By Chuck Ross

First and foremost, thank you. Without our readers we wouldn’t have been able to have a great run of almost 40 years. And without our advertisers we wouldn’t have lasted either.

The reason I’ve been able to be at the helm of this publication is primarily because of David Klein, Scott Donaton, Gloria Scoby and Rance Crain.

Scott, who is now at Hulu, was the first person I spoke to about coming to Crain Communications. That was back in 1996. Scott had just been appointed to run, on the edit side, Advertising Age, along with David Klein. So I became Ad Age’s media editor. Four year later, in 2000, David Klein and Gloria Scoby asked me to take over Electronic Media (EM) as its editor.

With their support — and Rance’s — several years later, after Rance had changed our name to TelevisionWeek, they asked me to become publisher. Then in 2015, when Crain was going to shut down TVWeek, the company sold me the pub.

Besides Rance, I received invaluable support from his brother, Keith, and when they came into the company, Keith’s kids, KC and Chris. Crain remains today a strong, vibrant company whose first priority has always been the importance of journalism.

My first task after being named editor was to move EM from Chicago to L.A. Having never before been in charge of a publication myself, I could not have run the pub in L.A. at all if my good friend and colleague Tom Gilbert had not agreed to be our managing editor.

The number of top journalism professionals who have passed through these doors at EM/TVWeek before and after my arrival is extraordinary. I’ll name some of them, and please, if I don’t mention you as alumni, it’s primarily the case of a failing memory. I am grateful to all of you.

Before I got here, the legendary Ron Aldridge ran the pub. Later David Klein came aboard as editor, and later still, P.J. Pednarski. Thanks to Betsy Edgerton, Marc White, Mike Schneider, Elizabeth Jensen, Joe Adalian, Greg Baumann, James Hibberd, Melissa Grego, Steven Rosenberg, Julie Osterman, Mike Freeman, Larry Oliver, Charley Daniels, Kurt Gardner, Angela Hoffman, Jenny Butler, Karissa Wang, Natalie Verdugo, Vlada Gelman, Chad Rooney, Shannon Peavey-Madhani, Jarre Fees, Scott Malbasa, Natalie Finn, Beth Sarnoff, Stephanie Robbins, Marianne Paskowski, Andrew Krukowski, Lisa Horowitz, Susan Thomas, Jon Lafayette, Sean Diviny, Allison Waldman, Wendy Petronka, Christopher Perez, Debra Kaufman, Manish Patel, Colby Coates, Dinah Eng, Susan Moss, Ellie Bodio, Patrick Doyle, Rich Martin, Richard Price, Jay Sherman, Joe Pasteris, Allen Semerdjian, Sheree Curry, Aimee Picchi, Eric Estrin, Lee Heidel, Lee Hall, Craig Leddy, Bill Mahoney, Adam Buckman, Janet Stilson, Richard Mahler, Robert Homan, Karen Egoff, Ed Joras, Richard Tedesco, Kathy Maeglin, Mark Mandernach, Susan Graening, Lissy Peace, Howard Gelfand, Susan Spillman, Millie Chiavelli, John Melkonian, Karla Keyser, Fotini Sposato, Lisa Padilla, Elizabeth Kovaly, Fran Prybylo, Lee Goldberg, Eileen Figure Sandlin, Stephen Gilkenson, Wayne Friedman, Alex Romanelli and Luke Matheny (who was an intern for us and who won an Oscar in 2010 for Best Live Action Short).

Hillary Atkin, your columns have been fantastic.

Dennis Liff, my best buddy here for so many years, words cannot express my gratitude. Dennis will spend most of his time now expanding on his landmark research into historic filming locations, which is the focus of his astonishingly detailed blog, iversonmovieranch.blogspot.com.

Here’s a wonderful snapshot of us: We published this on Feb. 23, 2003, which was the last issue of EM. We came out the next week as TelevisionWeek:

“We’d like you to meet the people who are responsible for putting together this newspaper every week. It has been said, ‘You are what you eat.’ We say, ‘You are what you watch.’ So in introducing the staff, as a little added insight, we’ve included their favorite TV shows.

“Thanks again, and we’ll see you next week in our new incarnation as TelevisionWeek!”

Alex Ben Block
Editor
Favorite current show: 60 Minutes
Favorite vintage show: The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour

Elizabeth Cherry
National Advertising Sales Director
Favorite current show: The Book of Pooh on the Disney Channel (watched with her daughter, Hailey)
Favorite vintage show: Columbo

Louis Chunovic
Senior Editor
Favorite current show: The Office on BBC America
Favorite vintage show: Rocky and His Friends

Jennifer Ciminillo
Design Director
Favorite current show: Alias
Favorite vintage show: Seinfeld

Michael Corsi
Pre-press/Production Director
Favorite current show: Curb Your Enthusiasm
Favorite vintage show: The Invaders

Rance Crain
President and Editor in Chief
Favorite current show: Curb Your Enthusiasm
Favorite vintage show: Seinfeld

Tom Gilbert
Managing Editor
Favorite current show: Malcolm in the Middle
Favorite vintage show: I Love Lucy

Michele Greppi
National Editor
Favorite current show: Miss Sally”s Schoolyard on HBO”s Oz
Favorite vintage show: Cheers

Doug Halonen
Bureau Chief, Washington, D.C.
Favorite current show: CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
Favorite vintage show: The Rockford Files

Katie Hingst
Graphics Designer:
Favorite current show: The Simpsons
Favorite vintage show: Today”s Special on Nickelodeon

Lillian Jackson
Copy Editor
Favorite current show: Sex and the City
Favorite vintage show: Married … With Children

Michael Jortner
Account Executive
Favorite current show: Six Feet Under
Favorite vintage show: Bewitched

Dennis Liff
Copy Editor
Favorite current show: Late Show With David Letterman
Favorite vintage show: Seinfeld

Renee McCullough
Sales and Marketing Coordinator/
Assistant to the Publisher
Favorite current show: Sex and the City
Favorite vintage show: Bewitched

Diane Mermigas
Editor at Large
Favorite current show: business news programming on MSNBC
Favorite vintage show: movies on AMC

Tina Mo
Sales Assistant
Favorite current show: Law & Order
Favorite vintage show: I Love Lucy

Yvonne Pettus
Regional Eastern Sales Manager
Favorite current show: 24
Favorite vintage show: The Cosby Show

Chris Pursell
Senior Editor
Favorite current show: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Favorite vintage show: The Twilight Zone

Jeff Reisman
Executive Producer, Electronic Media Television
Favorite current show: 60 Minutes
Favorite vintage show: Leave It to Beaver

Chuck Ross
Publisher and Editorial Director
Favorite current show: Iron Chef on the Food Network
Favorite vintage show: The Dick Van Dyke Show

Leslie Ryan
Network Editor
Favorite current show: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Favorite vintage show: The Dukes of Hazzard

Danny Schreiber
Producer, Electronic Media Television
Favorite current show: While You Were Out on TLC
Favorite vintage show: Cheers

Julie Schultz
Circulation Manager
Favorite current show: Sex and the City
Favorite vintage show: The Mary Tyler Moore Show

Tom Shales
Columnist
Favorite current show: Curb Your Enthusiasm
Favorite vintage show: The Colgate Comedy Hour

Michelle Wagner
Account Executive
Favorite current show: The Sopranos
Favorite vintage show: Family Ties

Daisy Whitney
Contributing Writer
Favorite current show: Sex and the City
Favorite vintage show: Family Ties

Robert Wray
Marketing Director
Favorite current show: The Simpsons
Favorite vintage show: The Wild, Wild West

Naomie Worrell
Associate Web Editor
Favorite current show: Trading Spaces on TLC
Favorite vintage show: Diff”rent Strokes

It’s been quite a ride.

As the best TV journalist ever, Edward R. Murrow, used to say,

“Good night and good luck.”