KPFA Radio's Public Events Series

By Bob Baldock

April is the 60th anniversary of KPFA, the first non-profit, listener-sponsored radio station in the U.S., and possibly in the world—the birth of public radio. It was established by pacifists urgently wanting a method of communicating that could be relatively free of both government constraints and of commercial pressures. Early supporters with lots of air time included Alan Watts and poet Kenneth Rexroth, both outspokenly wary of the station becoming a vehicle for communists. Both were ardent supporters of distinctly literary, spiritual, and religious communication and discussion.

In other words, open exchange.

One of the few sharp spurs compelling a few Moe's Books employees in 1982 to leave and set up Black Oak Books was the urge to establish more of a cultural hub, where authors could read their work to seated audiences and participate in conversations with their readers. This was new. Book signings were common enough in major cities across the country, as authors' tours took them to television or radio stations and the occasional campus appearance, but actual readings in bookshops was – west of the Gotham Book Mart in Manhattan – extremely rare. We talked with publishing house publicists, built bookcases on castors for easy moving, bought a hundred folding chairs, and were soon mailing out a monthly calendar of events. This proved a wild success with East Bay folks. Within a few years other Bay Area bookstores were doing much the same, and eventually this became a custom across the country.

Four years after we began, a KPFA Radio manager came into the store and asked if the station could record the readings for subsequent broadcast throughout northern and central California. We heartily consented. Soon we had requests from KPFA's network of stations in Los Angeles, Houston, New York City and Washington D.C. to air these recordings - a phenomenal boon for authors and publishers!

Soon our Black Oak gatherings became too popular to be contained. Increasingly, as we drew more major authors, the store was crammed and there were disappointed crowds milling about on the sidewalk. Success was perplexing. Then one Mothers' Day we held an event a dozen blocks away at King Middle School - a benefit to get donations for South African resistance and Nelson Mandela. Isabel Allende and Alice Walker both spoke. The excellent Vukani Muwethu choir sang. All 850 seats were readily filled.

In 1989 we organized "Bad News Bearers" (with the U.C. Graduate School of Journalism and Cody's Books), a prophetic event to benefit Media Alliance. It nearly filled Zellerbach Hall's 2400 seats. Alexander Cockburn, Mark Hertsgaard, Christopher Hitchens, Brenda Payton and Robert Scheer spoke. These two events provided ample evidence that a reliable many in the Berkeley community wanted political and literary forums – and would support them. Friends and other fellow residents would regularly wrench away from their computer and TV monitors to gather together and listen to our most engaged national and international writers and thinkers.

All of which was clearly beyond the desires of my Black Oak partners. We parted. Which is to say they booted me out. KPFA rapidly hired me to produce exactly such events for them. They budgeted me to design and get printed posters for each event, and to partner with appropriate progressive non-profit organizations. I went around to about 20 independent bookstores scattered around the Bay Area and enlisted their help in promoting author events by putting posters in their windows and by selling tickets without charging a fee. The best of the stores immediately agreed. This seemed essential to me not only to sustaining community vitality, but to preserving - via the cooperation of independent press and radio with writers and artists – public free speech optimally informed. Democracy of the agora.

In the twenty years since then KPFA has produced or co-produced nearly 300 public events promoting writers (with the occasional musician or filmmakers) in San Francisco, Marin and throughout the East Bay. For some years these events have been recorded in video as well, offered to station supporters for a fee, and given without charge to non-profit video media – such as community cable stations. Occasionally C-Span also records and broadcasts our events. While the writers themselves sometimes read from their work, more frequently now they discuss current concerns and take questions, offering something fresh and unique, trusting listeners to buy the books, always offered for sale at the events themselves by one or another of our incredibly valuable independent bookstores.

Perhaps tellingly, so far this happens on a substantial basis only in the Bay Area, unarguably the most progressive terrain in the nation.

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