McMullen was short in stature, but a media titan
Maybe John Donne said it best when he wrote “every man’s death diminishes me, for I am involved in mankind.” With the added reminder to “seek not to find for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for thee.”
The feeling is that all of us who knew him, and around here that takes in just about everybody old enough to remember him and his times, feel diminished by the death of Jack McMullen.
Jack died this week from injuries received when he was struck by a car in Uniontown, and at the time he was reportedly headed for one of his big pleasures. It was Friday night, which meant he was getting together with his cronies at the Uniontown VFW Post. He was reportedly crossing the street to keep that rendezvous when his injuries occurred.
I met Jack shortly after coming to this area, when he was with Uniontown radio station WMBS. We first met at a scholastic football game he was broadcasting, and I was covering as Connellsville sports editor. Our acquaintance was casual at first, but over the years developed into what became a strong friendship, whether it be in a casual or occupational sense.
Always a joke or two, maybe josh each other about something we had said or written, or teaming up against a critic who took exception to something from one or both of us. Heaven knows there were a lot of the latter even then, but we both considered the source, then shrugged it all off with Jack’s old Irish adage reminder that “where ignorance is bliss, ’tis folly to be wise.”
Physically, Jack was as small man. Occupationally and personally, he was a titan.
There wasn’t much size to him physically, and for that reason he could never compete in high school sports. So, he did the next best thing that kept him close to athletics. He became a cheerleader for old German Twp. High, from which he graduated in 1938 as class salutatorian.
After a distinguished World War II service stretch in the U.S. Coast Guard, Jack went into broadcasting, and built a fine career for himself, and for whatever station he was working for at the time.
He built up a great following among sports fans. The real fans, that is. Like somebody else that could be mentioned in this business, Jack found the fair weather fans to be a prolonged dispensation of discomfort in the gluteus maximus.
Every town has its so-called “characters,” and you might say that Jack knew every of them around here.
But, overall, Jack knew everybody. And everybody knew him. They knew him as a friend, a good storyteller, a man who loved a good story or joke in return, a man of long memory for the good things and the good people in his life. He enjoyed life to the fullest, and the more time you spent around him, the more you became imbued in the same respect.
Most of his broadcasting years were spent with WMBS, where like all of us at one time or another in this media business, he ran the gamut. He did news, conducted talk shows, played records (DJ), broadcast sports events. You name it.
Some of his most enjoyable moments were broadcasting the long and successful span when Uniontown was so dominant in WPIAL and state basketball. And he was also along-time local baseball umpire, and was known as a toastmaster for local events, bingo caller, you name it.
In later years, he joined the now defunct Connellsville station WCVI, as disc jockey and talk show host. It was in the latter respect that I was closest to him in his work.
Jack once suggested that we get together on Fridays for a talk show on sports, discussing the week’s happenings, especially on the local scene, and take calls from listeners. We developed a good following, so much so that people were telling Jack maybe we should do two shows weekly. We did, with the second day devoted to sports, or whatever else they might want to talk about. But it was mostly in the former sense.
There would be trivia questions, with movie tickets to the winners. Then, Bart Mallory would call in with some trivia questions of his own for Jack and me. Really, it became a lot of fun.
Perhaps the greatest compliment we received for these programs came one day in downtown Connellsville, when a fellow stopped me and said “I listened to you guys this morning.”
Asked how we did, he replied “If BS was music, you two guys would be a brass band.”
Jack told the story on the air, and when a listener called in and asked if we weren’t upset by the comparison, Jack laughed “Heavens, no. In this business, that is one of the greatest compliments you can receive.”
Many times after that, Jack would start our broadcasts with the reminder that “this is the Kriek and McMullen Band playing for your pleasure.”
His afternoon disc jockey programs were easy listening. None of the raucous, vile trash that unfortunately gluts the airwaves today. Instead, it was nice, soft, easy listening. Real music from bygone eras that has now been all but forgotten, except among people like Jack.
They were great times. And you can be assured that if The Almighty has a station or two, Jack is already in a comfortable seat ready to lead his “brass band” once again.
As The Bard of Avon wrote, “his life was gentle, and the elements so mixed in him that nature might stand up and say to all the world, this was a man.”
My sympathies to his family.
Jim Kriek is a correspondent for the Herald-Standard