Years after Johnnie Babcock resigned, my mother told me that things didn’t work out because he wanted to take over the whole broadcasting operation. I asked her what she meant, and she said Johnnie wanted to be the head of it. Of course, she was right, since he was already the man running Park Broadcasting for my father and had been promised the eventual title of presidency, in writing, over the years. That commitment was not honored and Johnnie left the company. I don’t know if my father ever realized the magnitude of that loss of talent and loyalty.
My father explained to my mother that the reason Babcock did not get the presidency of broadcasting was because all of his managers said they would quit if he were given that position. The very position he had been in, effectively, from Day One as he undertook the duties and responsibilities required to oversee operations during the building of Park Broadcasting. Johnnie hired the managers, fired people on demand for my father, set the salaries and budgets and managed the entire operation.
That’s when I realized that the story my mother heard from my father was the one he wanted her to hear. I’m sure he was shocked when Babcock resigned, but in his version of events he painted Johnnie with the same black brush he had used to keep me in the shadow with my mother. Now I fully realized that through all of the seventeen years I worked for my father, my mother’s picture of me had been shaded by what my father told her.
Looking back through all the letters she wrote to me during that period, I suddenly made sense of the whole situation. Time and time again she would quote what my father told her about the “problems” he had with me, and most of it was simply not true.
In effect, here were two sons, me and Johnnie Babcock, who was the son of the man who gave her husband his first real break.
What my mother knew about our performance in the business came only from what my father told her. So he was able to rationalize his treatment of both of us to her. Johnnie survived quite well. As he told me: “When I resigned from Park’s firm grip on my daily life, I also ended day-in-day-out contact with the management team I had built in broadcasting. I gamely deflected involvement in the affairs of the company despite pleas from many of my old team for ongoing advice.
“I could not simply terminate friendships, many held for over a decade. Even twenty years later I have retained firm and warm friendships with Roger Turner, who ably headed the radio group, and with George Lilly, who headed the television group.”
He pointed out, “There are station managers and former owners with whom I worked closely, and whose stations I visited several times a year. Hanes Lancaster in Johnson City, TN, has remained a close personal friend and confidant. Ron Philips from Richmond is another. I have spent many happy days with Hanes, whose family took me in as a member when we worked together. I have enjoyed continuous contact with other group members too numerous to list.
“Often our existence flourished under Park’s iron and sometimes unreasonable demands. They only made our bonding stronger. I miss working with them, and always will.”