Veteran broadcaster Neal Barton logged 45 years as a weather forecaster and news anchor. He shares a wealth of anecdotes and insights, peeling back the curtain on the inner workings of a TV newsroom, from the adrenaline-fueled reality of live ad-libbing to the precision required in weather predictions. Barton recounts the changes he’s witnessed—both in the news and in Tyler. He also shares the personal impact of stepping away from the relentless schedule that once dictated his every hour, offering a rare glimpse into the life of a man many have seen as a public figure.
TRANSCRIPT
LANDESS:
A 45-year career in broadcasting came to an end recently when the evening anchor for KETK News in Tyler announced he was leaving the news desk. I’m UT Tyler Radio News Director Mike Landess. After two decades in East Texas, UT Tyler Radio Connects with Neil Barton to find out if he’s really all done with cameras and microphones. Are you?
BARTON:
Everybody’s asking what’s going on, what’s the next step? I don’t know. All I know is I’m retired. You have been in the business, I think this much longer than me.
LANDESS:
Oh, it’ll be 60 years, actually, in December.
BARTON:
Forty-five for me. When I was 19, I got my first radio job. And you know it’s been 45 years of catching records, reading news, being on time, interviewing people, whatever, but everything dictated by a clock. And for the first time in my life, I barely know what day it is, and I am in heaven.
LANDESS:
You did weather for a long, long time.
BARTON: Twenty years, baby.
LANDESS: Yeah and talk about being on a clock. Here we want you to tell about everything that’s going on in the world, across the country, here in East Texas, here in the town, and I want you to do it in a minute and a half or 2 minutes or whatever.
BARTON:
That had to do with ad-libbing, and I did that better than anything else in the world — for me. And so I really enjoyed it. But I had a chance to go back in the news here, and it was the right time and the right place. People will always say, you know, you’re going to miss it, or have you missed it at all? And the answer is “No, not one bit.” I’ve been going for about a month, maybe three weeks, two months or whatever, and it’s been glorious. I’m sort of a commando when it comes to this sort of thing. When I’m done with something, I’m done. And that’s just me.
LANDESS:
Now, when you say done with something, done with the specific responsibilities that you had being on the air every night? Having dinner at your desk? Or if you got a chance to go home or at a restaurant or something like that.
BARTON: Every day showing up at this time, afternoon meeting, gotta write-this, gotta say-this, got to be here at 4:17. Have to do that. Got to be there at 5. Blub, blub, blub. Punching a clock electronically, I guess we can say with a microphone, for the time being, as we were saying before we taped… I guess we don’t tape anymore, we zero and one, digital, or whatever. But that’s it for now. I mean, that is just it.
LANDESS:
How does it feel to be a dinosaur? I was thinking that’s what I felt like when I finally got out of it.
BARTON:
I feel a little heavy. But you are to a point because you look around. You make jokes in the newsroom about Jimmy Stewart or James Cagney or whatever. Nobody knows what you’re talking about. You talk about Walter Cronkite. Nobody knows what you’re talking about. John Chancellor — nobody knows what you’re talking about. So, I am a dinosaur.
LANDESS:
I feel like I catch myself, particularly here on a college campus, and I’m sure in a newsroom full of kids, and they are all young people, they’re all young.
BARTON:
Nowadays, they are all young, even the bigger markets, they’re young.
LANDESS:
Yeah, coming right out of college or haven’t even had a first job yet, some of them it seems like. And I realize that the generational aspect is very difficult. You, I do some coaching and working with young reporters. I will make a reference to so-and-so, and I can see the eyes glazing over. They have no idea what I’m talking about.
BARTON:
Even just the vernacular we had in the ’60s, ’70s, ’80s and ’90s. They’re like, “What does he mean by that? What does that mean?”
LANDESS:
You know what I said the other day. I said to one of the reporters, I said, “You know, that fire that you covered, it had great flameage.” And they looked at me and said, “What’s flameage?” and I was going…
BARTON: Pictures look good.
LANDESS: The pictures look good because the fire is is going all over the place. Twenty years, Neil, 20 years in this market in Tyler, Texas. You have seen some amazing changes in the city and actually, this entire community.
BARTON:
Well, no one’s going to say because we’re all competitors to a point, but the index sign at the bottom of the screen, whatever, I brought that. The county-by-county forecast, I brought that. A few other things I brought. That was me. I didn’t invent it, I just brought it from different markets to here, and it was my pleasure.
LANDESS:
Yeah, yeah. And the thing that I find fascinating is that you operated as the main anchor and the news director.
BARTON:
For 13 years. Well, I got here, and the lady who hired me left. And I thought I didn’t move–
LANDESS:
Because she hired you?
BARTON:
No, no no, could you blame her? She had some taste. She left, and I thought I didn’t come here to see who’s coming to the door. So I went down to the new general manager, and I said, “Let me do it; I can do this.” Eddie Barker did it in Dallas, Walter Cronkite was a managing editor. I can do this, at least for the time being, and I did. Now, eventually things did change. We got bought by a brand new company, different aspects about things, and you had to be one or the other. And I would have just as soon stayed behind the scenes and been news director. But they said, “You’ve been on the air this long. Stay on the air for us.” So I did, but 13 years, I didn’t know that I was coming or going. People tell us stories all the time, even before I left. Remember the time you came in and you chewed us all out for whatever? I’m like no, too busy, just too busy. Because I literally I was getting up at 8 in the morning, being there for the 9 a.m. story meeting and working till 10:30 at night. But I liked it. I didn’t realize I was halfway to wrecking my health and driving myself crazy, but I enjoyed it because you got the same look in your eyes as I do. This is still fun. All the trappings of a radio station, the TV station, the cables or whatever, it’s still fun. And I can’t imagine going to work somewhere else, like an insurance office or whatever, where you have desktop computers and a coffee pot or whatever. I still like to know when I’m tapping this microphone here, it’s going somewhere.
LANDESS: Yeah, yeah.
BARTON: It’s going somewhere.
LANDESS: It is. You know, I was also thinking about the fact that being in this market as long as you have with Anissa Centers, Anissa Centers and Mark Scirto and you are probably the three longest-running acts in town.
BARTON:
Well, it’s hard to hit a moving target. I came here to do this. And when I got here, we had a consultant who came up to me and said, “We know why you’re here. We can get you out of here.” I’m like no, no. “We’re having trouble finding someone in Kansas City.” I’m like no, this is my thing, I’m staying here. I’ve got a farm down the road. At the time, my parents are both alive. I’ve done the revolving neon sign act of being all over the country, Hello. And all the expense of moving someplace else, broken furniture or whatever. This is it. And no one for years believed me: I was going to stay. I was going to stay until they finally kicked me out or I left. And so there you are.
LANDESS:
You know, it is interesting that our industry is one that’s itinerant. You go where the work is, and if you’ve had any kind of a career at all, you’ve been in a lot of places. You’ve been in a lot of places. Tell us all where you’ve been.
BARTON:
Started off in Beaumont-Port Arthur, and went to Austin, Texas. From there, when I was young — I love the farm — I moved to a KTRE television in Lufkin. I got there and realized I’m making no money, I can’t make this thing work. I got to get back on the road again. I went to Monroe, Louisiana; Dallas, Texas, for 5 years, Seattle for 5 years, Nashville for a couple of years, back to Dallas and here. So pretty much my furniture was broken up. I couldn’t afford any more furniture.
LANDESS:
There are times that when I’m speaking to a like an Optimist Club or something like that, I’ll say you know when they talk, when you talk about all of the places, one of us in this industry talks about where all we’ve been, it sounds like the announcer at the airport. You know, all of these different destinations.
BARTON: Now boarding to Dallas, Seattle-Tacoma A4.
LANDESS: That’s right.
BARTON: No, but I really enjoyed it. I grew up in Beaumont, Texas. It was an usually good radio market. It was an OK TV market. I wanted to be in radio, and I never thought about going to television. But the consultants killed the radio stations there. So I thought well, with my degree, before I sell life insurance, I’ll go and try the television station. And boom, I was better at television than I was radio. I thought so. So that’s how it is. But —
LANDESS:
I agree, you’re better.
BARTON:
Thank you, and I enjoyed my time. I called it almost my military experience because you know, used to back, our fathers and grandfathers, they had to go to the service, and so you had to go in. They moved across the country. That’s what made VFW halls. They could sit around and drink and smoke and talk about what they did in Subic Bay and the Philippines or whatever. But I enjoyed it. I learned a lot. I made great friends from all over the country, but when it was said and done, this is where I wanted to be home, and I’m here.
LANDESS:
Yeah, you know, you and I had lunch a couple of years ago, and I was thinking to myself at the time. I’ve used the analogy with friends any number of times. They said, they asked me. They said, “Would you like to be an anchor again?” I said, “Can you imagine me and Neil Barton in the same town? Two Q-tips on the air.”
BARTON:
Exactly, and I’m not dying my darn hair. I’m not dying the hair. This is how it is.
LANDESS: Did they ever try to make you do it?
BARTON: They never did. Years ago, when I was in Seattle, I had a hair person that said, “Let’s try it.” And she says, “Trust me, if we screw it up, we can fix it. We can fix it.” She did it. She couldn’t fix it. My nickname was like Rusty for about a month. I was, “Come on hair, grow out, grow out, grow out, grow out!” And so finally it grew out about a quarter of an inch, and I’m like, shave it, cut it, cut it and so no hair, I mean no, no hair dying.
LANDESS:
One of the things that I’ve enjoyed about my aspect of this part of my life is working with young people. Like I said, I do some coaching. You — the number of people who wrote on your Facebook page, out there social media were young people who talked about what an influence you had been on them. What a great mentor you had been, and I don’t know whether you were kicking their tails and yelling at them behind the scenes, but whatever it was, it worked, and it was memorable.
BARTON:
I’ve always led by example. Words were cheap. Talk is cheap. And so I’m a type-A personality, so I think they had a chance to watch. When I was news director, I didn’t ask them to do anything I wouldn’t do. If the tornado came through, I worked a 17-hour day, just like they did. I shot, with a camera, everything else. I think a lot of ways people can see you, and they’re pulled along. They’re pulled along. You can yell, yell at people and threaten and do this or that or whatever. That doesn’t mean, especially with a new, young journalist or whatever. Back in our day I used to tell the story all the time, and you’ll back me up on this because we’re about the same age. In the old days of broadcasting and television, if you had a disagreement with a guy, you may have gone to the parking lot. He’s going outside. “Hey, don’t you ever, ever” and back and forth, and back and forth. You know what? You got it out, you got it out, and you became best friends. “Who’s buying the beer tonight? Who’s doing it?”
LANDESS:
Exactly. I’ve got a lot of stories just like that. I know exactly what you’re saying.
BARTON:
And it worked out better. Now, I’m not saying anybody should bully. No one should take advantage of anybody, or whatever. But sometimes it’s kind of like: “You know what, Mike, I don’t like this.” And we can work this thing out, or whatever. It’s kind of you win some, I win some, or whatever. But that’s what made the wheel go around. I mean, my god, I tell them all the time they couldn’t believe it. The butt chewings my first general — no, not general manager with news director right would give us. I mean absolutely non-PC, it was ugly, but you know what? You picked up your drawers, and you went along and you made it work.
LANDESS:
And you know what man that is generational. It just does not fly.
BARTON:
It does not fly.
LANDESS:
You’d be in HR in a heartbeat and looking for a new gig. Yeah, no question about that. Tell me about your favorite story that you’ve done since you’ve been in East Texas for 20 some odd–or a couple of your favorite stories, ones that that you love to tell them, to share with other people about that this is why I do what I do.
BARTON:
Well, there’s just so many. I mean basically just helping people. Bicycles for Christmas.
LANDESS: Neil’s Wheels!
BARTON: Neil’s Wheels, the whole thing, that sort of thing. Making sure the weather was there because the weather is still the one thing that drives local television. It’s what affects everybody. There’s just so many things: helping out animals, lost animals. And helping people who really needed the help, because, as you well know, and this is also changing about news. News is what other people don’t want you to know about. Everything else is public relations. What I’m trying to say is uncovering facts, forcing people to do the right thing. That sorta thing. That’s news. You know what I’m saying?
LANDESS:
Holding the powerful accountable.
BARTON:
Exactly — that’s news. Everything else is public relations. Going to the food bank, which is important because they they feed people. Going to this shelter, going to that or whatever. That’s public relations. There’s a place for it. But holding people accountable, that sort of thing, that’s important. And there’s been so many those. I’m sorry. I don’t know off the top of my head I can only give one. But it’s basically when the time came, saying hey, hey, hey, hey. Putting microphones in front of somebody’s face and watching them back down, who was doing something wrong.
LANDESS:
Wrong. Absolutely. Share some final thoughts with our our viewers about — our viewers. Listen to me. Share some–
BARTON: We’ve done this for a long time.
LANDESS: You got me sucked right into that. I’ve just lost it.
BARTON: I lost it years ago.
LANDESS: Share some final thoughts, if you would, about what you think the industry is doing, what it ought to do?
BARTON:
Well, what broke my heart years ago when I was a news director–We had a– not the people who own us now, our former company. They loved consultants, and they would come in the newsroom or whatever. Social media was brand new, Twitter was brand new, the whole thing, whatever. And they’re like get it out there as fast as possible, get it out, get it out, get it out. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Do we know if this is right or not? And they said what’s the sound of another one saying we’re wrong, or we’ll correct or whatever? No, well, on my sign off, on my personal email, you may have seen it. It’s from Wyatt Earp. Uh, “Fast is fine, but accuracy is everything.” And that’s what worries me about where it’s going. It’s just so fast. Get something out there. Is this right or not? Is this vetted? Our chief engineer back in KETK years ago when I was general manager — he’s not there anymore, but he used to say, “Eventually, people are going to start doing newscasts out of their garage.” And I said, “No, they won’t, because someone’s gotta vet it. Someone’s going to make sure it’s right.” But the darn thing about it is, he was right. Yes, people are doing that. And what’s going on nowadays is people just go to where they want to hear what they want to hear, plug in there, and they said that is their truth. There is no “their truth.” It’s what the truth is — the truth or not? It’s just you and I can both see in that traffic accident here at UT Tyler. I got one side, you got the other side. You think it’s the purple car, I think it’s the white car’s fault or whatever, but there’s a truth. Who’s it? Who’s it’s involved? There’s not your fault, your truth or my truth. It’s the truth, and that drives me insane. Drives me insane because this is a precious business. It’s a calling. You forsake dinner time with family, personal time, a lot of emotional, getting your rear end chewed out by the news director or this one. There’s a lot of stress, and I’ve enjoyed it. It’s like high-stake gambling in Las Vegas, but it’s a wonderful line of work. And now that I see basically it’s turning into a web-based product. I still think there should be a man or woman out there on the screen looking at you, making contact with you, informing you, being your friend. That’s what this business is still all about, and I hope it doesn’t go away.
LANDESS:
Thanks for listening as UT Tyler Radio Connects with veteran TV news anchor Neil Barton. To share, listen again or for a transcript of this interview, visit our website UTTylerRadio.org. To be notified about future episodes, subscribe to “UT Tyler Radio Connects” on your favorite podcast platform. For UT Tyler Radio News, I’m Mike Landess.
(Transcripts are automatically generated and may contain phonetic spellings and other spelling and punctuation errors. Grammar errors contained in the original recording are not typically corrected.)
