{image1} Milwaukee has been waking up with Mark Concannon since September 1990. The Philadelphia native has worked his way through the country making stops in Syracuse, N.Y., Norfolk, Va., Fort Smith, Ark., Davenport, Iowa and Greensboro, N.C. before landing in Milwaukee to as a sports reporter in 1987. Still a die-hard sports fan, he's a Milwaukee ambassador, too. We sat down with FOX 6's resident early morning guy in this latest edition of Milwaukee Talks.
OMC: What brought you to news reporting?
MC: Growing up, I played sports a lot. I was one of the millions who were OK. I was lucky enough to walk in to the next best thing: sports broadcasting. It's funny, my two best friends I grew up with, we were all interested in this. One of those guys, Terry Smith, now does the Anaheim Angels and the other guy, Paul Kurtz, is now the news anchor at KYW in Philadelphia.
I was doing sports full-time up to 1990 when the Wake Up News started. Management asked what I thought about doing morning news. I felt it might be time to branch out and do some other things. My interest in news has grown, but it all came to that crossroads in September of 1990 when we turned the key and started Wake Up.
OMC: What is your schedule like?
{image2}MC: It's an early day. I get to the station between 3:30 and 4 a.m. I write, edit and produce the sports segments we have on and anchor Wake Up News.
It's three and a half hours, but it's pretty fast paced for us. We do a lot of news, interviews, preparing for interviews; a lot of times we're editing interview tapes and preparing for interviews during commercial breaks. Every day is different with this job.
OMC: What's the best part about your job?
MC: It's the personal connection the viewers feel with you. You're there as they're getting the kids ready, as they're jumping in and out of the shower. It's a very informal situation and relationship we have with the viewers. They feel very comfortable with us, and that is the best part. I've done other newscasts, sports and nightly newscasts, but I've never felt the personal connection in my career that I feel doing mornings. There's been nothing like it.
OMC: And the toughest part?
MC: I tell people, once you get up, it's great. An early start to the day and a relatively early finish compared to those folks on the clock until five o'clock. But it's getting to the getting up that's tough. That alarm never moves. If the neighbor's dog barks at 11:45 at night, the alarm still says 2:30 a.m. There are some days where you hear something, you look at you're alarm clock and it says 1:48 a.m. You look at the clock and say, 'I've got 42 minutes left to sleep and it feels like I've been asleep for five minutes.'
OMC: How has morning news changed?
MC: We started in 1990. Everyone had done cut-ins during the network programs, but actual morning news shows were not very developed. We were just kind of on and feeling our way through. There were actually people who said to me, 'You do morning news but you're on TV?' They were thinking radio.
Now, you look at the competition in our morning place and it is such a high priority. Morning news has grown so much with viewer interest and total viewership, it's unbelievable. It's easily the fastest growing television news viewership segment.
OMC: Would you consider yourself a news junkie?
{image3}MC: Even if I didn't do this for a living, I'd always want to be the guy who walked in to a friend's house and asked, 'did you hear this?' I always want to be the guy asking if you heard about this trade, this story. I just can't wait to tell people. Even if I wasn't on television, that would be me. That's always exciting.
OMC: Who are some of the notable people you have had an opportunity to interview?
MC: When I was in Virginia, our station and a business newspaper had learned that Muhammad Ali was coming to Virginia Beach. I believe Larry Holmes was fighting that night. Ali was there to look at some hotels. We went, along with the business newspaper and he agreed to let me ask the first couple of questions about sports. We're rolling on the interview, and I'm asking him if he's thinking about another comeback, what he thinks about tonight's fight and after like four or five questions, I ask my last question. He finished his last answer, looks at me and says, "Any more questions, Cosell, Jr.?" We ran that tape a lot.
Two years ago in Lake Geneva, Arnold Palmer was there building a golf course. We were standing in the middle of a fairway, and I asked him what he would do here. He responds, 'Well, you know, Mark,' calling me by my name, 'I'd probably hit about a six or a seven here, but a big guy like you would probably hit a nine.' The greatest golfer of our time just playing up like that.
{image4} OMC: What turned you on to sports?
MC: Every game can be something different. Every competition ... you just never know. There's just something about the preparation for games, the whole idea of going in to a particular event with the best plan to win and knowing that the other team has that same level of preparedness. That someone is going to win. There's just something irresistible about that to me.
OMC: Has this passion translated in to your life away from the camera?
MC: Oh yeah. The sports lessons that we learn are evident throughout our lives. In the last few years, I have lost quite a bit of weight and am trying to exercise and eat a little better. I think that there's a certain athletic pride that has been in me all this time and is still there. I like feeling good and having energy, no matter what it is that I do.
OMC: You are defeating the stereotype in Wisconsin. You're supposed to be drinking beer, eating sausage and gaining weight, not taking it off. What gives?
MC: I was having a physical three years ago. My doctor looked down my throat and said, 'Eww, that's interesting." At my tender age north of 40, I had to get the tonsil taken out. For the first month I couldn't eat anything except for sherbet, apple sauce and other soft stuff. I lost 20 pounds right away and felt so much better I just kept going. I still love to eat, but I was eating better things and making more intelligent choices. I was 260 and lost 82 pounds, which was a little too thin.
{image5}Our viewers were concerned, which was touching. The first thought naturally is 'what's wrong with him?' Eventually I just went on the air and confirmed that I was OK, I've just lost a lot of weight. I've gained some of it back. It has added so much to the quality of my life. That doesn't mean that I'm not going to have a brat at the ball game every once in a while, but that is a real treat.
OMC: What do you think about Milwaukee?
MC: I try to tell people from around the country what a well-kept secret this place is. I've been here 17 years, and I don't want to live anywhere else. It's the best of all worlds. It has, in my mind, all the advantages of a big city with few of the disadvantages. I grew up in Philadephia, but have never felt more at home than I have here.
OMC: Describe the perfect Milwaukee day?
MC: Breakfast at Solly's and lunch at Miss Katie's Diner followed by a spirited game of tabletop shuffleboard. I'd probably go to Eddie Martini's for dinner. There are so many great restaurants here that picking one is almost impossible. I would top it all off with Kopp's custard, and hopefully the flavor of the day would be Cherry Amaretto Cheesecake, which is my own personal favorite. That would be a dream day. Somewhere in between there would be a game, play or a concert.
OMC: If you could have a cup of coffee with one person who would it be?
MC: I would have loved to have sat down and spent some time with Rod Serling, the creator of "The Twilight Zone." He saw the world in a much different way than anybody else. I would have greatly enjoyed hearing him talk about people, the universe and his writing and storytelling philosophy.
OMC: Tell us something about yourself that we may not know.
MC: About the last seven or eight years, I've been writing short stories. I've probably written about 16 short stories. I just love the language. It's a great release for me.
OMC: You also read quite a bit, right?
MC: What I have done with my writing has rekindled my love of reading. I like to read a lot of different things. I love short stories. We have a lot of authors on the show and I will read their books. It's a nice leisure activity and prepares me for an interview.
OMC: Any words of wisdom?
MC: Never be afraid to say it's my fault, and learn from that. There are plenty of things I have learned by making mistakes and owning up to them.
