Grandpa on TV

A month ago I talked to WYAM channel 51 and offered to go on TV to let their audience know what we're doing. Well Tuesday was the day. We arrived at the station at 11:00 a.m. to make sure nothing went wrong. The workers were in high gear scurrying all over the place. Suzie Wily, the blond lady had been at work since 4:00 a.m. There was a computer man in his own room and was he ever good at finding pictures of the Granite Mountain Vault, the Family History Library etc. and loading them on his camera.

We walked into the broadcasting studio and there were lots of bright lights and three cameras looking at me. Derrick and Suzie were really good to try and make me relaxed since this was all new to me. The walls were all painted funny green like you see them in the picture above. They had told me not to wear green because that color actually looks black on TV. Two of the cameras were taking our pictures while another one seemed to use a computer feed that digitally put in whatever background the man in the other room wanted. The three of us sat down on comfortable stools, Derrick clipped a micraphone onto my lapel and some other gadget onto my belt. The fellow in the computer room yelled "Three, two, one" and my blood pressure went 100, 200, 300 and we were on the air. It was a live broadcast so whatever I said was not going to be edited. Suzie and Derrick really made it a pleasant experience. They took a major interest in what Vicki and I are doing and asked a lot of helpful questions and made a lot of interesting comments. We are buying a DVD of the program and will burn copies for all of you.

I was able to tell them about family and the friends we've make here and that Grandpa Hays was born in Northwest Alabama. They wanted to know how we filmed, where the film was stored, how they could access the images, how long we'd be here and about our RV Trailer. I told them some of the intricacies of filming, a few details about GSU (Genealogica Society of Utah), what's happening in Alabama, the Granite Mountain Vault, family history centers and bringing the microfilm images online through digital imaging and indexing. It was actually quite fun and they want us to come back on another program later in our mission! They offfered us apple friters as a reward which is a real favorite of mine. I declined because of my diet but it wasn't easy.