Home
Search transcripts:    Advanced Search
Notable New     Yorkers
Select     Notable New Yorker

Frank StantonFrank Stanton
Photo Gallery
Transcript

Session:         Page of 755

But this was the unusual timing that I had -- that gave me a break. I expect there are people like that in the field of computers today who are on the cutting edge, or were on the cutting edge of computers, who felt the same way that I did at that time. But it gave me a leg up on the Program Department, because management didn't want to approve programs unless they knew what the attitude of the audience was. I had the facts, or I could get them. Engineering or station relations needed me for affiliation. I discovered when I was going down to be a witness one time that there was no historical information on what station had been on the network. They had a thing called a rate card.

Q:

Right.

Stanton:

And when they went out to the advertiser, you had a list of them and dollars opposite, and you could pick what you wanted. Nobody ever saved those rate cards. I think we were into the sixteenth or eighteenth rate card when I discovered that nobody had the back rate cards. So I went to Kesten and said, “Gee, I just think the company's growing so fast somebody's got to look after what the hell we've been doing?” What did I mean? I said, “Well, I think I ought to have a couple of people who could clip magazines, keep books, start a little library and keep just the simple things. Try to find all the original rate cads.” We finally found copies. It had nothing to do with audience research, per se, but it later became a very important part. We started the morgue. That's when I got Bill Ackerman to come back from Princeton and head the thing. The company was receptive to fresh ideas. I don't know whether NBC was or not, but I know we had the best reference library in the business for many many years. Bill Ackerman was superb. He could see things coming long before they broke into the press, and so he was prepared for keeping his files and everything.





© 2006 Columbia University Libraries | Oral History Research Office | Rights and Permissions | Help