For stations like Minot's KXMC-TV in 1979, for example, videotape had recently replaced film for gathering and reporting stories. News department budgets and personnel were growing. Studio sets were becoming more elaborate and "uptown" in style. In a few years, technologies such as weather radar systems, onscreen graphic design systems and small, portable live broadcast units would fall to price levels small enough for small market stations to afford.

These were exciting times, when we experimented with creative ways to package and present news stories, when we probed the openings and limitations of storytelling in the video world.

And you got to do a little of everything in TV news those days. For example, I worked in one or more roles as news director, anchorman, assigmnent editor, reporter, photographer and studio cameraman during my times in Minot at KXMC-TV and KMOT-TV, in Bismarck at KXMB-TV and in Fargo at KTHI-TV (now KVLY-TV).

In 1979, fresh from radio and television jobs in Rockford, Ill., I arrived in Minot, charged with organizing and developing a video era newscast and news department. I restructured the newscast format, standardized the news writing, reporting and editing processes and helped block out the transition from a single camera to two camera studio newscast.

It's hard to adequately explain the adrenaline rush, the thrill of local TV news at that time. We were running fast and hard into unexplored territory with video reporting, editing and presentation. Everyone got a chance to be the first to try something new. If it didn't work, we simply put it aside and tried another approach. We weren't bound by a lot of rules because we were inventing the rules. We strove to be professional and responsible. But we were also loose, casual and united by a common adventure.

It felt like we were getting paid to play and have fun. We certainly weren't getting rich on our salaries in the local news business -- but we definitely were having a ball.

For better or worse, local news in the 1980s was viewed by station management less as an obligatory expense and more as a revenue opportunity. The more viewers you could attract to the 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. newscasts, the more money you could charge for local commercials in those newscasts. It was no longer about simply presenting the news -- it was about creating more interesting news, about delivering your news better and faster than the competition. Generating stories unique to your broadcast. Hiring anchors and reporters who came across warmer, friendlier and more professional than the other stations in the market. It was an era of news personalities and lifestyle reporting, when heavily promoted "must see" investigative reports and feature stories aimed at generating "watercooler talk" ran during ratings months (especially November).

This wasn't happening just in North Dakota -- the trend started in local news markets elsewhere in the country early in the 1970s, made its way to local stations in Fargo and Grand Forks and then spread out to Bismarck, Minot, Williston and Dickinson.

In my opinion, the Golden Age of North Dakota television came in the 1950s, when local TV stations debuted on air and began local newscasts with the first generation of hometown anchors and reporters.

I consider the 1980s to be the Silver Age of North Dakota television: More local news than ever before, brought to you in living color, on videotape, live from the scene, in a packaged, viewer friendly and team oriented format. Local news as a revenue stream.

I'm proud to have contributed my small part to that era. My forte was feature reporting. I've always had an interest in, well, everything, so I enjoyed covering just about anything. Some common themes in my TV reporting over the decade were children interviews, interesting people, stories told in verse, holiday related tales and all around fun and interesting stories. I did my share of hard news reporting, but I rarely passed up a chance to give viewers something to smile about.