silence. We’ve dated for a month, and now we’re on this adventure together.