Television viewers who watch a story unfold straight from the scene of an event can thank a Clinton Township man for helping to develop that technology, for which he has finally been recognized.

Fred Caesar was a 2020 inductee into the St. Louis Media Hall of Fame for his contribution to radio and television news and his help in developing electronic news gathering in the 1970s.

He joins an impressive cast of characters in the St. Louis Media Hall of Fame, including Dave Garroway, Joe Garagiola, Bob Costas, Jack Buck, Harry Caray and Tim McCarver.

Frank Absher, executive director of the St. Louis Media Foundation, said that in the early 1970s, CBS chose KMOX TV in St. Louis, where Caesar was assignment editor, to try out and improve the concept of broadcasting from the scene of an event or incident.

“That completely turned news coverage on its ear,” Absher said. “His station was the first in the country to do that, and Fred helped CBS perfect this equipment.”

He said prior to electronic news gathering, news crews had to shoot an event on film and bring it back to the station for editing and processing before it could be broadcast.

“It was his work in the trenches there in St. Louis with electronic news gathering that the (foundation) board saw as a fitting thing to recognize,” Absher said. “It revolutionized television, and Fred, as an assignment editor, was right in the middle of it.”

Caesar said he is humbled and honored by his induction into his hometown's Media Hall of Fame, but was quick to offer a reality check.

“The real heroes this past year are the health care workers,” Caesar said. “I'm honored by this, but everyone should keep in mind that we have heroes today who I hope get into some Hall of Fame for their efforts someday.”

Caesar recalled with nostalgia his radio and television career, which began when he served as an intern at KMOX TV while he was a business major at Washington University in St. Louis.

By the time he was a senior, he had attained the position of producer for weekend programs.

CBS owned seven stations throughout the U.S. at that time, and Caesar, at age 20, was the youngest producer.

He recalled the crash in July 1973 of Ozark Airlines Flight 809, just short of the runway, in which 38 of the 44 people aboard were killed.

Caesar, then an assignment editor, was off work that day but was called out to cover the crash because he lived near the airport.

“You're never prepared for those things,” Caesar said. “It always stayed with me because of the smell from the fire and the fuel.”

He rushed from the rainy, stormy scene back to the station with film footage of the wreck, and chatted with the news director as the film was being processed.

The news director instructed Caesar to appear on camera with the news anchor and talk about the scene, but Caesar protested that he needed a dry shirt.

“He said 'No, the people want to hear what you just saw,'” Caesar recalled.

So he described the scene on air, sitting alongside the news anchor, in a soaking wet shirt.

He switched to St. Louis' NBC affiliate in 1976 to accept a job as assistant news director, where he produced a program the following year celebrating the 50th anniversary of Charles Lindbergh's famous solo flight across the Atlantic Ocean.

Caesar and his team won several awards for the broadcast, which featured footage of the flight not seen in decades that Caesar managed to get from McDonnell Douglas aerospace manufacturing.

Amid the concerns of his wife and two children, Caesar moved to Harrisburg in 1979 just a few months after the partial meltdown of a nuclear reactor at Three Mile Island.

There, he worked at CBS affiliate WHP, where he was radio and television news director.

Caesar bought a house that was in a 10-mile radius of Three Mile Island, so he was given a meter to attach to his house to detect radiation.

“It never registered anything,” Caesar recalled.

As new director, Caesar was able to tour the nuclear plant, including the huge nuclear reactors.

“I was amazed,” he said. “You look up and it's just massive.”

Later, while working on a one-year anniversary piece on the Three Mile Island accident, Caesar had an idea to write Walter Cronkite and ask him to provide video for the project.

“I never heard anything, but a few days before we were finished with the production, the receptionist said: 'Someone is on the phone who says they're Walter Cronkite.'”

When Caesar picked up the phone, the unmistakable baritone of the venerated newsman boomed an apology for having forgotten to contact him about providing video.

“He said: 'Please pass along to your team how great you were in helping us (during the nuclear accident),'” Caesar said. “We were all very honored.”

He also visited the White House during the Carter and Reagan administrations and met both presidents.

In 1985, Caesar accepted a news director position in Portland, Maine. When he heard Cronkite would be docking his sailboat along the coast, he asked the reporter heading to the dock to have Cronkite sign a picture Caesar had salvaged from the Dumpster years before, when KMOX moved locations. “So I now have a Walter Cronkite-signed picture on the wall in my home,” he said.

Caesar ended up retiring in southeastern Butler County after his final gig in Washington, D.C., because his daughter, who had married a Winfield Township resident, invited him to spend Christmas there at her home.

Enamored with Saxonburg and its history, the Caesars moved to the borough.

Caesar has been involved with the Saxonburg Business Association and the Saxonburg Museum, and can be found most mornings at the coffee shop on Main Street.

He frequently recalls his days as a media man, and realizes he has had an exceptional life. “I was honored to present information to people I never knew who were watching every night and getting information from something I was able to contribute,” Caesar said. “Hopefully I have advanced someone's knowledge because of my work.”