OREGON ART BEAT Begins its 11th Season on October 8

Oregon Art Beat is set to brighten your fall and winter evenings as it kicks off a new season profiling artists and art of the region on Thursday, October 8 on the stations of Oregon Public Broadcasting. The award-winning show's 11th season brings you the music of legendary jazz singer Shirley Nanette, internationally known musician and composer Dave Frishberg, as well as a host of not-to-be-missed painters, ceramicists and dancers. Also … Look, viewers, look! See Dick draw! You'll delight in our interview with Dick Wiley, illustrator of the famed learn to read Dick and Jane books.

"I am continually amazed at the variety and depth of artists here and their willingness to share their work with us," said Executive Producer Jessica Martin. "Ten seasons on and we just keep uncovering gems in Oregon."

First up in the season opener is a moving feature on Paul Missal, a talented and sought-after painter who has also made his mark on hundreds of art students at the Pacific Northwest College of Art (PNCA). Tune in to find out why Paul loves teaching so much.

Next, meet Ty Ennis, a graduate of PNCA. Ty works in pencil and ink, and paints with a faint wash. His passion is finding stories that he wants to tell from history, especially his own.

Think you don't understand abstract art? Well, painter Lucinda Parker says to stop worrying about what it means and just experience how it makes you feel. Art Beat takes you to do just that as we watch her create one of her almost-wall-sized paintings.

About OREGON ART BEAT
Oregon Art Beat, Oregon Public Broadcasting's Emmy-Award winning local arts series, is in its 11th season. Art Beat profiles Northwest artists, musicians and artisans -- from an operatic baritone to a bit-and-spur craftsman to everything in between. The program airs Thursdays at 8pm and Sundays at 2am and 6pm. In the Mountain Time Zone of Eastern Oregon, the program airs at 9pm Thursdays and repeats at 7pm on Sundays. Funding for Oregon Art Beat is provided in part by James F. and Marion L. Miller Foundation and the Kinsman Foundation. More information is available online at opb.org/artbeat.

OREGON FIELD GUIDE Begins its 21st Season on October 8

Oregon Field Guide opens its 21st season with a half-hour special that follows a group of young people who cross the urban/rural divide to experience the realities of rural life. These kids have volunteered to participate in one of the only programs of its kind in the country, and it's no vacation. They get up at the crack of dawn. It's cold. They get muddy, help with calving, give vaccinations and share in both the joy and the misery that comes with real rural life.

It all began in 2005 when a group of students from Portland's Sunnyside Environmental School strutted into a public hearing packed full of ranchers from rural Grant County. They began to rap, share poems and read essays in defense of the West's most iconic predator -- the wolf. The ranchers, seated quietly in their tight Wranglers and Stetson hats seethed in anger. They'd long suspected that urban Portland was a training ground for environmentalists. Now their suspicions were confirmed.

The clash made headlines. Editorials were written. Angry letters were exchanged.

But just as it seemed Oregon's urban-rural divide had grown into an unbridgeable chasm, a handful of ranchers did the unexpected. They invited the kids to live and work along side them to see their side of life. And the kids took them up on the offer.

What's now called the Urban-Rural Exchange has taken place every year since 2005, thanks to 4H and the Sunnyside Environmental School. A dude ranch it's not. This is the real rural Oregon and it's unlike anything these Portland kids have known.

Tune in to the stations of Oregon Public Broadcasting on Thursday, October 8 at 8:30pm (and Sunday, October 11 at 2:30am and 6:30pm) as Field Guide tags along to Grant County to see how they're all faring.

About OREGON FIELD GUIDE
In its 21st season, Oregon Field Guide remains a valuable source of information about outdoor recreation, ecological issues, natural resources and travel destinations. Oregon Field Guide airs Thursday evenings at 8:30pm on the television stations of Oregon Public Broadcasting and repeats on Sunday evenings at 6:30pm. In the Mountain Time zone of Eastern Oregon, the program airs at 9:30pm Thursdays, and at 7:30pm Sundays.

OPB to Distribute $2 Million in CPB Grant Money

American Archives Pilot Program Uncovers Treasures in Station Stockrooms

Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB) will distribute more than $2 million in grants among 22 public television and radio stations to enable them to restore, digitize and archive valuable historical content they have gleaned from their vaults. OPB is the initiative manager for the American Archive Pilot Program initiative funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

This summer OPB supervised the process as 25 public broadcasting radio and television stations searched through hundreds of hours of historically significant broadcast material that might otherwise have been overlooked, neglected or lost. The pilot program focused on historical media related to the American Civil Rights Movement or World War II.

In their search, stations uncovered several long-forgotten gems: documentaries on busing and school desegregation, and on racial strife in Cairo, IL; unique recordings of Langston Hughes, Thurgood Marshall, and Gloria Steinem; Harvey Milk and the gay rights movement; the Ku Klux Klan in Northern California; 16mm news film outtakes unseen for over 30 years; and much more.

Researchers also realized what had been lost. Many learned of interviews, documentaries and even series they could no longer find. In some cases stations can’t be sure what they have. The tapes or film must be restored before they can be viewed and catalogued.

This pilot project will lead to CPB establishing the American Archive that will house thousands of hours of public broadcasting media with a goal of making this historic content available to educators, students and the general public.

Twenty-two stations now move forward into the second phase of the program, preserving and archiving selections of their content.

Phase II television stations include: WTVS, Detroit; WNET, New York; WHUT, Howard University in Washington, DC; LPB, Baton Rouge, LA; KCPT, Kansas City, MO; IPTV, Johnston, IA; and AETN, Conway, AR.

Phase II radio stations include: WYSO, Antioch University, Yellow Springs, OH; MPR, St. Paul, MN; and KPFA, Berkeley, CA.

Phase II joint licensees, radio and television, include: WSIU, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, IL; WPT/WPR, Madison, WI; WGBH, Boston; WVIZ/WCPN, Cleveland; WQED, Pittsburgh; WOUB, Ohio University, Athens, OH; WKNO, Memphis; WILL, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL; WCNY, Liverpool, NY; WMPN, Jackson, MS; KQED, San Francisco, CA; and TPBA, Texas.