When Journal Comes for Channel 5, Don't Be Surprised If They Shop for Radio, Too

[RadioZack]

The one thing I remember was the lack of "commercials" for The Orpyland Theme park.   

Huh?  I had the complete opposite experience.  It was one of my most vivid memory, seeing regular commercials for "the package," of staying at the hotel, attending the Opry and Opryland.  They seemed to be once every hour.  But maybe not as often.  I never went to the park, but I had a sense of what it was like from the commercials.

As for "Branson style venues," Gaylord had the Opry House, as well as the Roy Acuff and Minnie Pearl Theaters on the Opryland grounds, then they restored the Ryman Auditorium, and built the Wildhorse Saloon, and the General Jackson river boat, each with a performance stage.   Quite a few venues around Nashville.  In fact, Gaylord still owns all those places.

This is a little off-topic, but I just wanted to correct this last post a bit:

There was no Minnie Pearl venue. There were small Roy Acuff and Minnie Pearl museums, just outside the main doors and to the west of the Opry House, but those closed with the theme park and their contents were either merged with the Grand Ole Opry Museum or returned to their families. The buildings they were in later became the WSM-AM administrative offices. Those offices were heavily damaged in the 2010 flood, and the buildings were razed. There's just a patch of grass there now. The Opry Museum closed after the flood and never reopened, but the building still stands and the jury is still out on whether Gaylord will ever bring it back to life.

There was a "Roy Acuff Theatre" (later the BellSouth Acuff Theatre) just to the South of the Opry House, between it and the Grand Ole Opry Museum. Despite sitting outside the park gates, it was used as a venue for Opryland Themepark's top stage show ("Brenda Lee's Music Music Music" and "Dick Clark's American Bandstand Classics", among others -- you had to show your themepark admission stub to get in). It only became a 'ticketed venue' late in the park's run, during the "Nashville On Stage" concert series from 1995-1997. After the park closed, it was used as a venue for smaller shows, an auxiliary lecture hall for Gaylord Opryland conventions, and was the broadcast location for USA's/NBC's "Nashville Star". It suffered much the same fate in 2010. There was a children's dance competition taking place in there on May 2, and they had to evacuate the premises when they realized water was pooling on the carpet in the audience seating area (http://www.showstopperonline.com/blog/?p=137). After the flood, Gaylord opted not to repair the building—I can't imagine it was much of a profit center for Gaylord—and tore it down last year. It's now a bus parking lot for the Opry House.

 

[TheBigA]

What was the theater where Nashville Now was taped? My understanding was it was on the grounds of the theme park somewhere.

 

[onetake]

When you go into the Opryland Entrance go left. That road runs parrallel with Briley Parkway. Go past the hotel and the first building on the right was all of TNN. Offices, execs, master control, more execs, studios, engineering and more execs. The studio was empty last time I saw it, being used as storage and at one time the kitchen had some overflow of their stuff sitting around.
After Jack Dewitt, the guy who "got it" at WSM was Irving Waugh who hired well. The news team was second to none, and the tv side in particular had good management. Bud is a good fellow, but was known as the "hatchet man" within National Life for various reasons but he's a pleasant man who could explain what was going on to the National Life execs. They weren't broadcasters, tourist park guys or hotel legends but had a solid conservative eye for return on investment and Nashville provided a good place for them to be.

American General inherited and kept most of the NLT broadcasting side execs. Eddie Gaylord came along and having no better staff to replace the team kept them. They had been there for decades, were honest, connected to the market and stable. TNN's strongest revenue flow came from the fishing and outdoor shows aired on weekends. Both TNN & CMT were weak in home count, ratings and revenue flow due to (1 funds for programming and (2 guys in charge who had run a local tv station suddenly called for a broader vision to run a network.

On the verge of going under, Group W came to the rescue and bought half of it. CBS then buying Westinghouse later got the property. CBS wasn't in the cable business at all back then. After several years of seeing the Nashville operation "go nowhere" they felt "move it to New York" and run it from there. It's now significant in home count and revenue flow, especially CMT. It's sad and embarrassing to see the hometown team could only take it so far. Their vision was limited in broadcasting, they second guessed the park's potential and now with the Omni Hotel coming in they have REAL STRONG hotel competition for a change, and are saying "Hey Marriott, YOU do it." Sounds harsh but they got into a lot of areas with the same ole guys who kep the same local guys in charge. Like all of life, our blind spots eventually show up. That's why I started way back by saying if Journal buys radio here they need true real dedicated radio guys running it or they'll be a stepchild to channel 5. History repeats itself.

 

[RadioZack]

What was the theater where Nashville Now was taped? My understanding was it was on the grounds of the theme park somewhere.

Nashville Now (and later Crook & Chase's Music City Tonight, and the early days of Tom Wopat's Prime Time Country) was broadcast from the Gaslight Theatre. Originally, Nashville Now was broadcast live, but sometime in the late 1980s, they began taping it in the early afternoon. The Gaslight's entrance was inside the gated theme park, but the building itself was just behind the Minnie Pearl & Roy Acuff museums. After the theme park was torn down, it was the only building that once stood inside the gated theme park to remain standing in its original location. For 12 years after the park closed, it was used for the yearly "ICE" exhibit, as a banquet hall, and occasionally as a soundstage. It, too, succumbed to the flood and was torn down sometime in 2010.

I'm kind of an Opryland history dork, so I've made a handy little map (thanks to Google) (http://home.comcast.net/~zack.bennett/oprylandoverhead.PNG) to show where everything was before the flood.

Again... off-topic, I know. Sorry to divert.

 

[Tibbs4]

Again off subject, but the two main decision makers on taking out Opryland are friends and they both readily admit it was a terrible call. Sometimes you have to keep the heart intact, even if it costs you. The other vital organs have obviously struggled in many ways. The rev. stream was seriously impacted. The Omni certainly will not help Gaylord, but the mere fact that a quarter of downtown Nashville is being virtually rebuilt will date the hotel on Briley Pkwy even more. I am grateful that the city bucked the years of attempts from Gaylord to stop competition and keep it all to themselves. I am glad that Gaylord has all but left the city. I am sure many will disagree, but I think Gaylord many bad calls that slowed this great city down and cost their stockholders much lost potential revenue. Thankfully, downtown is being resurrected bigger and better than any plan anyone after NLT ever dreamed possible. One look at the map posted proves how much of a disaster has been left even before the flood. One aerial look at SoBro / The Gulch and even in it's infancy it is very impressive and well planned. Soon no one will need "Opryland." And, YES this has a lot to do with radio in this city....I think.

 

[secondchoice]

IMHO Oryland (the theme park) did not deal with the growth of Dollywood. Being squeezed in (land-wise) and being built in a active flood plain seem not to be a good thing either. If I was running the park I would have "rebuilt" at least one ride after every flood season (whether it damaged the ride or not) with something "new". Even in Bankruptcy Six Flags managed to come up with a "new" ride in most of their parks every year. I realize the constant construction in the "off season" would be expensive but it would give a reason for families less than a hundred miles to visit the park every year or two which should more than off set any construction costs.

 

[firepoint525]

The Opryland area was also "squeezed in," albeit a little less literally, by other regional theme parks, like Dollywood, Libertyland, Six Flags, even Beech Bend.

 

[secondchoice]

The Opryland area was also "squeezed in," albeit a little less literally, by other regional theme parks, like Dollywood,

BTW Dollywood was is a good operation:

http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2012/sep/11/dollwyood-wins-five-golden-ticket-awards/

 

[TheBigA]

Interesting how all the other theme parks have gone belly-up, other than Dollywood.

 

[deltas69]

The thing I noticed about Dollywood...you didn't have to stand in line very long to ride..Opryland had lines over two hours long on all the good ones..I never waited more than 30 minutes at Dollywood..maybe I hit both parks at the worst/best times..but it was the same every time I went to Opryland the rides were better better at Dollywood I thought..it was just a much more enjoyable place compared to Opryland..

 

[Jon J]

I believe I have read these posts carefully and have not seen a mention of the person who actually first floated the idea of Opryland and all the ways it could grow and benefit the area. That gentleman (and I mean gentleman) was Elmer Alley.