"Happy Hare’s Trifecta"
Trifecta - in which the bettor has to pick the 1st 3 winners in correct sequence.

In mid-1966, Hal Neal, the president of ABC Radio along with Chuck Fritz, the VP and GM of WXYZ Radio in Detroit came to Cleveland and sat opposite Specs Howard and me at lunch and told us that they wanted us to come to Detroit to do mornings. Specs and I had done it all in our five years in Cleveland and it was logical for us to ascend to the next rung.  Hal Neal was a gentle mannered man. We liked him.

Chuck Fritz was content to let his president do the talking. He would occasionally interject something, meant to punctuate what his boss was saying. Neal was saying that ABC would pay us a lot of money, and that we would be the franchise He named a figure. Specs said, “we want more,” and they didn’t blink. We got it. After that, what were we going to tell them?   No?.

Neal would not suggest ways to break our Westinghouse contract, as this would result in a sure-fire law suit by Westinghouse against ABC claiming that they had conspired to break our contract.

We were equally flummoxed because, as it was, we would remain captive to the old KYW contract in Cleveland, one that was a great deal less lucrative than the one the guys from ABC were offering us. Understand that Specs and I appreciated Cleveland, and that being there had resulted in this amazing offer by ABC but, we wanted more..

I wanted the increased prestige and money represented by WXYZ, period. More important; I wanted to go to Detroit, because I was in love down to the cellular level with Carol, (pictured here) and needed the extra money to honor my obligations to my ex,. and bring this fabulous woman to my side.

Her side was in Miami working for her dad, Ben Chapmen, the Producer of “Flipper.” where she served as his Administrative Assistant. There was another hitch:. She had a fabulous gig, hobnobbing with stars, and living the good life, and was willing to give it all up to be with me, but I had to put things together, then call her.

Putting things together appeared to be only a fantasy. The ABC execs had come to Cleveland, created a golden vista for Specs and me, then disappeared, leaving it to us to work out a  legal split  from Cleveland.

They said, in effect, the same thing as Carol. Call when you have put it together.

Were ABC and Carol operating out of the same play book?

I was locked into a contract that bound me legally to Westinghouse in Cleveland. I had asked them to release me and they refused, citing the iron-bound contract to which I had agreed. Piling it on, they assured me that breaking the Westinghouse contract was impossible. The way it looked at that time, Specs and I going to ABC in Detroit was out of the question.

 Breaking the Westinghouse contract, bringing Carol back into my life, and being free to go to Detroit required a mortal struggle in which I would have to win all three stages of the Trifecta, or lose all.

I almost called my friend the gambler, Kenny Rogers, for counsel, but, hell, he would have told me that winning a Trifecta is near impossible, and that this was the time to fold ‘em. 

FAST FORWARD 

            . It was March of 1967. Specs and I were in the penthouse suite of Leonard Goldenson, the Board Chairman of ABC for a dental inspection. by the Blair reps who had been flown in from all corners of the country to see personally what ABC had bought into. Specs and I had started our new show in Detroit on January 30^th, 

The top floor penthouse was all done in various patinas of white, except for a golden  7 foot high liver shaped modern sculpture dominating the suite. It was like the  setting for a ‘50s Broadway musical with chorus girls ready to burst into the room high kicking and singing, “New York!  New York! A Helluva Town.”

What a setting!  Specs and me surrounded by every Blair rep who wasn’t mortally ill. Beaming proudly on us was our new boss, V.P. Chuck Fritz, attired in an expensively tailored suit topped off with a silk ascot,

 A jarring note: Hal Neal died of a heart attack a short time after our Cleveland  meeting and was replaced by Ralph Beaudine. He was pleasant but looked like he was not entirely with the program. So?  The two year firm contract was signed.

Strolling servers threaded their way through our gathering, dispensing, wines and champagne, or whatever else you might want. Other trays were loaded with intricate hors d’oeuvres and caviar.

 Giving vent to a soul full of joy, I ducked into the foyer, and picked up a phone.

 Lee Bartell, my former KCBQ mentor, was a few blocks away from the towering ABC building. He now ran McFadden/Bartell Publications, headquartered in the McFadden/Bartell building in Manhattan. I figured he was working late. Two rings and he picked up. “Lee, it’s Hare,” I gushed. .”I am in Leonard Goldenson’s suite with the ABC brass, and all of the Blair reps. They are having a reception for me and Specs.”

This buttoned down man uncharacteristically gushed back.. “Wow! That’s great. Go get ‘em!.” Nothing better than hearing your dignified mentor gush. 

How we wound up in Detroit against all odds is hard to follow.  

              REWIND  BACK TO CLEVELAND 

Part one of the Trifecta was a long shot. It covers how Specs and I broke the inviolate Westinghouse contract, liberating us to go to Detroit.

Go back historically, many years before Martin and Howard, when NBC and Westinghouse were battling for the Philadelphia market..

NBC won when they bullied Westinghouse out of the fight by threatening them  with the loss of the NBC television franchises in their other markets,.

The FCC approved the switchover, not realizing that NBC had blackmailed Westinghouse, who did a slow burn, and finally appealed to the FCC. Hearing how Westinghouse had been victimized, the FCC reversed the decision...

This FCC appeal seemingly had been forgotten except by a few expensive lawyers and upper management on both sides. The commandment from the FCC to switch markets was a huge shock in our building.. NBC was removed from Philly and sent to Cleveland., and Westinghouse, including the Mike Douglas TV Show,  went to Philadelphia

NBC wasn’t the only whipped dog in this battle. It looked like our Detroit  hopes were dashed and I would not be able to reunite with Carol.

I called an attorney chum asking him to look at the NBC contract that had been given to us for signature. He said he was more interested in the Westinghouse contract

I didn’t ask questions. I dug it up for him.

I had little or no hope that he would find anything..

One day we were Westinghouse employees. The next, we were working for NBC. Specs and I did our usual morning show on the first day with NBC and were urgently summoned to the new GM’s office when we left the studio.

He was Art Watson, soon to be the president of NBC Radio but now our new boss, and one of the top items on his docket was to squash any dreams we had of leaving. Watson was a short  bespectacled man with hard blue eyes, and a penetrating way of articulating that made words spray out of his mouth like B-B’s.

Our first contact with him had been in the hall the day before. It had been brief and concise. “Come see me tomorrow when you get off the air,” he said in his command voice. The coded message was that we would, by God, sign the new NBC contract and no back talk.

Obviously, he wanted us to know that we were already under contract because of our old Westinghouse document, and our signing with NBC was just a formality to make things nice and neat. We had no reason to doubt him.

The next morning after the show, I went into our office to dump the logs and other gear when the phone rang. It was an attorney listener who had developed into a good friend..

“Harry,” he almost shouted, ”Have you signed the NBC contract yet?”

“No,” I replied. “We are on the way to the GM’s office to handle that right now.”

“Well don’t do it.” he said abruptly. “I just went over your Westinghouse contract and there is no transfer clause in it.”

“What does that mean?” I asked, not daring to start doing cart wheels.”

“It means that you are free. A transfer clause is usually standard in a corporate  contract, meaning that you are bound by  contract to transfer to the new owner if Westinghouse sold the station, and it isn’t in the contract that you signed  5 years ago for Westinghouse. I can’t believe it. Their Legal Department overlooked it in the boiler plate of their agreement with you.”

“Does this mean we are free?” I asked, to make him pronounce,” You’re free.” again.

“Pack your bags,” he said laughing. “By the way, my fee is for you guys to get me a deal on a Lincoln when you get to Detroit.”

“I’ll do better than that.” I said. “You will be the one to call Art Watson and tell him that you are our attorney, and that we are history. Your fee will be lunch.

I bought lunch that day. 

One minute I had been trapped  in Cleveland, a black hole which I was being smothered, then I had stumbled through a Star Gate, into a parallel universe in Detroit, a  beautiful new paradise beyond description. Still, I didn’t have Carol. It was like Adam in Paradise without Eve. Or, Sirius without Howard Stern. 

Getting Carol back, was not going to depend on a time warp like Cleveland and Detroit imploding together in a mathematical improbability. The third leg of the Trifecta was s simple equation: going to Miami in the little time left, and dislodging Carol while running the gauntlet of her father’s wrath.

He was a former Air Force General with a temper as high as the Wild Blue Yonder. Now, a Hollywood Producer, he was running the Flipper studio with Carol as his chief aide. I was lucky if he didn’t gut me on his bass boat and use me for chum in Biscayne Bay.   

I don’t care what that ”Love Story” idiot wrote.

 “Love means having to say you are as sorry as hell”.  

But why stretch this out when you already  know I succeeded in retrieving her,

completing the TRIFECTA.

This year marks our 40^th year of marriage. She was my muse during the  writing of this sequence, as I have preferred to block out a lot of it. Women always remember the details..

`           I spared you the cheap Billboarding trick that jocks usually employ to keep their listeners hung up, in this case, not TSL but TSR, Time Spent Reading.

What I am holding off till next week is telling you how I got her back. I was embroiled in an epic struggle rivaling “Dr Zhivago” 

          Love can light on a monkey’s back…..

                                                                        My Grandma