After more than 13 years at Texas Public Radio, Arts and Culture Reporter Jack Morgan is retiring.
Morgan spent decades in broadcasting before coming to TPR, including a long career in television. At TPR, he covered San Antonio’s artists, musicians, cultural institutions and the people who make the city’s arts and culture scene what it is.
TPR’s Steve Short sat down with Morgan to look back on some of his favorite stories and what comes next.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Steve Short: Today, after a long, illustrious career in broadcasting, we bid adieu to Texas Public Radio Arts and Culture Reporter Jack Morgan. Jack, you're retiring.
Jack Morgan: Can you believe it? Gosh, I've been here for 13 years and most of a month but hanging up the old microphone now.
Short: So what are some of your best memories and best stories that you remember here at TPR?
Morgan: One of my favorite yearly stories I do is the TubaMeister Christmas with Ray Grim.
It happens at the Artisan River Theater, which is so funny because the stage is on one side, the audience is on the other, but the boats go in front of the whole production. And for once, tubas finally get to be the main instrument. He's one of my favorite stories.
We've also got Elizabeth Barlow Rogers. She was born and raised in San Antonio. Ended up going to Wellesley College, and went to work for Central Park, and eventually worked her way all the way up to where she was running the whole thing. And Central Park in the 1970s was not a good place, really.
And she used her own ingenuity and ability to raise funds to make a lot of corrections and neat things about Central Park.
She told us all about things that we'd never heard before, and one of the weird things about that story is that it's the only time I've been retweeted by Yoko Ono. So that was cool.
Next is Mariachi Extravaganza. Every year, these kids get together and try out and practice, and then they have a big competition.
Now this is one I won a national Edward R. Murrow Award for. I'm very proud of that. But the station also won two Murrow Awards back-to-back as essentially the best large market radio station in the nation.
Short: Over your long career, you interviewed a lot of prominent individuals as well. Who were some of those people?
Morgan: I made a list this morning. It's not very extensive, but John Cleese of "Monty Python," Karim Wasfi, the Baghdad cellist.
When there was terrorism happening, he would take his chair and cello and go and sit in front of the damage and the destruction. He was essentially trying to fight terrorism with art, and that was so cool.
Also, Neil deGrasse Tyson, the late and really great Jesse Treviño. (I) also got to interview NPR's Scott Simon, and artist Vincent Valdez, who was just awarded yesterday a MacArthur Genius Grant, great guy and wonderful artist. Also, Justin Hayward, the singer for the Moody Blues, I got to interview him twice.
Lila Cockrell, Phil Hardberger, Ron Nirenberg — all the mayors of the city. Kinky Friedman went to his ranch and interviewed him. That was fun.
Also, Yo-Yo Ma. Now, I didn't do a story myself on Yo-Yo Ma. We left that to Norma Martinez. She got to interview him because she's a cello player too.
And he was really good. That video, I shot video of it, and it was put together, and it's on YouTube.
Short: That was down in Laredo, right?
Morgan: Yes, right on the river. 201,000 people have watched that video on YouTube. So that's pretty amazing stuff.
Carlos Cortes, who's the proponent of Faux Bois and Trabajo Rústico here in San Antonio, he's got the huge grotto that's there next to the Pearl, where you can walk down in it.
There's two or three waterfalls. It's 160 feet wide. It's the biggest piece of art in San Antonio that I'm aware of, at least.
And a lot of incredibly smart, creative, and neat folks locally, artists and such as that. I've just had a lot of fun doing this.
Short: You also went to Beirut once.
Morgan: Six months into this job, I was contacted by someone who said a foundation was bringing people to the Middle East to talk about stories, how to cover them. I got invited to go to that and did, and really kind of had the time of my life on that.
Short: Thirteen years at Texas Public Radio, but you've had a long career prior to that. You also have a background in television. Tell us about that.
Morgan: TV was my career until I got to here. I worked at all four affiliates in town, and worked in Vermont, worked in Florida. So yeah, it's been a wild ride.
Short: Something many people may not be aware of about you is that you also are an artist.
Morgan: That's true. I make stained glass. If you're ever on the fourth floor here at Texas Public Radio, there are three windows I've made. So I make stained glass when I can.
Short: Are you going to continue that now that you're going to be retired?
Morgan: Yeah, I am. It's one of my favorite things to do.
Short: Well, it's beautiful work that we see around here.
Short: I understand this is not really a goodbye forever, though.
Morgan: Not quite. You're not rid of me quite yet. I'm going to do occasional freelance stuff here at the station. If the story is interesting enough, I'll talk to Dan Katz, our vice president for news, and get it worked out.
Short: All right, Jack. Well, thanks for coming on this afternoon.
Morgan: Thank you, Steve. You've been great to work with.
Short: You too.
