From the OPB volunteer website:

AIN (Golden Hours) Update

After more than 30 years of serving the blind, visually-impaired and elderly, Accessible Information Network (formerly Golden Hours) will cease operation by April 30, 2008.

We reached this difficult decision after months of research which included in-depth conversations with community partners serving the blind and visually impaired community in Oregon and Southwest Washington, as well as discussions with OPB’s board of directors and strategic planning committee.

Four immense challenges were identified in the course of this research:
1. The imminent demise of the secondary audio program (SAP), which is the primary means of delivering of this service;
2. The difficulty in identifying any significant user base of this service;
3. The cost of producing content and the lack of any viable revenue sources to support it, and, finally;
4. The lack of any feasible and effective methods of delivering the service following the end of analog television broadcasting next year.

When AIN/Golden Hours began in 1975, the blind and visually impaired had few options for receiving news and information. For many years prior to the rise of the internet and prior to OPB radio becoming primarily a news and information service, Golden Hours provided one of the only options for the community it serves.

Today, the number of TV news channels has skyrocketed, the Internet has exploded, thousands of books and magazines are now offered on tape. Advances in synthesized voice have led to new telephone and online news services (like NFB Newsline, a telephone service that provides audio of several Oregon-based newspapers such as The Oregonian and The Statesman-Journal). Media habits among the blind and visually disabled are also changing, albeit at a slower pace than the sighted population, towards a greater use of on-demand media and time shifting.

As we reviewed potential options, it became clear that OPB can provide a greater public service by promoting the services of organizations already serving the blind and visually impaired community. For example, the Talking Book and Braille Library, run by the State of Oregon, currently serves about 6,000 of the estimated 50,000 Oregonians eligible to receive this free service. Similarly, only 800-900 people have signed up for the NFB Newsline.

By June 30, OPB will launch a website of resources available for the blind and visually disabled in Oregon and SW Washington. By this fall, OPB will launch a cross-platform marketing campaign to address this need. Promoting these services will help connect more people to the services that can help improve their lives. This is an important role for OPB to play in the communities we serve.

The fundamental changes that have occurred in technology, consumer behavior and program options in no way diminish the commitment, passion and dedication of hundreds of volunteers, and most importantly, Jerry DeLaunay. For the past sixteen years at OPB, Jerry has worked tirelessly on behalf of the blind and visually disabled community. His sense of humor, entrepreneurial spirit and ability to literally create a service with few resources are amazing. Next time you see Jerry or Liz or Willie or Don, say "thanks" and "here's to you." They deserve our support and well wishes as they transition from OPB.

OPB and the AIN/Golden Hours and Volunteer Resources Staff especially want to thank every volunteer who has helped to make this program possible. We literally could not have done it without you! Over the next few weeks, OPB will work with staff and volunteers to transition the service. If you have questions or comments, please contact Tara Taylor, Vice President of Marketing & Planning at 503.293.1969 or ttaylor@opb.org. If you would like to find out more about other ways you can get involved at OPB please contact Dana at 503.293.1947 or dmahoney@opb.org. We also hope to have some referral information available in the coming weeks, if you are interested in volunteering at other organizations that serve the visually impaired or elderly. Thank you again for all the time, talent, energy and devotion you have given to AIN/Golden Hours!

And for those of us in Southern Washington, maybe some station (91.5??) will pick up Evergreen Radio Reading Service and rebroadcast it here??

So I wonder what will become of Willy Thornbrue? I always got quite a kick out of his (and Ron Shaplan's) sport news/analysis programme "Lion's Den".



Truly a loss of a valuable resource (I think, anyways) to the community. And now I won't have anything to listen to on my way home from work. On the other hand, in re: item #4, I do happen to know of some very good 67kHz subcarrier space on KOPB that's been vacant for at least the past seven or eight years........................ ;o)

I wonder why they don't just keep it, and stream it...

And then there's this--
http://omnimedianetworks.org/iris_radio_donation.htm

Apparently the Iris system must not have taken off very well, given the problems detailed in the letter Darkstar posted above. And from what I understand, you have to supply your own Internet connection (e.g. People's PC) in order for it to work.............

Unless, of course, the user lives within range of the Portland Wireless Internet System--I'm sorry, I don't know what the official name for it is outside of the generic "Wifi Cloud" nickname The O and the WW seem to favour--and if the Iris is compatible with wireless networking, then the availibility of a connection point would be moot, I think.

Omni has been streaming GH for years. It's a good question Eastwood, why don't they continue......

What would Graham Archer think? Golden Hours goes back further than the article indicated. I believe it started at Mt. Hood Community College around 1972 and began by running phone lines from the college to various nursing homes in Gresham. I'm a little hazy about this. Maybe Warner remembers better than I.

KOAP-FM began its Golden Hours, SCA sub-carrier channel service in March 1973. Golden Hours ran 10am to 5pm Monday through Fridays with Graham Archer as Director.

I remember it being a big deal for Golden Hours to land on KOAP-FMs SCA, giving them coverage all over the area. They continued to broadcast from MHCC for quite awhile before moving to KOAP.

It's kinda funny that this occurred, especially because just last week I had emailed OPB to find out about volunteering to be a board op. They replied stating that all volunteer positions were currently filled for AIN and OPB Radio doesn't use volunteers.

A few weeks ago, when we were yacking on another thread about the quality of the KOPB HD-3 audio, I tuned in for a while, and heard several requests from the announcer for listeners to call in... sounded like they were trying to determine the size of the audience... Guess the phone did not ring much!

Just tuned in to see if KOPB HD-3 is still on, right now there is NO KOPB HD at all!

This has probably been in the backs of a few people's heads for some time. I doubt if anyone else knew anything about it until shortly before the public announcement. On a bright note, maybe they don't have to be concerned with improving the audio on their HD3.

Ya know, in a way I could kind of see something like this coming, specifically with regards to the potential loss of listenership caused by that fateful day coming next February. Ya kill NTSC, that means you kill BTSC and its SAP channels and that means *surprise* what happened to Golden Hours?

But the way I had envisioned it was they would consolidate entirely to Live-365 streams (if they didn't switch to a different host in the meantime) and HD3. Maybe even the alternate audio channel on an ATSC subchannel. I didn't think they would shut down altogether.

Incidentally--I tried calling Tara after hearing Jerry Delaunay announce her number on-air a couple of weeks ago, all three times I called I got the "fast busy" signal. Maybe this means something???

By the way, is Graham Archer still around? (Not at GH, I know that; he retired in the 80s.) It would be interesting to hear his position on all of this, I think...............

I had the opportunity to volunteer at Golden Hours Radio about 10 years ago. It was a genuinely fun experience. The staff and volunteers were a committed bunch. Jerry, the manager of Golden Hours Radio when I volunteered, was a super guy. My hope is that OPB will help the paid staff find employment within the OPB organization or elsewhere.

The fast, busy signal indicates an overworked line or at least, it used to. Graham Archer was not a young man in the early 1970s!

"The Oregonian" September 6, 1997 Obit:

Louis Graham Archer
A funeral will be at 11 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 6, 1997, in Bateman Funeral Home in Newport for Louis Graham Archer, who died Sept. 2 at age 85.

Mr. Archer was born April 28, 1912, in Blackfoot, Idaho. He lived in Depoe Bay and Portland. He attended Fullerton Junior College and a broadcasting school in California. He served in the U.S. Navy during World War II. In 1946, he moved to Portland, where he worked for radio station KGW, retiring in 1985. He married Betty Greenwood in 1970. They started the ``Golden Hours'' program, now on Oregon Public Broadcasting.

Survivors include his wife; stepdaughter, Laurel Young of Memphis, Tenn.; and two grandchildren.

Interment will be in Eureka Cemetery in Newport. The family suggests remembrances to Lincoln County Meals on Wheels or Retired Senior Volunteer Program.
_______________________________________________________________

Graham Archer also worked for KOIN Radio.

There's an online article on Willy Thornbrue at http://www.omnimedianetworks.org/press/made_for_radio_pr.htm that is interesting reading.

Many of us found our jobs in radio disappear over the years, and I realize that it is just part of life in this business. Which is why I'm now in another business.

But when Willy mentioned to me recently the possibility that he might have to look for a new radio job soon, that hurt just a little bit. In an industry where job opportunities are becoming limited, they are just that much more limited for a person with his challenges. For the effort he has put into this business, it seems like such a waste of talent (on the technical side) for someone who's options are more limited than the ones most of us have.

He's a nice guy with fine skills programming automation and operating the board, but worried that mainstream employers would never consider him. Sad.

Given the changing state of technology, this was probably something that was going to happen sooner or later. As a former volunteer reader (I had the good fortune to share the reader's table with Bob Griggs), I know how much the service meant to a lot of listeners.

OPB would do well to bring an end to the service with a good old-fashioned wake. There were a lot of us who served...it would make a great celebration of GH to send it out with a memorable party!

Semoochie, thanks! I was thinking we worked Golden Hours from MHCC back in 72 or 73. We used to play Big Band music, old radio shows (Amos & Andy, Fibber McGee, etc.) and read the news. What a great time. Sometimes Graham would ask us (me very often) to tone down the old jazz a bit. But mostly he left us to our own devices.

Years later as I was way out of radio, our company participated in Golden Hours as a community service, from the new KOAP studios on Macadam. Jerry helped us out, we read the news or whatever we felt like for an hour. It was all recorded, and I never really knew if anyone actually heard it, but it sure was fun nonetheless.

I hope the staffers get to continue doing something, they were great.

Thanks for the memories!

I think I only did it once and may have been filling in for someone. It seems like I used one of the practice booths. We might have run the news from one of them. They were about the size of a small closet, remember?