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Caught
on the Web
www.redraidernation.com
By Seth Rorabaugh
Post-Gazette Sports Writer
February 27th, 2002
Thank
goodness Web sites aren’t high school athletes. And thank
goodness they don’t have parents. That’s why reporting on Web
sites has proven to be such a pleasure. You never have anyone
complaining that you don’t cover the City League Web site enough
or that you blatantly follow the Baldwin Web-site all the time
and intentionally disrespect Central Catholic’s site.
So, at the risk of enraging parents, a whole bunch of other
WPIAL, City League and some select District 10 schools, we offer
by the finest site dedicated to a local high school team,
www.redraidernation.com.
What’s there: The site, which is all but an official site
for the Uniontown boys’ basketball team, is an amazing
accomplishment because so little advertising appears on it and
its professionalism is quite good. Updated seemingly every day,
this is a very comprehensive site with anything you want to know
about Uniontown boys’ basketball. There is a 1,000-point
scorers’ tribute set to the music from “Gladiator”, a message
forum, a booster club section, a chat room, a section for the
2001 football team and a tribute to Uniontown great Bennett
Gregory. The history section is tremendous.
There is a very thorough recap of Uniontown athletics and a hall
of fame for athletes and teachers. When you initially logon, a
pop-up window will appear with a snazzy little video dedicated
to the Red Raiders. A cute potshot is taken at Central Catholic
Coach Chuck Crummie, who is quoted as saying had his team had
won the recent Central Catholic-Uniontown match-up, his team
would not have celebrated as Uniontown’s did. Upon further
review nothing of and real consequence works against the site,
unless you don’t like the color maroon, which is obviously
prominent throughout. Also the “Gladiator” tribute will really
freak you out up on the first viewing.
Overall: For a
high school site, www.redraidernation.com is a
tremendous accomplishment.
Score: 4 out of 5.
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My name is Edward A. Owens and I've worn my
high school ring everyday since I graduated in 1966! I've worn it in
Vietnam and it was held in place by my wedding
 ring in the 1970's -- but
I've always made sure I wore it and showed it with pride.
Red Raider Nation wasn't a lifelong goal. In fact, I'd already had
another profession that started long before I began developing and
designing web sites.
One year after graduation I joined the US Air Force, to avoid service in
Vietnam. A year and a half into my military service, I ended up at
Danang! Even in a war zone I still managed to keep up with the latest
Uniontown Red Raider exploits, by reading my Uniontown Morning Herald's
sports pages every day.
When I returned from Vietnam, I looked around for a career. I'd
always wanted to be a play-by-play announcer, so I enrolled at Career
Academy of Broadcasting in Washington D.C. I graduated early and on
January 4th, 1972 I began my life's work. first as a Disk Jockey and
then as a basketball and football play-by-play announcer for the
Wellsboro high school Hornets, in the tiny town of Wellsboro,
Pennsylvania. I would move to Lewistown, Pennsylvania for a brief time
as an announcer at WKVA-AM. I left there after 4 months and began
working at WCVI-AM in Connellsville.
By then I'd figured out that broadcasting is something like a
traveling circus. After only a year and a half, I jumped into television
reporting at WSTV-TV in Steubenville, Ohio. It only took me a few weeks
to realize that television provided a greater opportunity to express my
creativity. On one Friday afternoon, I was sent into the field to shoot
film to use a backdrop while our weatherman, local legend Red Donnelly,
would show the current weather statistics on the screen. I came up with
a rather unusual idea. I would shoot video of a guy playing fetch with
his dog. I shot the guy running and throwing, but I never showed the
dog. The result was an anchorman and weathercaster so amused they nearly
forgot to continue the newscast. I'd arrived in broadcasting!
 I was soon courted by WCHS-TV in Charleston, West Virginia. I
would be their Huntington, West Virginia bureau chief. Unfortunately,
the WCHS-TV sportscaster took ill and I was pressed into service to be
his fill-in for three months. When he returned to work, I started work
in the Huntington bureau. On the very first day I took over the bureau,
I received a call from the news director at WBNS-TV in Columbus, Ohio. I
interviewed for the job, accepted it and moved to Columbus -- less than
3 months after I'd moved to Charleston, West Virginia. So, in less than
4 years of broadcasting, I had already worked at 5 broadcasting jobs!
Columbus, Ohio was a place to settle down. (for 2 years) It's
where I learned how to be a news reporter, and I developed a niche'
I would become their troubleshooter. That's the reporter who would find
people being mistreated and make the authorities fix their problems. The
highlight of my two years in Columbus, Ohio? A telephone call from then
Governor James Rhodes. He'd seen my report about a Columbus police
officer who'd been shot on duty, but been refused disability benefits.
The potential embarrassment, could have jeopardized Rhodes' re-election
hopes. He personally made sure the police officer was given his
disability!
A report that didn't escape the new director at WKYC-TV in
Cleveland! He hired me and put me two work in 1978. Cleveland, as you
may know, was no place to live for the faint of heart in 1978. The
city's problems were too much for me. After a few spats with management
and fellow employees, I moved on to WISN-TV in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I
spend a year there before I moved to KPNX-TV in Phoenix, Arizona and my
favorite job as a broadcaster.
KPNX-TV's news director Al Buch gave me the tools I needed to
become a fairly good reporter and broadcaster. Before long, I began
winning awards with startling frequency. In 1981, I won a regional Emmy
Award for a set of stories about a longtime Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
photographer named Morris Berman. A fascinating man who'd shot that
famous picture of New York Giants quarterback Y.A. Title as he slumped
to his knees with blood running down his forehead.
Also in 1981, I received a call on a Saturday evening in March. The
Uniontown Red Raiders were in the PIAA State Championship game, and my
brother had called to let me hear the final quarter. When I answered the
telephone he simply said, "Al, listen to this!" He then sat the
telephone near the television and I heard Uniontown win its fourth state
championship in basketball.
And 1982 was even better! I took over as the WPNX-TV
entertainment editor. I actually got paid to go watch movies, the
symphony and to review restaurants. A review of the Paul Newman movie
"The Verdict" earned my second Emmy. I sent the tape of the movie review
and my resume to a new television program called Entertainment Tonight.
A few weeks later I got a reply. "We're sorry, but the position you are
applying for has already been filled." I didn't know I was applying for
a position. I just thought I'd send them a tape and a resume.
In 1983, I experienced my best year as a broadcaster. And one
of the reasons was an hour and a half interview I did with
comedian/commercial pitchman Bill Cosby. A man who simply sat there and
tried to make me laugh, while giving me the best parts of his philosophy
through 4 video tapes! The results: A half hour television show
featuring Cosby, Lena Horne and four members of the English comedy
troupe, Monty Python. a show I wrote, produced, performed the
interviews, edited and appeared on. Al Owens, Bill Cosby and Friends
produced my 3rd Emmy Award.
I received that Emmy Award on a Saturday. The following Monday I
composed another letter and sent it and the Cosby tape to
Entertainment Tonight. Among other things it read: YOU DIDN'T HIRE ME
LAST YEAR, EVEN THOUGH I WASN'T APPLYING FOR A JOB. HERE'S THIS YEAR'S
EFFORT. KEEP THE RESUME, PLEASE RETURN THE TAPE. I'M GOOD, YOU DON'T
HAVE TO TELL ME I'M GOOD. SEE YOU NEXT YEAR! That was Monday. The
following Sunday afternoon I accepted the job to join the Hollywood
staff of Entertainment Tonight. And by the time I moved to Hollywood,
that letter had circulated throughout the show's production company,
Paramount Pictures.
In August of 1984, I began working for the nationally syndicated program
Entertainment Tonight. Just 12 years after stumbling into broadcasting,
I was being seen by 21 million people a night. A fact that frightened me
to death! And what was even more frightening was that within a month of
my first day of the job, they drafted me into service as an anchorman.
Me and Mary Hart, side-by-side. I was the one who looked like a scared
rabbit!
For nearly 3 years, I worked as a reporter and an anchorman
on that show. It was not my favorite job in broadcasting. Unlike in
Phoenix, Arizona where I had my hands on everything, at Entertainment
Tonight, I couldn't write, produce or edit anything. I just spoke
somebody else's words. And when management changed at Entertainment
Tonight, I was the first person of many whose contracts were not
renewed.
I soon found myself preparing movie reviews in Wichita, Kansas. KSNW-TV
assured me of two things. I'd get paid only a fraction of the money I
got paid at Entertainment Tonight, and I'd get an opportunity to do all
of those things I'd done in Phoenix, Arizona. In other words, I'd have
to work for a living again! And I loved it. I stayed at KSNW-TV for 3
and a half years before moving to Tacoma, Washington and KSTW-TV in the
Seattle/Tacoma television market. But by then, I had already soured on
the profession of broadcasting. I only spent about two years on the job,
before I found myself out of work and not looking for any more work
while performing "my life's work".
In late 1996 I returned to Uniontown to find a community that had
long before lost the sense of pride that I knew 30 years prior. There
were fist fights between public officials, and political squabbles that
seemed to take priority over the betterment of the people who live here.
I once attended a night at the now defunct Hall of Freedom, in which
people were called to discuss What's Right With Fayette County!
The events of recent times had led some people to believe that if you
could bring a group of people together, and they could actually find
something positive to talk about, maybe things weren't as bas as they
seemed. But by the end of that night, I didn't hear enough positive
things to fill up the left side of an envelope.
Enter the Uniontown Red Raiders! In 2000, the Uniontown Red Raiders
didn't need to talk about positive things. They WERE the positive
things. They'd beaten bigger teams on the way to Hershey and a State
title shot. Suddenly, all of that talk about sports, and Uniontown's
sports immortals seemed to have put a new glow on the region. It was
then that I decided that you don't have to sit around and talk about
what's good. All you have to do is let people know that when you rally
around a common goal, everything is good. In December of 2000, I
embarked on my new "life's work". A web site that is designed to bring
old friends together; to give people a sense of the good things in their
community; a way to SHARE what's right about Fayette County. That web
site is Red Raider Nation.
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Like any small town, Uniontown, Pennsylvania is
in a constant battle for recognition. When I was growing up that
recognition came easy. A Friday night, a Tuesday night, a basketball,
a football and near unanimous nationwide acceptance. But 30 years
later, when I returned to Southwestern Pennsylvania, that recognition
had evaporated. Even the local newspaper and radio station, both had
always kept a close watch on the Uniontown Red Raiders before, nearly
abandoned them.
But by the spring of 2000 things were
changing. Student athletes had once become Local Heroes. Students had
become overnight diehards and the newspapers and radio stations had to
pay attention again. Uniontown's undersized, underclassmen had managed
to stay alive with noteworthy wins against favored giants during the
PIAA play-offs. Suddenly the sounds of young people talking basketball
had returned to Uniontown.
Despite an abrupt and convincing end to Uniontown's first serious
stake to a state basketball championship in nearly 20 years,
basketballs could be heard throughout the town's East End all summer.
Sending young men and women to playgrounds with a purpose. A chance to
gain widespread acceptance again. And another opportunity to solidify
Uniontown's second nickname - THE SCHOOL OF CHAMPIONS.
So why not a web site to keep the memories of decades old
championships alive? Red Raider Nation can be a place where we can
relive the glory days and follow the present days of young people
fighting for the honor of their little Western Pennsylvania town! A
place should exist like this for every high school longing to gain
recognition. And every school and town certainly deserve it.
e.a.
owens
webmaster Red Raider Nation
copyright © 2006
thinkwebworks.com
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