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Chris - you will be sorely missed
Chris Bowman fielded calls
from listeners and discussed current affairs as a talk show host
at WNTA (1330 AM) since 1994.
Area loses Chris
Bowman
By Frank Schier, Editor & Publisher of The Rock River
Times
At age 51, Chris Bowman, WNTA 1330- AM radio talk-show host, died on Tuesday, Feb. 3, after a sudden illness.
Noted for the controversial and news-breaking content of his radio shows, Bowman was also very active in the Republican political scene locally and nationally and was a former television journalist.
WNTA’s complete press release and his biographical information from the station’s Web site appear at the end of this article.
He was a highly competitive and aggressive journalist, often being the first to break a story and call it his.
Bowman frequently had national political figures on his program, displaying an access and savvy unmatched in local media.
A frequent guest on Bowman’s radio show, Dr. Thomas Fleming, president of Rockford Institute and editor of Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture, said: “Chris had his own point of view and was never shy about expressing it. But unlike most talk-show hosts, he was willing to let his guests and his callers express their opinions. This openness made Bowman’s show perhaps the freest talk radio show in the Middle West, which explains why he attracted so many listeners from outside the Rockford area.”
Stephanie Caltagerone, former Rockford school board member, said: “The first thing is that I already miss his laugh. That goes without saying that there were many community issues that he was an integral part of, and I’ll certainly miss working with him that way. More than anything, I’ll miss the afternoon calls when he woke up from his nap, saying, ‘Hi, honey. How was your day?’, knowing full well what my day was going to be before I did.”
Well known for his scrambling to line up stories before his show, his constant phone calls to sources and his unique humor, Bowman pushed the envelope of journalism as few in his field dare.
Jeff Havens, staff writer for this paper and also a frequent guest on Bowman’s show, said: “Chris Bowman and I shared an interest in revealing the truth. In so doing, we often shared information in a business that frowns on cooperation. Chris and I were more interested in exposing the truth with the hope that the truth would increase our freedom and understanding of the community in which we were both raised and lived.
“Chris was one of two people who gave me a voice and venue to expose the truth about what was happening at Rock Valley College,” Havens added. “While many doubted and abandoned me during the early days of the Rock Valley College story, Chris did not, and for that I will always be grateful.
“Chris had aspirations to change the county’s priorities about how the jail tax money is being spent. We planned to have crime expert Dr. Michael Hazlett on Chris’ show Feb. 16. We will continue what Chris would have wanted.
“Chris was interested in seeking the truth, and I am confident that he has found the ultimate truth—THE CUBS WON THE WORLD SERIES!” Havens said.
Despite the fact that he was a Cubs fan, or perhaps indicatively, Bowman was also a front page columnist for this paper for three years. His first column on May 10, 1995, “Warrior Breed—is there a connection?”, dealt with gun control, religious controversy, and the school district.”
Bowman is credited by many as one of the leading media persons who helped in the removal of the tort tax, or taxation without representation by Federal Magistrate P. Michael Mahoney.
His last two items for this paper appeared on Sept. 23, 1998. The first was a headline news story, “School Board refuses to use ‘Illegal’ Tort Fund,” and the second was his column, “Rockford property taxes highest in the U.S.”
In the latter piece, he disputed a Kiplinger Personal Finance Monthly magazine article that ranked Rockford fourth in the nation for property taxes paid. He also disputed the Rockford Register Star’s figures on the subject and showed we were “tops.”
The last two paragraphs of that column were classic Bowman—to the news-breaking point, clever and to some unpopular or offensive. Those paragraphs read: The purpose of this correction is not to paint a bleak picture or to be negative. You can’t solve the problems of this community by sticking your head in the quicksand of untruths. Once we realize the strength of this community, faced with a domineering federal court, we will stop challenging ‘negative’ news like this, admit the present and work for positive change. We should not box ourselves in, Magistrate Mahoney. Creating more inequity fails to remedy past inequity.
“Memo to RRS: Just the facts, ma’am.”
Bowman left these pages due to deadline conflicts.
On a sad, typically weary, yet smiling personal note as an editor, Bowman, you always push deadline, even when you’ve left. It’s Tuesday and time to go to press, with news of your departure that all of us here at The Rock River Times are very sorry to print. To his long-time partner Bill Rose, family, friends and listeners, this paper’s staff extends our condolences and best wishes. The news in Rockford will be missing some great stories.
Chris Bowman’s Work History
• 6/94-Present: WNTA 1330 AM, Radio Talk Show Host
• 9/92-6/94: WROK 1440 AM, Radio Talk Show Host
• 11/91-9/92: Regional Representative to the U.S. Secretary of Labor
• 5/90-11/91: Consultant to the Lynn Martin Senate Campaign Committee
• 2/89-5/90: Account Executive for Ruder-Finn Public Relations
• 12/86-2/89: Political Director for Republican National Committee
• 2/85-12/86: Deputy Executive Director for the National Republican Congressional Committee
• 1/81-2/85: Chief of Staff to the U.S. House Representative Lynn Martin
• 9/79-1/81: Assistant News Director and Reporter at WIFR-TV
Education
• 9/70-12/74: Drake University, B.A. in Radio & TV Journalism
• 9/66-6/70: Guilford High School
WNTA Press Release
WNTA Radio talk show host Chris Bowman died today (Feb. 3, 2004) following a short, sudden illness. He was 51.
“It is a tragic day for all of us,” said Bob Rhea, RadioWorks president. “Chris Bowman dedicated his career to the Rockford community. He will be sorely missed.”
Bowman has been a lightning rod for local issues of public importance since he began hosting a local radio talk show in September 1992. He spent his first 22 months on local radio with WROK.
Following his June 1994 termination at WROK, Bowman was immediately hired by WNTA and has hosted a midday talk program continuously for more than nine and one-half years.
Himself a product of Rockford schools and a 1970 graduate of Guilford High School, Bowman was most noted for his tenacious attention to the ongoing sagas involving public education. For most of his talk tenure, the Rockford District operated under the control of a federal magistrate resulting from a consent decree in a desegregation lawsuit.
The Bowman Show was a magnet for breaking local news stories due to his extensive contacts in the local community, regionally and nationally.
His media career bookended 11 years of political work. His first media job was as a reporter and later assistant news director at WIFR-TV in Rockford. He left that job in January 1981 to become chief of staff to United States Representative Lynn Martin.
In February 1985, Bowman became deputy executive director for the National Republican Congressional Committee. Two years later, he began serving the Republican National Committee as political director, a position he held until February of 1989.
He was a consultant for Lynn Martin’s unsuccessful campaign for the U.S. Senate in 1990, and then served as Martin’s regional representative as she served President George H. Bush as Secretary of Labor. He moved back to Rockford in September 1992 to begin his radio career.
Bowman was a 1974 graduate of Drake University with a bachelor of arts degree in radio and TV journalism.
In the late 1970s, Chris Bowman worked as a local television news reporter. He’s pictured here (far left) with the staff at WIFR-Channel 23, which included Sue Mroz (third from right).
Bowman, who once had been political director of the Republican National Committee, joins former President Bush on a campaign stop at the MetroCentre in Rockford. With them are Bowman’s parents, the late Jerald and Joan Bowman.
In 1981, Bowman left TV journalism to become chief of staff for U.S. Rep. Lynn Martin, whom voters elected to replace John B. Anderson after his bid for president.
from the Rockford Register
Star, February 4, 2004
Feisty newsman
Bowman dies
WNTA
talk-show host Chris Bowman died Tuesday of liver failure at age
51.
By MARK
BONNE‚ Rockford Register Star
ROCKFORD — Chris Bowman, a Rockford native who once
worked as a top strategist for the national Republican Party but
was known in the last 12 years as a controversial local radio
personality, died Tuesday of liver failure. He was 51.
Bowman’s death was announced on his WNTA (1330 AM) talk show shortly after 11 a.m., and for the next six hours, colleagues shared memories and took calls from listeners and political figures, including recent Democratic presidential candidate Carol Moseley Braun.
The 1970 Guilford High School graduate was taken by ambulance Sunday to OSF Saint Anthony Medical Center where, friends and co-workers said, he deteriorated rapidly until he became comatose.
Politicians who called WNTA Tuesday came from both sides of the aisle. Besides Braun, U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, state Sen. Dave Syverson, Winnebago County Board Chairman Kris Cohn, State’s Attorney Paul Logli and Rockford aldermen Dave Johnson, Nancy Johnson and Bill Timm offered tributes.
Illinois GOP Chairman Judy Baar Topinka issued a statement that praised Bowman as “funny, endearing, sincere and insightful” and said he was “always the guy you wanted on your side.”
The Rev. Steve Bland, who opposed Bowman on issues relating to the federal discrimination lawsuit against Rockford public schools, weighed in. So did media types from across the country. John Ivanic, a former news anchor for WREX-13, called from Ohio, and former cable TV executive K.C. McWilliams called from Florida but became too choked up to go on the air.
“Many people who listened to Chris considered him an advocate for the underdog,” said WNTA news director Ken DeCoster, who hosted the spontaneous broadcast eulogy. “He would champion a cause and see an issue to its conclusion.”
Not everyone held Bowman in the same high esteem as his hard-core, anti-establishment fans. Some thought he gave too much attention to vocal minorities and focused too often on the negative. Former Rockford Mayor Charles Box ranked among community leaders who refused to go on Bowman’s show.
Bowman’s struggle with alcoholism led to an arrest for drunken driving and absences from his radio show. He publicly disclosed his battle with the disease to listeners in 1997. Those close to Bowman said Tuesday he had turned a corner in his recovery in recent months and seemed fine Friday when he did what proved to be his final show.
“We didn’t sugar-coat,” DeCoster said of Tuesday’s live radio outpouring. “We pointed out that at times Bowman could be persistent to the point of being annoying — and yet you couldn’t stay mad at him.”
U.S. Rep. Don Manzullo, R-Egan, was among those who spoke of run-ins, confrontations and feuds that ended in friendship, or at least truce.
“He would like to stir the pot,” Manzullo said in an interview from Washington, D.C. “But he never really intended to harm anyone. He never did anything mean-spirited. He was the kid brother who never grew up.”
Manzullo said Bowman worked in a high-wire media format that rewards antagonism and leaves little or no time to consider one’s thoughts before articulating them.
“He was spontaneous,” Manzullo said, “and if he hurt you, he would feel bad.”
Bowman earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Drake University in 1974 and returned to Rockford to take a job with the CBS affiliate, then known as WCEE.
Arles Hendershott, now the station’s publicist, worked as a street reporter for rival WTVO at the time.
Bowman was “tough as nails” pursuing stories and broadcasting from crime scenes or public meetings, but he was a cutup off camera.
“I don’t care how serious the story was,” Hendershott said, “he would do something to make you laugh.”
As a cub reporter, Bowman was “tenacious ... a real pit bull,” said Pat Cunningham, Page One editor for the Rockford Register Star, who worked at WREX and competed with Bowman.
Most everyone spoke Tuesday of Bowman’s insatiable appetite for the telephone and his habit of calling people at all hours.
“He was almost like a teenager in that regard,” Cunningham said. “I don’t recall him ever sitting through an entire restaurant meal without getting up to use the phone. That was in the days before cell phones.”
Hendershott said that even after Bowman left TV to work as chief of staff for newly elected U.S. Rep. Lynn Martin in 1981, she received late-night and early-morning news tips from him.
“That same fierceness and competitive edge you saw in him on the street as a reporter, he protected Lynn with,” Hendershott said. “He was a very good press secretary for her.”
Bowman left Martin to work in leadership roles for the GOP, serving as political director for the Republican National Committee from 1987 until 1989. He returned to Martin’s side in 1990 as a consultant in her unsuccessful bid for the U.S. Senate.
“Interestingly, despite his Republican credentials, he never seemed very ideological in a political sense,” Cunningham said. “His views were all over the place.”
In 1992, Bowman turned to radio, first at WROK. After being fired for low ratings, Bowman joined WNTA.
“Controversy swirled around him the entire time he was on radio, and he loved every minute of it,” said David McAley, vice president and general manager of RadioWorks, which owns WNTA and three other Rockford stations. “He loved being at the center of the action.”
McAley suspects Bowman at times regretted that his work left him ostracized.
“I think Chris would have liked for everyone to love him.”
“On the other hand,” McAley said, being a lightning rod “perpetuated his legend and made him who he was.”
Bowman also wasn’t as brazen in person, McAley said, as he came across on the air.
“Bowman could cut someone’s head off on the radio. But if that person was in the studio, he turned into a pussycat. In face-to-face situations, he was much easier on people.”
Bowman had his detractors, McAley said, but none “ever questioned his genuine love for the community.”
Although his show broached a range of issues, Bowman devoted countless hours of airtime to school politics.
Former Rockford School Board member Ted Biondo said Bowman played a crucial role in the effort to end judicial control and court-imposed taxes resulting from the federal discrimination case.
“He gave people outside the establishment an equal voice,” Biondo said. “He would present the facts, and the facts are not positive or negative.”
Biondo cried when he said Tuesday that he stood alone at Bowman’s bedside at Saint Anthony and held his hand Sunday night.
“It was almost more than I could bear to look at that man,” Biondo said, “It was really sad. I lost a good friend.”
Bowman grew up the son of a surgeon. During the summer he played baseball on a makeshift diamond where Eisenhower Middle School now stands.
“We grew up loving Rockford in its heyday,” older brother Bill Bowman said. “Chris just embraced the big-town, little-city idiosyncrasy Rockford has. Chris wanted that for Rockford and was constantly striving for that."
(NOTE: Chris' ashes have been scattered at Wrigley Field in Chicago.)
A DVD or VHS tape of Chris' memorial service is available, for a $20 donation to the Chris Bowman Scholarship Fund for high school students who intend to major in journalism. Call 815-874-7861. Donations to the fund can be made at Alpine Bank, PO Box 6086, Rockford, IL 61125.
ONE YEAR LATER - TRIBUTE BROADCAST - hours of soundbites
SEND ME YOUR MEMORIES OF CHRIS... PICTURES, STORIES, ETC. TO BE POSTED ON THIS PAGE. SEND TO: ejpagel@netscape.net