Available for purchase in trade paperback at Amazon.
Recalling a turbulent career in television broadcasting, questioning fate, chance, and coincidence; little did G L Rockey know when he switched majors at Michigan State University from Restaurant Management to Communication that it would be the beginning (1963) of a career in television broadcasting that would last some thirty plus years.
Working in various television positions from Cameraman to Studio Supervisor to Producer/Director to Program Manager at eleven television stations (thirteen if you count scab work) in various size markets from Terre Haute to San Antonio to Phoenix and many in between; he ended up as manager of Cleveland Ohio’s iconic Jim’s Steak House.
He concludes (predestination aside) that you can’t blame the decisions you make on Fate. The instances that Fate presents may be unplanned, but you choose what you will do with the pop-ups that occur willy-nilly in your garden of life.
REVIEWS
4 out of 5 stars from Literary Titan Reviewer
A terse yet vividly colorful account of a career in TV broadcasting, Vagabond Broadcaster Gypsy TV Guy by G L Rockey is a short, quick read.
Thirteen chapters are bookended by a prologue and an epilogue; the book packs quite a bit in a chapter. The prologue alone covers the author’s less-than-ideal childhood, his time at acting school, and his disillusionment, getting his girlfriend pregnant at a young age, marrying her while still in college, and ending up at WZZM station right out of college. Beginning with the themes of fate and predestination (which run through the entire narrative), the author dwells on a number of decisions- the situations of which were presented by fate, but the decision taken was by him. Then again, he always ends up wondering if his decision changed the course of his life if it was all predestined and written anyway. It’s an interesting conundrum, and it’s easy to read it as a consolatory mechanism being used retrospectively by the author.
From manning the camera to working his way up to the Operations Manager at several TV stations, the author’s career trajectory is highly impressive and an entertaining one to read. The writing is terse, like bullet points in a journal, without too much description. The collection of remembrances in a chronological form has the reader shaking her head at his chequered career and at the sheer number of times, he moves jobs, his family, and his entire life.
I think a little more background on the industry would lend more context to the book and help place said anecdotes in a clearer picture. But I still think Vagabond Broadcaster Gypsy TV Guy: A Memoir is a funny and wry read, and the inner workings of TV stations in the USA in the 1960s and 1970s are well-depicted through his anecdotes.