Kelsey Litchfield from Rio, IL, joined the RFD Radio Network team in Bloomington, IL, this summer, reports Rita Frazer. A junior at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Kelsey is studying agricultural communications with a concentration in broadcast journalism. She is a member of 4-H House Cooperative Sorority, Collegiate Farm Bureau, Explore ACES steering committee, and Illini Agricultural Communicators of Tomorrow. Recently, she was elected to serve as Member Relations Coordinator on the National Agricultural Communicators of Tomorrow officer team. Also, Kelsey is the 2015 Jim Evans Scholarship recipient sponsored by the AAEA Professional Improvement Foundation.

Marlin Bohling describes new RD-TV Studios in Nashville, “The new RFD-TV studios are a feat of engineering. Designed and constructed by companies from New York, the main television studio room is actually comprised of six different sets located around the periphery of the main room,” reports Marlin Bohling, Markets Editor (RFD-TV and Rural Radio, Nashville, TN).  He added, “The five cameras, including an overhead jib camera, are all located in the center of the room and can pivot to cover all of the different sets, which are used for everything from our ag news and market reports to western sports coverage, weather, stand-up teases, and cozy interviews in a living room setting complete with a realistic ‘digital’ fireplace.” He continued, “Hundreds of lighting components are all computer-controlled and instantly reconfigurable. Ten giant LCD monitors arranged on end and combined in two banks of five serve as an amazing backdrop to our news stage and can show any combination of images, graphics, and videos in any size configuration for a dynamic high-action set. New world-class hardware and software systems allow for top tier production capability rivaling other national networks.” 

Joe Cornely (Ohio Farm Bureau Federation, Columbus, OH) shared this photo from a recent taping of the Ohio Farm Bureau weekly public affairs radio show Town Hall Ohio. Joe put Dave Russell, at left, (Brownfield Network, Dublin, OH) on the other side of the mic when he conducted a roundtable with Ohio agricultural journalists. Along with Dave are Susan Crowell (Farm and Dairy newspaper) and Matt Reese (Ohio's Country Journal and Ohio Ag Net). Joe is senior director of corporate communications for OFBF, and he served as NAFB President in 1995.

While many were preparing for a long holiday July 4th weekend, Red River Farm Network farm broadcaster Mike Hergert (Grand Forks, ND) spent the last week of June in central France on a Limagrain press trip. Founded in 1965, and managed by more than 2,000 French farmers, Limagrain Coop is the leading French seed manufacturer and the fourth-largest seed company worldwide. It is vertically integrated, from wheat and corn breeding, crop production, to milling and baking. A 26-member media delegation from nine countries participated in an exclusive Limagrain tour with Mike being the only U.S. journalist on the trip. 

Katie Johnson, this year’s summer intern at KICD Radio in northwest Iowa, took the station by storm, reports Dan Skelton. The Iowa State University senior enthusiastically responded to a wide variety of projects and work assignments. “Specifically, Katie learned to quote market information live, on-air, in an exact two-minute time frame. She also learned to write anf edit local and farm news for broadcast within time limitations. Katie conducted interviews in various formats. She learned to quiz traders on why markets were trading the way they were. She conducted long-form interviews on a variety of topics. Perhaps her favorite activity was interviewing 4-H youth at more than eight county fairs.