My first question was regarding the weather correspondents. Do they actually do anything? Are the forecasts their own, or do they just read what the national weather service gives them? Has it always been the way it is now, or back in the day, did the independent weathermen create independent forecasts?
Which leads me to my next question. Do the news anchors actually do anything? Do they actually go out in the field and investigate stories? Do they actually have input into what they report on and what they don’t? Perhaps they are really just a special type of actor who comes in at 5:55 pm and goes on camera at 6 and acts very serious and non-partial?
Oh one more “answer”. I’ve heard that during WWII the national weather service (or whatever we might have had back then) did not supply information. We apparently didn’t want any possible invaders to know what the weather might be like to help them invade. Supposedly some local forecasters could figure out what the weather was like to their west (where the weather usually comes from) by studying horse racing results. If “mudders” were winning the races, they’d forceast rain.
It varies between different media outlets. The BBC’s weather presenters all originate from the Met Office, not from the usual ranks of budding presenters. They produce the forecasts themselves, in close co-operation with the Met Office.
Here’s a selection from one of their biog, chosen at random:
Around here all the TV stations have gone to professional meterologists. They take great pride in preparing their own forecasts (and earn great ridicule when one of them, say, predicts rain, another predicts sun and a third predicts snow.)
In addition, each of our local stations seems to have one meterologist whose major job is to know how to play with the radar. That’s the one who can bring up the lightning Doppler, the hail Doppler, the predicted storm path Doppler and so on. You might not think that’s much of a skill, but try doing it on the air live during a tornado.
As for the anchors, all of the ones around here originally started as genuine reporters. They don’t do much reporting anymore, but if the President or God or Oprah comes through town, they’ll be the ones doing the interview. Many of them write (to be exact, edit) the copy they’ll be reading. A few of them consider themselves to be the final check of numbers, background, etc.
In a lot of smaller cities, the anchor usually either produces the newscast (select the stories, group them into order and write the copy) or acts as assignment editor (figuring out what stories will be covered in the first place.)
Of course, there are a lot of glorified actors around, but some anchors actually do work.
I saw an interview with Walter Cronkite where they asked him a similar question. He said he wrote all of his own copy, every word (with the possible exception of something that comes in while he is on the air already).
From watching some of those behind the scenes documentaries on “The Weather Channel”, it looks like their on-air people for the most part have meteorology degrees and some technical background. But they also have specialists and less glamorous people who work in the background to help out with the forecast.
You can’t expect Jim Cantore to know what the weather is in all 50 states all at once!
One of my fraternity brothers is on-screen weather talent for a local network affiliate in Louisiana. He was a meterology major (and there’s a funny story about him watching The Weather Channel in the nude).
It’s amazing how much this has changed over time. Most weatherpeople today have at least a degree in meteorology, although they almost all subscribe to one of a few national services that supply data.
Back when the world was in black and white, the weather was often - especially in larger cities hungry for ratings - brought to you by pretty girls, chosen for no other reason than being pretty. Some famous newswoman - I want to say Barbara Walters, but I’m not sure - started her career as a weathergirl.
The movie Up Close and Personal, based on the life of Jessica Savitch, has Michelle Pfeiffer going from weathergirl to national reporter. I don’t think this was true of Savitch’s real career, though. Just a side note: she was the first female deejay at Rochester’s Top Forty WBBF, but to protect her, they wouldn’t use her name but called her the “Honeybee.” Ah, the good old days.
Along the same lines, David Letterman started his career as a funny weatherman, yukking up the weather, the male equivalent still around as a stereotype with Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, although Bill’s character knew his weather.
All these phony weather types got their weather info by phoning the government National Weather Service.
OldGuy: NOAA’s history site says that the following restrictions were made during WW2:
-Elimination of technical data from long-range broadcasts.
-Elimination of long-range broadcasts giving general weather information of military value.
-Centralization of general weather analysis staffs.
-Curtailment of weather teletype drops to private interests.
-Elimination of private weather messages of international scope
-Discontinuance of weather bulletins and maps published in newspapers.
-Coordination directly with the War and Navy Departments in matters of policy through special weather Bureau channels.
So I assume that the Weather Bureau (as it was called) could still provide short-range information and vague long-term forecasts (‘warm and sunny’, ‘rain’). Obviously many of their staff would have been assigned to military duties, but it would still be important to predict the weather over North America and some of that information could be released to the public. It does seem that weather forecasts were limited to the radio, though. (Newspapers could be sent more easily to an enemy, but information from the radio could be sent too.)
That being said, I wouldn’t be surprised if some newspaper weathermen did use something like horse races to predict their forecasts. If it was assumed that locals would know which horses did well on muddy tracks, you could even add an extra layer of security by just saying the names of the winners (‘Runs In The Rain set a new track record at Springfield Downs yesterday. Buy war bonds.’). But it seems like radio weathermen were free to give some information.
Here in PA, we have a program called “Weather World” that Penn State produces. It’s basically a practice program for wannabe TV weather guys. They’re actually meteorology majors and graduate students, but they need practice working in front of a TV camera. “Weather World” was recently cancelled, but has been brought back after viewer protest.
Now then. What anchors do depends on the station. At some smaller stations, they report, write, and produce their own stories. At larger stations, they may only read the copy that is given to them; the stories themselves are produced by other people. Most people don’t start out anchoring in large cities, though, so an anchor may have years of reporting, writing, and production experience under their belt before being “promoted” to the anchor desk.
Even if the anchor does nothing else, there is still show prep that needs to be done. They must familiarize themselves with the copy they will be reading and possibly make changes, they must know the order of the stories that will air, and be aware of last-minute changes or updates.