KNME Jon Cooper, Goodbye Tape

You You Thanks,

John, for 21 years of service to KNME TV. You have taken us on a long journey with many accomplishments. You have been an inspiration to all of us and we will be forever grateful. We wish you the best of luck with your new future and we will certainly miss you. I hope you enjoy the many kind words that follow from your friends and staff at KNME TV. Good luck, John. One of the things that I think has demonstrated the success that John has had over the years is the success that we've had with the legislature and with the state of New Mexico in terms of the funding for the conversion to digital. John has put together a good team, many of whom are here today that have participated in making that happen. But it's under John's leadership that a fantastic group of KNME employees have been put together. And that the real vision to see what could be accomplished, not only in terms of public broadcast programming, but also in terms of the conversion to digital

television. John is for John's leadership and vision that has enabled that to take place. I want to stop for just a moment before we go on with the program. Dorothy and Pam have a special surprise that I think right now would be the right time to bring that in at this point. And so I'll just stop for a moment and let them go out and come back with a special surprise. You're a favorite person. In case you all don't know John, he loves Julie London. She's made a special appearance for him today. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. We wanted to be here

so that we can participate in the other parts of the program today. Can you round her arm around? I'm going to violate the proper protocol for these kinds of things, and that's very cute. Carol, I hope you don't get too young. She did. The proper protocol is always to have the presentation of the gift at the end of the program. But I'm going to do it differently today because I want people to have the opportunity to see John open his gift. And if anybody has the leap early, I want to make sure that they have a chance to see this. So John, you'll get a chance to talk a little bit later, but I want you to open your gift now if you would. And I hope that Julie doesn't snatch it out of your hands.

There's a story about it. You can tell the story while you're opening your gift. I made a simple straightforward comment one time that I thought was wonderful in terms of a gangbusters fundraiser. I thought, I mean, this thing will work. And everybody went to what it was. I said, let's do a concert with Julie London. And there was dead silence in the room. No one in the entire room knew who I was talking about. It has to do with the age of your style. It has to do with my age. Well, then I might have been the only other one in the room who would have recognized the next. Really John, we want you to get to the gift. Oh, I'm sorry. I have trouble with timing.

You've been the only piece of advice I didn't take John. Did you get it? Just the only one? That's what I didn't take. There's walking shoes. Oh, right. Thank you very much. The reason we had to do this was he was afraid he was going to take his palm away with him. And then he went, there would be some misdemeanor charge available. And he didn't have anything to check. Oh, thank you very much. The palm pilot. Before I ask a few of the directors to say a few words, I'd just like to say, how much I have enjoyed working with John. He's always the gentleman. He knows so much. He's taught me so much about public television. I have a lot more to learn in the fact that I don't know as much as I should is not his fault.

But it's been a real pleasure for me the last three years to work with John. And I will miss you very much, John. I have valued the working relationship. It's been a wonderful experience for me. Now the directors would like to make a few comments. This comes. Oh, we have another gift here. Dorothy's a little nervous about putting it in our hands. But this is a... I've already gotten smudged. It plugs in. Put exactly just the plug in. Is it backwards? Yes. This is what it is. It's got all the different logos. It's got all the logos. I guess you should turn it around. I wouldn't have started by saying thank you, John, for spending the last 20 plus years

with us at Channel 5. We really had a lot of fun. A lot of you would probably disagree and say, fun when we're working 20 hours a day, you know, instead of eight. But it really has been as Judy has said. I mean, I was a listener. It's so true. When I first began working at Channel 5, and John later joined us in 1979, the station was really laying low. We were producing, I think, about six studio -based programs. And three of them were two of them were actually music, this Kathleen and Nancy Johnson. And we were producing the Dr. George Fishback series, the science series. And other than that, the programs were there, but they really weren't having impact. Well, John came along and we stopped what we were doing, and started doing producing programs that really had impact on us here. That, I mean, the documentaries that

really placed us in the books, as far as PDS, the community is concerned. We won tons of awards. John really allowed us to take risks in producing these documentaries that we would have probably not otherwise have done. And then he didn't stop there. I mean, programming our group we have been a worker for the longest time, the most viewed public television stations in the nation. And a lot of that had to do with the fact that he wasn't, I mean, we were allowed to create a schedule that best served as community. Not what PDS was feeding us that served other communities. We became the most viewed public television station. And we have won awards because of the fact that we're an award -winning station. So, you know, it wouldn't have happened. And he hasn't even stopped. I mean, we've just began the education

area, and we're very successful in that area already in the short time that we've done. A lot of times we all said we can't do it. We can't do it. And John just kept pushing a little bit and a little bit and later proved that we could do it. And I think it's because of all of these efforts that we have all put together and we have all accomplished that has really allowed us to be successful in our fundraising campaign for DTV. Had it not been for all those risks that John allowed us to do to take, we really wouldn't be regret. So, I'm going to say thank you. I really enjoyed working for you. And I'm going to miss you years right across the hallway for me. When he had bad days, I had good days. We were never, you know, in sync. So, but we always tolerated you. Thank you, John. I think

one of the other qualities that I really appreciated through the years from the very beginning was the fact that you listened. You listened to me and you didn't know much about what I could do or not do, Champon. But you allowed me the luxury of, you know, telling me what I wanted to do and then supporting me in it. And through the years as going from a one person department to numerous people in a team of professionals that you now have a can of me, that two takes leadership and someone who's willing, as Shirley said, to take the risk. And you were that kind of person. I saw you work well in crisis and we had a bunch of those to deal with. I think you handle those things well. The other thing I admire about you, to me, used to be a good Christian person because you knew how to turn the other cheek. Sometimes, sometimes things happen that, you know, and you just for the kind of person that let people have their say.

And anyway, I enjoy working with you and I wish you well your next adventure. And I want to also thank you for allowing Carol. Carol was one, Carol and I would probably team there from the beginning and you know, you're a great dancer. And lots of fun when you're not at the office. John, 21 years is quite an accomplishment. It's hard for me to even imagine being anywhere for 21 years, much less what you accomplished in your 21 years here. From programming success to establishing the station on a development basis to the progress we've made in getting digital television realized and getting the three stations working together. There's a lot to be proud of in that time period. And it's been great working with you too. I've learned a lot and certainly we've had a lot of experiences all over in New Mexico on the road shows and

changing tires as I mentioned at the lunch and other things. I still can't imagine what you are going to do after the adrenaline rush of doing all this project. How you're going to be able to withdraw and pull back and do something else. You've certainly earned that rest from all this, but I can't see how you're going to disengage. So again, I can't say goodbye, but I can say we'll see you next time on the next project. Thanks and good luck. John, thank you very much for all the years that you have contributed to K &M and PBS. We thank you very much for your services and we hope that you will be around for a long time. Come back and help us as we pursue the DTV adventure because we know that you'll play a big part in that. Again, thank you very much for all your work that you've done here at K &M to make this a great station. And we hope that your retirement is just exactly what you've always

dreamed of. Thanks again and good luck with your new adventure. Well, John, good luck on your retirement. I hope you enjoy it and enjoy all your grandbabies and grandbabies to come. And I hope you enjoy your new life and have fun and it's been a pleasure working with you for all these years. And I hope we see you around soon. Bye -bye. Hi, Mr. Cooper. Well, this is kind of sad and happy at the same time. I'm happy for you that you're retiring and starting something new in your career because you're still too young to retire. It's really been a pleasure working for you. It seems like it's just a couple of months since I've worked for you. I really have enjoyed it. And hopefully we'll be seeing you around. You can't desert us completely. And if you need anything, I'm here. It's not going to be the same here without you. We're really going to miss you. But happy retirement and maybe you can get to England and see that gorgeous grandbaby of yours.

So good luck and goodbye. Well, John, here it is. You're very last day at work. I dreaded this day and I thought, actually, I didn't ever think I'd see this day. I thought maybe I'd leave before you and you've beat me and I hate you for it. But I just wanted to say that I've really enjoyed working with you. It's been a lot of fun and we've had good times and bad times, but the good ones always have outweighed the bad times clearly. And I just wish you all the luck in the world in what you will be doing, whatever that is. I'm sure you'll be great at it. And always remember that we will be here and we will always need your support financially, especially now. So stay tuned and give me a call if you ever think something's going wrong on the air. And I'll see what I can do about fixing it only for you. Thanks a lot. Good luck. We love you.

Can't I mean, may I help you? John Cooper? No, he's moved on to other ventures. We miss him dearly. He will visit. Thanks for calling. We miss you. Bye. I accept that. Thank you. Unique opportunity to express myself and I sincerely hope that he makes the best of his next new challenge. I'm sorry, Jay. Yeah. That's Bert. Hi, John. It's nice to know on you. I really miss you. I wish you all the best and where you're going to. Oh, you're retiring. Well, that's even better. I wish I could retire. Well, I want to be like you when I grow up. All the best. Cheers. And I also want to

thank you, John, for the opportunity to come here about two and a half years ago. And I thought coming from Nebraska ETV to a small station might be difficult, but it really has been a lot of fun because it's more like family. You get to know everybody really well and then when you ask me to be in charge of the statewide conversion to digital, that really was exciting because putting together the PTFP grand, working with all the chief engineers at the other stations. So it's been a very rewarding experience for my career. And as you know, I plan to stay here till I retire. Unless I get hit by a Mac truck someday. Okay, man, is that enough? John, we wish you the best of luck. I hope you really enjoy your time away from can and me. Take advantage of everything that you can do. Like off, go fishing. Take some great vacations and just enjoy life. This is a wonderful time. And I hope that you and your family really enjoy it. We'll miss you here at can and me. Good luck with everything. You want to wave? Bye! I

say something and then we'll just wave and take a bite. Yeah, we can do that. Okay, so ladies and development, take one. Oh, shit. Terrible. Ready? Hi, John. Everybody over here from Membership. Sure does appreciate all you've done for us. And we're really going to miss you. And we hope you have a good time in retirement. And take it easy. And we will miss you very much. Congratulations. Happy retirement. Thanks, John. Yes, thanks, John. Congratulations. Bye. Okay. John, I really want to thank you for everything you've done for the station. And especially for me, because you gave me an opportunity to come into the development area. When was it? Years ago. So

I appreciate that. And I wish you lots of luck and have a nice retirement. You deserve it. Talk to you later. John, have a great retirement. You've earned it. Hey, John. Well, you know, everybody's going to miss you around here. I want to miss you, too. Yeah, we're going to miss you. Oh, my friends, and I'm going to miss you. The little green guy is going to miss you. The little red guy is going to miss you. The purple guy is going to miss you. We are all going to miss you, Cooper. Bye -bye. See you later. Have fun. Confession. Don't work so hard. you. I'm going to miss you. And

we have had what, to me, has been a very important working relationship in a way that I think has helped me to understand the role of K &Mee in the university and in the community. And that I hope has given John and K &Mee the opportunity to interact perhaps more regularly and in different ways with the university. John, as you know, much better than I is so committed to public television in this community and in this country. And I think the fact that you are here this evening speaks to that. It's a wonderful tribute to John. I could talk about his accomplishments, but you know about his accomplishment as well or better than I do. What I would like to say is that John's accomplishments over the last 21 years really leave us with a future at K &Mee. We're able to go forward because of what John has done over the last 20 years,

mostly in a very quiet, unassuming way. He's assembled a wonderful staff. The people at K &Mee are so devoted to public television and to K &Mee. He has engendered an enormous amount of support in this community for public television. And his gift to us is a future for public television in this community and in this state. And we in turn will, I am quite sure, make our gift to him that we will steward K &Mee in the future and that it will always have a big piece of John Cooper attached to it. It's been my honor and pleasure to work with John over the last three years. I will miss him terribly. We have persuaded him to help us out in a couple of ways over the next few months until we have a new general manager. There will never be a replacement for John, but there will be a new general manager. He will help us during that transition period until that new

general manager is here and he will also continue to be involved with us in terms of the capital campaign for K &Mee. And I want those of you who are in the community and on the K &Mee staff to know how much K &Mee means to the University of New Mexico. It's really very important to the university and will continue to be even more important. And I think that that is something that perhaps we don't say often enough to the people who are involved with K &Mee. The K &Mee really is a jewel of you and them and we treasure it and we will continue to treasure it. We also have for you a resolution from the Board of Directors John and a picture of you so you won't forget what you look like. And

John, as I understand that you once admired this picture of University House and so we have for you your own picture of University House signed by President Bill Gordon who was very sorry that he couldn't be here this evening. Thank you. We have a few people. One more thing. This is Raft John. Is he to unwrap it right now, Dorothy? Certainly. Okay. But we had a little staff lunch in the other day and John was unwrapping these presents painfully, slowly, genuinely. So just tear it open, John. Be wild and crazy. Oh, okay. You can just move on, move on. Carol says, wild and crazy is

not in his repertoire. I can actually tell you that myself from firsthand knowledge because we went to Nashville last year for the PBS annual meeting. And we never left the hotel. We went to meetings from seven in the morning until 10 at night. One, I said, can we go to the grand old offer or something? He said there is a meeting tonight on cables, something or other. And I really think we need to go to that. So if there's a wild and crazy side, I never saw it. Have I given you enough time to open it up? Thank you very much. I'll tell you about that. I guess it looks like a clock. So he'll... You're home often. Yes. Let me say that I'm very fond of thinking of a great novella written by Eugene Rhodes, called Paso Porocchi, which I understand means essentially he passed this way. And I like to think of that

when I'm on an occasion like this, when John is stepping down from that post. Because you're very glad that you did pass this way. I'm further that you saw him stay for 21 years. In my opinion, but with television in the state, the enemy, of course, the TV in the state, in the Rocky Mountain region, and nationally, and most important, the audiences that these stations serve are all better today than they would have been if you had not been here, John. So having said that, I have a thing to present to you, too. You will put over here. I want to give you a genuine... You know the rest of it, and you were talking to that time and again. Oh,

I got here. I got here as a genuine, the enemy artifact. Oh, right. I did a little archeology on my mantle, and then one of the Indian pots, this showed up. It's from the 1960s. It's a pin that says, we watch Channel 5. And it was these. We ordered 25 ,000 done. George Fishback gave them all out in about a month. We ordered another 25 ,000. George and Kathleen and the other owner of teachers gave them out. I don't know how many thousand we finally went through. But anyway, John, I think you should have this as an important artifact from the enemy's past. Having sent that back on the earth. And I thought, what can I give John to help him remember all the support that he gave us, getting those music programs

on the air, and allowing us to do all the crazy things we did. I'm sure he thought that someday I was going to bring Ben, who is chariot, right into the studio, but we didn't do that. I didn't get around to that, John. But he was always very supportive and helped us in every way that he possibly could to get those programs on the air. We finally got a few on tape, believe it or not. And I thought, what can I give John? And I thought of maybe a musical instrument. Well, you know how much musical instruments cost these days. So I thought of something. I thought that all the little hummers would probably appreciate the fact that John can have his own do -it -yourself hum -a -kit. And John was just telling me that I would be an hour together on the plants drive. That he has a little hummer in the family now, right? He has

a grandson, granddaughter in England. And so if you need help, learning how to do this, John, I'll be glad to give you a lesson, or maybe we can call on a little hummer to do it. You know, John's wife, Carol and I remember the days back in the... Where is Carol? Back in the days when we remember the old sorority that was actually the studio. And then we moved into what then was a beautiful studio that needs to be probably renovated now. But just so you don't think that my husband, Doug and I, are all callous about your retirement in my flippant way. I want you to know how much we appreciate all you have done for public television and community. And hum -a -long. Well,

the wedding hummer is actually here somewhere, little Caitlin. Where is Caitlin? She's out. She's out. Okay, I'll let John do those introductions of the family later on this. I'm not going to let everybody do this because we would be here until two o 'clock in the morning. But Ron Salock wanted to have two minutes. And so we'll certainly be pleased to have him come up and speak to us for a couple minutes. Thank you, Judy, and knowing Wayne, I will be brief. Well, I arrived in New Mexico in 1991 when this gentleman down here, Jim Dryden, decided to retire from, or 1992, actually, from KRWGTV in Las Cruces. Well, I was being the youngest in terms of experience in New Mexico as a general manager. And John representing the largest and in terms of dollars, the wealthiest of the three stations in New Mexico. I started referring

him to as being our elder spokesman. Whenever we discussed whoever should talk and represent our efforts before legislative committees, that type of situation. And we always asked John to do it because he was so eloquent and knowledgeable about New Mexico and the needs of the three stations. For us all three stations, this effort really paid off in 1998 when $1 million was placed into the general obligation bond issue for equipment replacement to be split among the three stations and it passed. And that was the first time that that occurred, I believe, since sometime in the mid to late 80s. So John, for being the leader at the $1 million level, you're all familiar with pledge drives. We have for you this thank you gift. On behalf of KRWGTV, and I'm sure Dwayne

Ryan for Portales, we have this handy -dandy t -shirt. Now, in the year 2000, as Wayne mentioned, we were even more successful when the legislature included 7 .2 million in the general obligation bond issue to help with the three stations converting to digital television. So John, for being the leader at the $7 .2 million level, we have for you this handy -dandy t -shirt. And because we're the poor station in the South, at least that's a line they use with our legislators. We can't afford cloth, hand, fancy tote bags, but here's a handy -dandy plastic bag to put your gifts in. John, thank you so much for

this gift. I want to do nothing other than thank you personally for giving that kind of time to your community. It is probably out of the way you were brought up, or as we would say, my group would say how you were raised. And I am proud to be able to be allowed to say it to you. I take that position under two things. I am a free man of color, but I'm free. I'm a free man. And I use every opportunity to push forward good product. You are a good quality, John. And we are happy to have had you in this community. I would not have known you had it not been for a lady, John Gantz -Kuni, who said,

when you get there, get to know him. And I'm proud that that lady introduced me to you. I think then to say thank you is really all I want to do to thank you. And I want all of you in this room, those of you who are seated to get up on your feet. Get up. Give this time. And I guess I'll just close with this for $150. I can send you the video tape. Your chart is on the CD. All right, that is the set. And of course, we'll see you do the membership card, which is super one -dining. And if you put it on your charge card, we'd love to send you a

12 month subscription of Sunset Magazine. Time Magazine. And of course, on top of all of that, you get our program guide, Vintana, for a full year. Thank you all for being here. I really appreciate it. You You