I started in broadcast television in 1983 as a news stringer for the Portland, Oregon network affiliates: KGW, KATU and KOIN and the public TV station. Living on the coast put me in a good place for a part-time job covering events and news that the crews in the city couldn't get to. Since I'm a pilot I could deliver the tapes to Portland in time for the 6 or 11 PM programs. Although that made me a pretty valuable asset it made for some extremely hectic shoots. Covering news can be stressful in itself but when I had to make the deadline by flying over mountain ranges and avoiding weather in single-engine, rented airplanes there were times when it was more than I should have tried.

My first story was a non-injury shark attack. Another was a missing person which I would rather have not done. The poor mother, whose daughter was never found, wept on camera and showed me pictures as if I was there to help.

Ann Curry, who has been with NBC for many years, was with KGW at the time. The reporters and assignment editors that I worked with then were very generous and instructive, Ann particularly. She took the time to write to me with suggestions on one occasion and included her editing notes to help me see what the reporters and editors need to assemble a good story. The reporters, editors and cameramen helped me whenever they could and I respected them for that and how well many of them did their jobs. I was also impressed with their cynicism. The day that Korean Airlines flight 007 was shot down I was working at one of the studios in Portland. I heard about it on the radio on the way over the mountains from Tillamook and by the time I got there the jokes had already started.

Another customer while we lived in Oregon was the MacNeil-Lehrer news hour. They had a segment at the end of each program, like CBS Sunday Morning does now, in which scenery from around the country is shown. The Oregon coast has some of the most beautiful scenery there is so I sent them tapes of the beaches and forests near Tillamook and I went to Northern California once to do it there too.

After moving to Los Angeles in 1985 and then to Florida I continued to do in-house video with the companies I was with, RCA, General Electric and then back in Delaware with ILC Dover. When I started my own production company in the mid nineties, I produced commercials and PSAs for Comcast Cablevision, supervised multi-camera shoots for Comcast and others, and myriad other tasks and projects for businesses and individuals in Delaware and elsewhere. My credentials were on international, crew-for-hire data bases which resulted in work from producers in California, Seattle, England, Atlanta, New York and Switzerland. It was through those channels that I came to work on "WIld On" on E Entertainment television, "Wife Swap", casting calls for reality shows, and a documentary on a trans-gender couple living in Milton, Delaware that was pitched to HBO.

Video isn't a professional activity for me now but I shoot for fun, including skydives and sailing, and I still allow myself to get roped into recording family functions. Weddings, Facebook posts and memorial slide shows are among the things I do for our friends and relatives now.