WOUB experience came in handy during computer programming career for Tom Muchmore

When you learn that Tom Muchmore retired as a computer programmer, you might be confused as to why he values his time training as a broadcast journalist at Ohio University and WOUB. But as a person who spent much of his career putting together all the pieces of a puzzle to make computer applications function properly, he says it makes perfect sense.

“The training at WOUB was incredible,” said Muchmore. “One of the big things I learned in news was never to assume anything. In computers, when you talk to a user who wants a program to do something specific, you can’t assume you know what they want. So, I asked a lot of questions because you never assume.”

Muchmore received a scholarship to attend Ohio University in 1970 after graduating at the top of his class at Carlisle (Ohio) High School but decided to stay at home after the anti-war riots that spring at Ohio University, Ohio State and Kent State. He attended the Middletown campus of Miami University for two years, but Miami did not offer on-air journalism experience to its students. So, he transferred to Ohio University for his junior and senior years. Muchmore quickly learned about the opportunity to work for WOUB News and was on the air just a few weeks after arriving on campus in 1972.

“I worked mostly on radio news,” said Muchmore. “During my senior year I was the anchor for the morning news from 6:30 to 8:30 a.m. every day. I stayed over spring break once and did TV sports. But I wasn’t really interested in sports.”

Muchmore was part of a team of students that traveled to Charleston, W.Va., to cover the re-election of Governor Arch Moore in 1972. He anchored WOUB-AM's coverage of the 1973 election from the Athens County Board of Elections and went with another team to the Ohio Secretary of State's Office to cover the 1974 primary election.

“I was also honored to be selected to be part of a WOUB TV film crew that went to Washington, D.C. in 1973 to produce a ‘a day in the life’ documentary on southeast Ohio Congressman Clarence Miller,” said Muchmore. “That trip included covering the congressman's attendance at a dinner speech by Vice President Spiro Agnew where the WOUB crew was positioned next to the CBS crew and its young reporter, Connie Chung.”

After graduation, Muchmore worked as a newspaper and radio journalist in Middletown, Ohio, for about a decade. Eventually, he decided to go back to school to get an associate’s degree in computer programming. He worked as a programmer for health care facilities and large corporations until he retired.

“When I was working as a computer programmer at Big Lots, I shared my media training and experience with the company videographer and was then asked to host a number of employee video newsletters, traveling to stores and interviewing employees on camera,” said Muchmore. “My work with WOUB TV and radio helped me to produce a professional program. I even hosted a home-shopping-network-style video for a company product that was then played in the stores. Also, the company CEO at the time, learning of my writing experience, asked me to interview him and then ghost-write his column in the company's national newsletter over several issues.”

And Muchmore still uses his broadcasting skills to be on the air today as a volunteer for the Voicecorps Reading Service. Voicecorps is a 24/7 information service which provides free access to print publications for people who cannot read the printed word. Voicecorps volunteers read aloud from daily newspapers, flyers and other current print without censoring or editorializing. WOUB broadcasts Voicecorps one of its digital TV subchannels - 20.7/44.7.

“You can’t get the broadcasting out of you,” said Muchmore with a laugh. “I’ve been doing Voicecorps for eight years now. I love being able to be heard in Athens again.”