Mike McCarville—-Brainchild of What Became OK Energy Today

MikeMcCarville

 

by Jerry Bohnen

 

Why am I writing a death notice about a friend?  Because had it not been for longtime journalist and broadcaster Mike McCarville, you wouldn’t be reading OK Energy Today.

Mike died early Wednesday morning after a long fight with lung issues, the result of many years of smoking, a habit he just wouldn’t kick. Many knew him as the author of the McCarville Report, the popular political newsletter that was a bible to many politicians at the State Capitol.

I got to know Mike when we worked investigative stories together in the early 1990s. We became fast friends as Mike would always say, “Jerb, what’s up?” I hired him part-time at KTOK when I was employed there and it opened the door to him becoming a wildly-popular radio talk show host.

In 2012 after being made a victim of “corporate downsizing” by Clear Channel Radio, I naturally had a conversation with Mike who wrote about my sudden departure at KTOK. He referred to me as the “Dean of Broadcasters.”

In the following days during one of those telephone conversations, Mike suggested, “Jerb, you know what this state needs?  An energy newsletter!” I wasn’t exactly overwhelmed with the idea initially, but the more we talked in the following days, the conversation gave birth to OK Energy Today. Today, we have more than 4,100 subscribers. All thanks to Mike.

Of course, it doesn’t say anything about the kind of journalist Mike was.  The kind I have never worked with previously or since.  A prolific writer. A bulldog when it came to probing stories. He was driven and keenly observant. His diminutive stature belied a tenacity that many a politician felt the sting of Mike’s arrows of truth.

His live radio reports of the Murrah bombing in 1995 were most insightful as he described in detail the weariness of the firefighters as they trudged past him following hours of searching for bodies hidden in the debris where victims lay buried. It would be nearly 20 years before Mike and I both had the courage to walk together through the Oklahoma City Memorial Museum, recalling and sharing memories of that horrible day.

Mike was the consummate journalist. He wrote books about writing and the Ford Mustang not to mention the 1984 coffee table book “Ford, 1903 to 1984,” which was published internationally. He worked for newspapers in Tulsa and Oklahoma City, was Assistant News Director at News 9 TV, ran an antique auto parts company for the Shoebox Fords made in 1949, 1950 and 1951 and later became host of “Open Mic Live” on radio.

May he rest in peace.

Read how his death was announced on his McCarville Report early Wednesday morning.