Indiana RadioWatch: March 6, 2009

For our schedule next calls for a visit to another nearby Michigan Avenue office tower and an appointment with one of the most famous radio studios in America.

This utterly unassuming room on the 16th floor is, we believe, the most listened-to radio studio in the nation, for it's here that Paul Harvey speaks to America and the world three times daily. It doesn't get much simpler, does it? Two Electro-Voice RE20 mikes, a monitor speaker and the clock on the wall pretty much sum up the gear, and the decorations are limited to a glass case on the floor that holds the dozens of keys that Mr. Harvey has been given to cities and towns around the country.

But when Mr. Harvey sits down and, on the cue from his engineer (out of frame through a window to the left of the clock), launches into "Hello, Americans...", there are few experiences that can compare to being in the studio when the master is practicing his art. I think I may have breathed once or twice during the 15-minute midday newscast (fed from here at 10:35 AM CT), but it's hard to remember in all the excitement.

After the newscast is over (and with it, Mr. Harvey's day - he comes in at 4 AM, writes both his daily broadcasts himself, and is on his way home after a few quick retakes of several words in the midday newscast), we're treated to a brief tour of the comfortable office suite in which the Paul Harvey News staff works. While the control room still houses four big Otari reel-to-reel machines, the broadcasts are now edited digitally to be refed to ABC in New York and then to the hundreds of affiliates around the country.

A conference room looks into the studio; it's used for greeting visitors (including my companion for this tour, Blaine Thompson of Indiana Radio Watch fame, for whom Mr. Harvey has several questions about Fort Wayne and about his affiliate there, WOWO.)

Down the hall are offices for the staff, for Mr. Harvey himself and for his wife, Angel, who still comes to the office from time to time. (We can attest, having seen it personally, that the Paul Harvey newscasts are still typed on an IBM Selectric typewriter by the man himself.)

It's a pleasure to report that Paul Harvey himself is every bit as gracious and accommodating in his studio as he sounds on the air - and that, at 85, he's still the picture of good health. (And it was a pleasure to be able to thank him in person for saying such nice things about the Tower Site Calendar last year...and to learn that his engineer reads some of your humble scribe's writings from time to time!)

One more thing before we leave the Paul Harvey News studios and make our way over to the nation's tallest building for a quick transmitter tour. Have you ever wondered what the receptionist at Paul Harvey News says to visitors as they leave? What else - "Good day!"