Don’t cry because it’s over. Rather, smile because it happened.
Kyle Kellams: This is Ozarks at Large. It’s Monday. I’m happy to have Randy Dixon from the Pryor Center with us.
Randy Dixon: I’m back.
Kellams: What did we hear?
Dixon: Well, that was a simple adage from broadcasting legend. This week, we will profile David Jones, who unfortunately passed just less than two weeks ago. He was the owner and general manager of KARK, which is the NBC affiliate in Little Rock, Channel 4, and he was there for 32 years to the day.
Kellams: Wow.
Dixon: During very formative years — the 1950s, ’60s, ’70s, and ’80s — the changes he saw in the delivery of news led the station through. It’s important to note that at the time he was there through those decades, KARK was a powerhouse — number one. They were one of the top NBC stations in the country.
The Pryor Center conducts in-depth, long-form interviews with Arkansans. We do several a year, and I had talked to David Jones over the summer. I’d run into him at a KARK function and thought it would be good to interview him for one of our Arkansas Memories. We set it up, and we interviewed him just two months ago.
Kellams: Oh, wow.
Dixon: Just in great shape. He was 94 years old and was just up and chipper and really with it. Fortunately, I was able to get that, and it was shortly before he died.
He was born in 1931 in Sheridan and graduated from Sheridan High as class president in 1949. He married his childhood sweetheart, Betty Jean Pennington, and graduated from Henderson State University — at the time, called Teachers College. Here’s a clip from that interview with Jones a few weeks ago, where he talks about his life after college.
David Jones: Well, I could not get a job when I graduated from college because I didn’t have any experience. Growing up in a town of 2,000, I was offered a job teaching high school in Camden. I taught 10th-grade English, 11th-grade speech, 12th-grade drama, directed the high school plays, sponsored the Future Teachers of America, the Thespian Society, and the junior class, sold tickets at the basketball and football games for $2,700 — $300 a month for nine months.
We had an old black-and-white TV at our apartment in Camden. We lived in a government housing project when we first moved there because my teacher’s salary was low enough that I qualified. We later got enough money to get an apartment. Even though I loved it — dearly loved it — I wanted to do better for my family.
Dixon: So he decided to answer a blind ad in the newspaper for a salesman at a new — at the time, it was new — in 1955. TV was a brand-new medium, and it was for a salesman. He got the job, and he and Betty moved to Little Rock. After working in sales, he soon became the general sales manager.
He and a guy named Bob Brown, who was the general manager at the time — who later went to KTHV Channel 11 in the 1970s and ’80s — ran the station. In this clip, he talks about that but also gives a little tip on TV programming.
Jones: I was blessed that I had the right people in the right job. I let them do their job. We had the first helicopter. We weren’t first in color — Channel 7 was first in color; we were second. They beat us by a couple of months.
We had decided in prime access we were going to run “The Beverly Hillbillies” 6:30 to 7 Monday through Friday, and we called our New York office, our rep office, and told them we were going to do that. They started laughing, and I said, “Why are you all laughing?” And one guy said, “Well, you aren’t serious, are you?” And Bob spoke up and said, “Yeah, we’re serious.” They said, “We don’t think that’s the right thing to do. We think that’s crazy.” And Bob said, “Well, we’re going to do it anyway.”
We started playing “The Beverly Hillbillies” Monday through Friday, 6:30 to 7, following our newscast. When the first ratings book came out, we had a 50 share in our news as well as The Beverly Hillbillies. That’s where we learned that the lead-out program was as important as the lead-in program as far as ratings were concerned.
Dixon: In 1969, he became vice president and general manager, and in 1974 became president and CEO of the station.
I talked to one of his old friends, Bud Northern — a colleague and friend who worked in the sales department — and asked him about how David Jones was as a boss.
Bud Northern: As a general manager, one of the things that David made a point of was that he knew all of his employees. He knew their spouses or significant others and endeavored to keep up with how many children and maybe even their ages. He was a people person, and that was reflected in his day-to-day operation.
David was an excellent broadcaster. He kept up with the daily business of the thing. But David had a unique feel in looking at a program and saying, “Viewers will watch that.”
Kellams: So KARK, as you mentioned, was just this sort of juggernaut for decades.
Dixon: Yes.
Kellams: And we’ve talked about the programming, but of course, you don’t become a juggernaut in local markets without local news, right?
Dixon: Right. And they had it. Carolyn Long, major anchor there — she was the top of any of them. She was the highest-rated, most popular — called a Q score — she had the highest Q of anyone in the market. She ended up leaving and coming up here.
Kellams: Coming here?
Dixon: Yeah, she anchored with Craig Cannon for a couple of years at 40/29. Carol and I have stayed in touch over the years, and I talked to her last week, right after his memorial service, about what it was like working for Jones.
Long: He always made everyone in the company feel like they were so special, that they mattered — and they did to David. No matter if he were Mr. Poe, our wonderful janitor, or his wife, or anybody in the newsroom, our salespeople — I believe everybody would say the same thing. He was a man who enjoyed building people up, not tearing people down. He enjoyed and made himself available to us in any number of ways.
He wanted people to be successful not just for his own purposes but for their purposes. Yesterday, at his beautiful service, I heard person after person say, “David helped me do this,” or “David promoted me,” or “David gave me an opportunity that I never thought would ever lead me to where I am now.” And I feel that same way, because David gave people opportunity. He gave me a tremendous opportunity, and I would never have had the career that I had with any other boss.
Dixon: Jones was very much liked by the corporate folks at Gannett, and he had been told that if the station ever came up for sale, he would have the first crack at it. Back then, a company could only own seven television stations, and you could not own a TV station and a newspaper in the same market. Gannett owned seven and wanted to buy another one, so they had to get rid of one.
David’s going to tell this story about a phone call he got one day in his office.
Jones: He said, “Okay, we’re buying Minneapolis, so you can have Little Rock — go get your money.” I said, “How much money do I need?” He said, “I can’t tell you that. We’re a public company; we’re on the stock exchange.” I said, “Oh, okay, well, thanks,” and hung up.
I’m sitting there wondering, now what do I do? About 10 minutes later, my private phone rings again, and it’s a woman. She said, “Mr. Jones?” I said, “Yes.” She said, “$25 million,” and hung up. So I knew he had told me without telling me.
Dixon: Jones contacted some of his friends — pretty good friends to have when you need money: Jerry Jones, Mack McLarty, Sheffield Nelson — and this was even before Jones owned the Cowboys. He and some other investors got together and formed United Broadcasting Company and got a $25 million loan — that magic number that came to him in that phone call from an unknown voice.
They bought KARK, and whenever a TV station is bought or sold, it’s big news in a market. It was big enough for the competitors, like my station, KATV, to cover it. This was in 1982, and here’s the report from the KATV collection on the sale. The first voice you’re going to hear is David Jones.
In 1982, Gannett Company Inc., the nation’s largest media group, announced an agreement in principle to sell KARK-TV in Little Rock, Arkansas, to David J. Jones, president and general manager of KARK, and a group of businessmen headed by Larry C. Wallace of North Little Rock.
Jones said to disclose the price would not be prudent, but he acknowledged it was between $25 and $30 million.
Dixon: When you are one of these stations that has had a well-oiled machine of anchors, weathermen, and sportscasters, and you have this native Arkansan who’s owning it and has been in the market for a long time, you really want to be part of the community. And he was.
They put on telethons, donated the time and manpower, did fundraisers, and prioritized public service announcements — always given air time for free. He encouraged his employees, especially his on-air people, to volunteer and be part of their communities.
One cause that was very personal to him was ambulance service. In 1974, his daughter was involved in an accident. It took 20 minutes for an ambulance to arrive, and the base was only nine blocks away. He decided something was wrong and needed to be fixed.
He spent 10 years establishing MEMS — Metropolitan Emergency Medical Services. Here’s a report from KATV about MEMS featuring David Jones.
Metropolitan Emergency Medical Services hopes the new subscription service will help cut the cost of an ambulance run. They’re calling the offer Lifeguard.
“For only $49, MEMS provides Lifeguard members the ambulance services they need for a full year — family included — and takes care of all insurance paperwork.”
The subscription system operates without tax dollars, according to the authority, and places a limit on patient out-of-pocket expenses.
“That’s not a high price to pay at all, considering you have the equivalent of a mobile emergency room just minutes from your doorstep. What’s more, the money generated by Lifeguard helps keep ambulance costs down for our entire community.”
The enrollment period ends Oct. 31, 1970.
Dixon: I talked to him more about that when we sat down for our interview. You could hear the pride in his voice over the achievements and advancements that moved forward from his idea.
Jones: We started it with nine ambulances and 90 people. Today we have 120 ambulances and 420 people. We serve Little Rock, North Little Rock, Pulaski County, Maumelle, Sherwood, Cabot, and Sheridan. We have our own academy; we now teach our own EMTs and our own paramedics.
A lot of people don’t know this, but once someone becomes a paramedic, they can do things that a registered nurse can’t do. They have a career. They can work at any hospital in America or any ambulance company in America. After they’re educated — and we pay them while they’re in school — once they graduate, they have a career.
Dixon: At his service last week, there was a very large contingent of MEMS employees there. On top of that, there was a flyover after the ceremony of emergency helicopters — med flights. His remains — he was cremated — but his remains were placed in a, it had never been used, a brand-new, state-of-the-art ambulance, and it took his remains to the cemetery.
So let’s move on. We’re up to the mid-’80s, and United Broadcasting bought two more stations during that time — I believe it was El Paso, Texas, and Meridian, Mississippi. But by 1987, the group was ready to sell the properties, and David Jones was ready to retire.
One of their partners, attorney Larry Wallace, made this announcement about the sale.
“Today, United Broadcasting Corporation and its shareholders have signed an agreement to sell all of its stock and its three television stations to Merrill Lynch Limited Partners and Merrill Lynch Media Partners, bound together through one common general partner, a subsidiary of Merrill Lynch and Company, and a managing general partnership made up of Herb Elton Rule and Marty Pompadour.”
Dixon: They brought in a general manager named Dean Henson, who — and I don’t know if it was from orders from above — slashed the budgets, got rid of the helicopter that David Jones was talking about, and didn’t want to pay their anchor people what David thought they were worth to keep the station number one.
He brought in a news director named Al Sandbrook, and he believed in what he called Action News. We called it tabloid news. He took away the tripods from all the photographers so there would be shaky video. And David Jones told me this — he said that on his first day on the job, Al Sandbrook walked into the newsroom in a devil costume, stood on the assignment desk, and announced to the newsroom, “Remember this day. This is the day the devil came to Little Rock.” And he turned the news department upside down and ran viewers away.
And I think I’ve told you this before — they were moving from one building to another. And rather than move their archives, which is quite a feat — because I’ve moved our archives twice, and it’s not fun, right? But you don’t throw them away, right? He had all of their film and videotape thrown in the dumpster rather than having to move it and store it. And guess what? David Jones had something to say about that.
Jones: When Dean Henson took over the job, and he took all of Channel 4’s archives and had them sent to the dump and all of that history — that would be like the Library of Alexandria — could never be replaced. As many people know, the reason you’re here is your long-time standing — good standing, I might add — in broadcast TV, broadcast Channel 7, and you all were wise enough to give your archives, which there is no value you can put on that. They’re invaluable. There’s no price that you could pay for that.
Kellams: And of course, like anybody, he’s more than just his work, right?
Dixon: And we don’t have enough time to go into everything. But, you know, he loved horses and horse racing. I think he owned a few horses. He traveled the world, knew a great amount about religions — all religions. Very religious man. He was, I believe, a member of Geyer Springs Baptist Church, and his wife of 70 years, Betty, who died in 2020.
You know, it’s funny. All the people that I’ve talked to — you know, this is a man that ran a number one television station for 30 years. He was a broadcasting legend, I guess you’d say. But when I talked to people about him, it’s not about his career. It’s more about him as a man and the kind of person he was. And I think you could tell from what people were saying — he really cared about people. And he cared more about that than television. You know, it was all very personal.
But I’ve got one more little comment. It’s from David Jones himself. He said this right at the end of our interview.
Jones: I’ve had a magical life. I got the woman that I wanted, had the parents I wanted, the childhood I wanted, two kids I wanted, the three grandkids and two great-grandkids, the two jobs — all my dreams came true. Now, I don’t want to mislead anybody. I’ve got more scars than Frankenstein. I’m a four-time cancer survivor. I’ve been clean for eight years, but blessed beyond measure.
Kellams: Thank you for sharing.
Dixon: He was a great man.
Ozarks at Large transcripts are created on a rush deadline. Copy editors utilize AI tools to review work. KUAF does not publish content created by AI. Please reach out to kuafinfo@uark.edu to report an issue. The audio version is the authoritative record of KUAF programming.
