Brownfield

WSVX AM and now FM

WSVX-AM in Shelbyville, Indiana has been under new ownership just over a year now and they are going full steam ahead with their radio station. A complete building overhaul has been complemented by a station truck and trailer as well as local billboards throughout Shelby county. They also recently launched an FM frequency, one of only 10 AM stations in the country to be allowed to rebroadcast their AM signal on an FM frequency.

-Mike Cady

(Mike is Brownfield Affiliate Relations Manager)

Sweet corn harvest

For nearly everyone on the Brownfield team, our love of agriculture and involvement in it reaches beyond what we do as members of this team.  Take for instance Julie Harker.  It was a typical, hot Saturday in July when her family headed out to Lowell and JoAnn Mohler’s farm to pick sweet corn.  It is an annual event and part of the Grace Episcopal Youth Group fundraiser.  They pick corn donated by Lowell and JoAnn and sell it the next day at church.

Former Brownfielder Lane McConnell who now works at Missouri Department of Agriculture made sure the youth had AgriMissouri bags for proper packaging. 

Lowell Mohler is a former Missouri Department of Ag Director and Missouri Conservation Commissioner.  He is happy with his sweet corn crop and Julie couldn't resist videotaping him as he talked about it. (The youth group picked 8 rows of the regular sweet corn.  They did not pick the Bt corn Lowell talks about in the video.)

Improving customer service

Brownfield Affiliate Manager Mike Cady had company on a recent affiliate trip.  Here's what he had to say:

It's not everyday I get company on an affiliate trip but recently I had the pleasure of traveling with two fellow Learfielders, Media Buyer/Research Analyst Jennifer Shinkle and Affiliate Coordinator Mandy Shanks. Their positions at Learfield require them to interact and work with on a regular basis with most, if not all, of the affiliates of our networks in the Learfield news division. In an effort to help the ladies understand the "life" of an affiliate we made a two day trip through Northern Missouri and Southern Iowa and visited eight affiliate locations. Our goal for the trip was to provide Jennifer and Mandy a better understanding of what it's like to work in a radio station in the hopes that this will help them interact better on a customer service level to those we serve daily.

Our stops included KMMO-AM/FM Marshall Missouri, KIRX-AM Kirskville Missouri, KBIZ-AM Ottumwa Iowa, KBOE-AM/FM Oskaloosa Iowa, KWPC-AM and KMCS-FM Muscatine, Iowa, KILJ-AM/FM Mt. Pleasant Iowa, KMCD-AM Fairfield Iowa and KMEM-FM Memphis Missouri.

Traveling with CSIF

I've been quite busy with the Coalition to Support Iowa's Farmers "Doing it Right Farm Tour."  Instead of blogging here, I've been focusing my energies on that project.  Check it out! 

Visitors from Germany

We get a lot of visitors to the Brownfield newsroom in Jefferson City, Missouri.  Earlier this week, we were pleased to have the opportunity to visit with Gerd and Uschi Schumeckers from Dusseldorf, Germany.   While in mid-Missouri, the Schumeckers stayed with Learfield News President Stan Koenigsfeld and his wife Julie Koenigsfeld.

Gerd and Uschi Schumeckers visited us along with a group of 55 Germans from the Lank area of Germany.  Their 16-yr old son Simon was also in the group, staying with another family with a son in college who had travelled with the German Heritage Society group from Loose Creek, MO on their last trip to Germany.  They live in the rural area of Meerbusch across the Rhine River from Dusseldorf.  Uschi is on her church council and active in many volunteer activities.  Gerd is a retired CEO of the Spanish bank Santander in Germany and is now on the Board of Directors there, as well as an independant consultant.  Their hobbies include horses, tennis, books and wine.  We had a wonderful visit with them and can't wait to see them again.   
They really enjoyed meeting everyone at Learfield and were very appreciative of your time!
-Julie

Message from Pike County, Illinois

Our good friend Blake Roderick, Executive Director of Pike and Scott County Farm Bureaus and Two Rivers Farm Bureau Foundation sent an update that we were all very pleased to receive.  The news was good this time for the region Blake represents in fighting the 2008 floods.  Julie Harker and Tom Steever spent some time a couple of weeks ago with Blake - on the levees - in west central Illinois.  Blake continued to keep us abreast of the situation as river levels fell. 

Update from Pike County
Wednesday, July 2, 2008:

Monitoring the 54-miles of main-stem Mississippi River levees in the Sny Island Drainage District of Pike County will continue for several more days. River levels crested three times at near record levels during the 2008 flood.

The Mississippi River will be under major flood stage in the next couple of days—points south of US 54 are at or below major flood stage today. All the points along the Sny will be at or below flood stage within a week.

Mexico, Missouri affiliates

Brownfield affiliate radio stations KWWR -FM and KXEO-AM, Mexico, Missouri, are surrounded by some of Missouri's best farm land.  You can listen to Brownfield Ag News programs throughout the day on both stations.

Brownfield Affiliate Relations Manager Mike Cady was in the KWWR and KXEO studios last week.

Best Radio in the Ozarks

Mike Cady, Brownfield Affiliate Relations Manager, visited KKOZ-AM/FM Ava, Missouri last week.   Mike said they call themselves the "Best Radio in the Ozarks."

Ava is home to the Missouri Fox Trotters Horse Breed Association. Needless to say Hoofbeat is a big hit every Saturday on KKOZ.

Welcome new PD at KELE

Affiliate Manager Mike Cady visited Brownfield station KELE-FM in Mountain Grove, Missouri last week.  Mike happened to arrive just as PD Keith Stephenson was interviewing country musician Frank Ortega on the air. 

Keith also hosts The Grove morning show. 

The day Mike stopped by was Keith's 6th day on the job.  Welcome to the Brownfield family, Keith!

Straight line winds

More deadly weather moved across the Midwest over the week-end.  Brownfield's Pete Shinn, headquartered in downtown Omaha, Nebraska was smack dab in the middle of a dangerous storm late Friday afternoon.  From Pete:

Here are a handful of pics taken right after Friday's storm in Omaha. It knocked out power to around 130,000 customers, myself included, and killed two teenagers in Council Bluffs when a tree fell on their car. It's the only time in my life I've been scared of a weather event. Straight-line winds of up to 115 mph knocked over lots of trees and snapped power poles like twigs. The whole thing blew up and was over in 10 minutes. Wild! Crews finally got power restored to our building last night at about 8:30 p.m.