Door-to-Door Salesman
I always had a summer job; had to. Mother said so. Throwing newspapers. Mowing lawns. And for four years working in state offices here in Missouri’s Capital City. I absolutely hated the state jobs--filing mostly. So, when a guy recruited me to sell books door-to-door after my junior year in college, I picked up a sample case and went.
For four years, three months each summer, I knocked on doors for the Southwestern Company: first in Covington, KY; then Greensboro, NC; then Ebensburg, PA; and finally in Lancaster, PA. Sue was with me three of those four summers. The work was hard. Just walking up to each door, knocking and getting in for a demonstration was challenging. And I had to make 30 demos a day; six days a week.
I made very good money but more importantly, I learned selling. The last three years I took a team of men with me, so I learned managing. And I learned about myself. In fact, I credit those four years with Southwestern as valuable as my college education. I came to believe in myself. And therein was the spark, I think, that led to the creation of Learfield.
--clyde
Early in my freshman year I joined the staff of the campus radio station, KMOE. I was a disc jockey; er, an announcer. I absolutely loved it. I loved everything about it. It became my passion over my entire four years. One of the cool things we did was home and away play-by-play of “The Eagles’” games. I recall how exciting it was to have the live feed from Liberty, Mo. when we played the hated William Jewel Cardinals. Big stuff in 1964.
It was some 35 years ago that some of us began building this company. What started as a dream for me in college began to come to reality in late summer of 1972. By October I'd written a very rough business plan and we were incorporated on November 1st as Missouri Network, Inc., a name we later changed. Our first broadcast was on January 2, 1973.
Last night we announced and celebrated the election of Phil Atkinson and Jeff Martin as company Vice Presidents. Neither was aware, so the dinner was delightful for that reason alone. Phil was there with his wife, Sheri; and Jeff with Cathy. Sue and I, Roger and Cheri, and Paul and Katie joined in the celebration at the Jefferson City Country Club. Phil is head of Information Technology; Jeff heads up Human Resources.
"Launch is just a few weeks away and the team used this time to finalize sales strategies, program direction, web design and have a little fun too. The opening introduction rules were to say your name, title and give one fact about yourself that no one knows. I've been sworn to secrecy but I can tell you that someone in that group holds a park record for rollercoaster rides, another hates cats, one can do a very fascinating spoon trick, and there's even a former "wrestler" in the bunch."
More great news on the Learfield Sports front. I am proud to announce our brand-new relationship with the University of Montana. Effective this fall, we begin a 10-year term with the 
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At Radio Iowa, Pat Curtis joined us from WHO in Des Moines. Pat is a native of Williamsburg and grew up listening to WMT and WHO. He went to the University of Northern Iowa and worked at KGCI in Grundy Center, KXEL in Waterloo and at WHO. In ins spare time, Pat plays in a punk rock band called "
Terry James is the new news director for the Nebraska Radio Network. Terry works in Lincoln at the KLIN studios and will primarily cover the capitol. He comes to us from WISN in Milwaukee and was previously at WOC in Davenport. Terry has won a lot of awards for his work including kudos from the Iowa Associated Press and the Iowa Broadcast News Association. 
And, finally, Bill Pollock makes the leap from Affiliate Manager for Learfield Sports to Sports Director for the Missourinet [
