I worked with a great one at WARM in the 80's and in to the early 90's, Pat Castellani. Pat took the the news department in to contemporary times. He made sure we had good tape recorders, new pagers, the latest cell phones, and Pat is the one who had the station buy my extra long microphone. It made my life so much easier. Sound is all a radio news person has, and he recognized the value of getting that mic right in people's faces. Before Pat, I was using a cassette recorder I bought at a drug store because the ones the station had were so unreliable. I kid you not.
Pat helped the WARM news department in other ways. I still remember that cold, rainy, icy January day when we inched an SUV to the top of Penobscot Knob in Hanover Township to see WBRE's collapsed tower. Actually going up there gave WARM's reporting that added dimension.
I can still see Pat, working all those nights and crawling beneath cabinets, to wire up the new Magic 93 studio in Avoca, but still taking time to make sure whatever problems I had were remedied. Great people do that. Pat's engineering office was my hiding place on slow days. He was always good for an interesting conversation and a wonderful laugh. As far as the new studio wiring went, it was meticulous. That was Pat.
I'm not sure many people knew this, but Pat did an outstanding impression of one of the many, many, many managers we cycled through during my 10.5 years working for WARM. It was perfect. I should name names. Both Pat and the manager are now gone and I don't want to get Pat in trouble during his first week in Heaven.
After years of health problems, Pat , who I always called "Pasquale," died Thursday. He was only 61. A talented man, but more importantly, a nice man. We just swapped messages a couple of months ago. I knew he wasn't well. I had no idea he didn't have much time left. I'm sorry he's gone. I'm glad I knew him.
Pat Castellani made WARM's news department better. I appreciated it, and I'm sure our listeners did, too, even if they didn't know about Pat's contributions. He will be missed.
I'm fond of saying that I am made up of little pieces of every broadcaster and journalist I ever worked with. I learned from the good ones. I learned how "not" to do things from the bad ones. It wasn't just the editorial stuff. It was how to treat people. As I reflected on Pat's life while writing this, I also realized I learned so much from the people who were never on the air.
Pat, I owe you.
