Part 1 of 3 in Three Ways In, a series on the Community Media Archive: public access.
In July 2018, on Berks Community Television in Reading, Pennsylvania, Tom Gajewski welcomed a returning guest to his program, Polish American Connection. The guest was Walt Kazmierczak, and they talked about Walt’s radio show, Walt’s Polka Party (27 min), on WRAW 1340 AM. Before the conversation starts, Gajewski reads out the station’s phone number and asks callers to state their question and then give the guests a chance to answer, so that everyone who calls gets a turn.
That is a local television show about a local radio show about polka, with the phone lines open, and I love it. It shows what public access was built to do. When cable companies were granted the right to run wire down public streets, many towns asked for a channel in return that anyone could use. You took a class, borrowed a camera, and booked studio time. Nobody decided in advance what the programs would be. The people who showed up decided.
The Community Media Archive holds 528 public access station collections, with close to a million videos between them and at least 82 years of running time. This post is a short walk through some of it. Every video linked here runs longer than three minutes, and I’ve given the running time of each so you know what you’re settling in for.
A lot of public access is someone showing you how to do a thing they love. In 1988, Bob Dembinski of Norfolk, Massachusetts made Basic Baking: Cheesecake (33 min). The credits list him as camera, editor and talent, and describe the program as “a One Man Production.” On Kauai, Ho’ike Community Television carries Kumu Ken Bray teaching traditional Hawaiian wood carving (34 min). Gillette Public Access in Wyoming drove out to Story to visit Piney Creek Pottery (12 min).
In Fort Collins, Colorado, Alexis, who describes herself as “just an ordinary cook,” made chile relleno bites, green salsa and guacamole for the big game (24 min), with a guest appearance by Buster the cat. And at the Cary Library in Lexington, Massachusetts, Alexandra Bartsch of the Lexington Bee Company and Ashley Rooney gave a talk on keeping bees in the suburbs (55 min). Bartsch works with the Lexington High School Bee Club to supply bees to the town’s public gardens and orchards.
Local stations record the music their communities actually play. In Waupaca, Wisconsin, the Winchester Academy’s Academy of the Air marked 25 years of programming in 2016 with folklorist Rick March, author of Polka Heartland, explaining why the Midwest loves to polka (1 hr 20 min). In Attleboro, Massachusetts, Accordion Cool (29 min) ran for 330 episodes. Its host explains that he is there to try to make the accordion cool, and then shows you what the instrument can do.
Back in Reading, Butch Imhoff welcomed the brother-and-sister duo Buffalo Mountain Bluegrass (53 min). In Richmond, Vermont, Mount Mansfield Community Television recorded the Northern Bronze Handbell Choir opening the 2014 summer concert series (1 hr 13 min) at the Old Round Church. In Michigan, Access Vision carries a long-running gospel program, Full Gospel Deliverance (1 hr 18 min). The episode linked here is number 375.
For many communities, public access was the first television made in their own voice. Somali Media Live (59 min) was produced in Minneapolis. The Brockton Channels in Massachusetts recorded the city’s Cape Verdean Festival (1 hr 26 min). Wareham Community Television recorded a Wampanoag dance (1 hr 20 min) in February 2025.
In Burlington, Vermont, Rik Palieri devoted an episode of The Songwriter’s Notebook to Vietnamese music and culture (31 min), with guests Howard Le and his wife Lilly. The description on that episode ends with a link and three words from the station: “Make your own show!”
In Laurel, Maryland, the Griot’s Storytelling Circle invited Laurel resident Nancy Daniels to explain her family tree (22 min), her family’s part in the history of the city, and how she is related to Francis Scott Key.
Public access stations have become some of the country’s most dependable oral historians. GrassRoots TV in Aspen, which describes itself as the country’s first community cable station, runs the Roaring Fork Veterans History Project. One of its interviews is with Jack de Pagter (1 hr 26 min), who was born in Vlissingen and grew up in The Hague. As a boy he rode his bicycle with his brother to the 1937 World Scout Jamboree, and his interview covers his years in the Dutch underground from 1940 to 1945.
A different kind of Dutch is on Berks Community Television. The Pennsylvania German Cultural Heritage Center recorded Growing Up Dutch (54 min), Jennifer Schlegel’s interview with Lee S. Heffner about a Pennsylvania German childhood.
Some programs have become history just by lasting. Winchester, Massachusetts kept Magic with Morty, shows 1 through 3 (1 hr 15 min), from 1985. Nearby, Wilmington’s station kept a puppet show performed by Shawsheen School students (46 min) for their schoolmates in 1997. Those students are in their thirties now.
Public access also shows up for the fun. PATV in Iowa City covered the Quad City Rollers’ Riverbend Bombers against the Naptown Rollergirls’ Third Alarm (51 min). Princeton Community TV recorded Café Improv (1 hr 26 min), an evening of local performers. That night’s line-up included Rick Dill, a Monmouth County social worker who has been writing songs for 40 years, and Emma Dubin, a 15-year-old Princeton High School student.
McMinnville, Oregon’s station brought home “all the fun, excitement and aliens” of the 2017 UFO Festival parade (39 min). Ho’ike livestreamed the seventh annual Kaua’i Pride Parade (50 min) from Vidinha Stadium to the Historic County Building. And in Ohio, Community Access Yellow Springs was there for the Yellow Springs Senior Center flash mob (6 min).
None of these programs was made to reach the whole country. They were made for the people down the street, by someone who thought those people should see this. That is still the best reason to watch them.