It was three days before Christmas 2008, while most listeners were still asleep, that Ian Pickus showed up to work on Morning Edition at WAMC for the first time. Now, 17 years later, including the last dozen as News Director, Ian is leaving WAMC this week. It comes after thousands of newscasts, Congressional Corner interviews, election night marathons, and every Fund Drive shift you can name. Before he signs off one last time, Ian sat down with Assistant News Director Lucas Willard.
Ian, how are you?
Well, it's very bittersweet, Lucas, and you and I went through so much of that together, so thanks for taking the time.
Yeah, this is the conversation that I didn't want to have. We just gave the listener a little bit of a history lesson of your long, storied tenure here at WAMC. But how did you first get involved? I know that you've been in newsrooms for since you were in high school, practically, but tell me when and how and why did you get involved with WAMC?
There's so much luck involved in my story of landing here. And you’ve got to think back to what it was like in 2008 even before I started working here. I spent an entire summer listening to ‘Marketplace’ talking about why Lehman Brothers was going to fail, and it was obviously the economic crisis, and it was not a great time to be breaking in. And I had been trying to eke out a living as a graduate student, freelance writer and, well, basically what happened was I ran out of money,
So you came to public radio?
Exactly. I got very, very lucky. I remember I was looking at what my next freelance job was going to be and trying to make the math work for the next couple of days between there. There was a job opening for a part-time ‘Morning Edition’ producer job here at WAMC, and it worked out for me. I had had our morning host David Guistina in college as an instructor. I landed the job, and the rest is history. And I think I'm still tired from those early wakeup calls. That was definitely trial by fire when you heard that alarm go off at 3:40 in the morning.
So you were a ‘Morning Edition’ producer. You worked a lot with Alan Chartock, our former president and CEO, as Alan's producer. And then in 2013 you became News Director here at WAMC. And I know you're a busy guy, and it's a busy job, but life got a little busier at that time too. So tell me about how you felt stepping into that larger role and really beginning to change the look in the sound of WAMC to some degree.
I was really terrified. But I remember thinking that this was such a great opportunity, because I had so many ideas about things I thought that we could be doing. So, on the one hand, it was very, very scary, because suddenly, you know, I had the rudder, and every day WAMC News punches above its weight. That's always been true for years and years. It's one thing I love about this station, and then suddenly I had to make sure that we didn't drop the ball. I remember Katie Britton, who was News Director before me, took me aside and said, ‘Look, you know, it's a well-oiled machine,’ and you're going to be able to count on people like Pat Bradley in the North Country. And boy, was she right about that. A lot of them knew what they should be doing, and they kind of helped me figure out how we could work cohesively as a team. And you were out in the Berkshires at that time as our Berkshires reporter.
I think my takeaway as I'm looking back on this time period is that any ups and downs that I've had, the successes are really shared successes. They are team efforts, things that we worked on together, or breaking news stories where everyone pitched in, or election nights. It's not just one person, and it never has been. And so I have had this privilege of being in a job where when people have a great news day, you know, I get to take a little credit for it, and when they have a bad one, we kind of all wear it together. And in the meantime, we've got this great WAMC listening audience that keeps us honest. And so it's hard to look back at 2013 me and know what I was getting into, because I'll be honest: the last decade or so has just been impossible news-wise. There have been so many tough times with COVID and January 6 and elections and contested elections and nail-biting breaking news and we kind of got through all that together.
And the team, by the way, has grown too over the years, and you were part of that. And we also now have the New York Public News Network, which has a reach across the state, and there's a new partnership between WAMC and the other regional stations. And you had told me about how Katie Britton said it's a well-oiled machine, and folks like Pat Bradley, our North Country Bureau Chief, are there, and they're going to help you out. But there was a lot more collaboration and an expansion of our news team as well. Is that something that you had wanted to do, or you felt like was needed for WAMC to expand its news operation?
Yeah, and we're so fortunate that we've had people in charge of this station who agree, because a lot of stations are scaling back. I mean, let's be honest. We all know about this moment in public media when there are cuts and people are making hard decisions and the federal government funding is over; WAMC has decided to double down on local and regional news. And you were part of that. You know, we didn't have a Southern Adirondack News Bureau in Saratoga Springs until you kind of pioneered that for us. We've got full-time reporting in the Hudson Valley on the campus of Vassar College. We've got the two reporters in Massachusetts who are covering Western Mass. and then in state government, we're part of this effort, as you say, to expand New York state government coverage with a team, if you count everybody in the New York Public News Network, on any given day in the state capitol, there are five people who are reporting on New York state government. And that is almost unthinkable, from what I was used to as a listener and a News Director, when if Karen DeWitt, for whatever reason, had to bring her dog to the vet or whatever, we would miss the story. Now we have this really rich tapestry, and I can't take credit for all of that, but it's been very exciting to be a part of it, because I know that the news product at WAMC is better than it's ever been.
Now, Ian, I know that your job as News Director has been thankless in a lot of ways, because it's your job to make sure that the reporters and that the stories and that everything that comes over the airwaves sounds as good as possible. And that means putting the reporters and the product first. And we still managed to get WAMC’s Ian Pickus on some interviews too, not to mention just the ‘Congressional Corner,’ which keeps all the listeners informed about what's going on in Washington, but also ‘Roundtable’ interviews and interviews with musicians, and you're filling in on ‘Vox Pop’ to talk about sports or baseball cards or whatever it is. There's a lot of Ian Pickus personality that once in a while will show up on WAMC. Is there any particular interview or guest or somebody that you got to talk to that felt like a dream come true when reporting on a story or recording an interview for WAMC?
So many. I mean, a few that come to mind, I'll talk about the music stuff first. I had gotten some inspiration from listening to all of those interviews that you mentioned that I produced for Alan Chartock. Now, Alan was obviously super into folk music, and you would hear this name Alan Lomax come up in those interviews. Lomax went around the country and sort of used an old-style tape recorder to record the stories and songs of American blues and folk before they disappeared, really. And so when I started hearing that name and understanding how that worked in the tradition of folk music, I had this thought, I remember very distinctly, that, hey, the music I like is played by people who are getting up there in age too. A lot of stuff from the 60s and 70s. And I had sort of set out an unofficial goal for myself to record as many interviews as I could with the classic rock era of people.
But that's also what you like. You're the biggest Who fan I know.
And that was one of the things that I was able to do in this job that I do not take for granted at all, get to interview people like Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey. You know, not the main part of my job, but something really fun to look forward to. I've had this series of ongoing interviews with Graham Nash from The Hollies and Crosby, Stills and Nash that I wouldn't trade for anything.
And so looking back on it, there have been all these legends of music whose work I just adore that I've actually had the chance to talk to and to learn more about them, and I'm really glad that I took that on, because, you know, as we're seeing, these guys are in their 80s now, a lot of them, and they're not going to be here forever, and it's very precious.
You’re WAMC's sports guy, too.
So that was another thing I realized as News Director: if we were going to have sports coverage, a lot of times, it was going to be me, or we just wouldn't have it with a lot of these things. So, you know, I'm a Yankee fan. I went and got to cover the Yankees. They played an exhibition game against Army at West Point. I caught a ride down there with a photographer I know, and we spent the whole day watching the Yankees tour West Point and they played an exhibition game against Army. They went in the locker room and they checked out the campus. And that was surreal. That was in 2013 right on the eve of the new season, an unforgettable day in my career. You know, I had the chance to interview people like Joe Torre and CC Sabathia for work.
And then here in Albany, another interest of mine is college basketball. We've had the chance to see a lot of great NCAA Tournament action come through around here, including Caitlin Clark playing in the NCAA Tournament in Albany just before she went pro after that tournament. And those were events and stories and feature stories that I always tried to make just a little room for to fit them in. One, because I thought, for me, they were just a passion project. But two, I thought that sports has an important place on public media airwaves, and, you know, it's not everyone's first choice.
I also just want to mention ‘The Simpsons’ too.
There have been more than a few ‘Simpsons’ segments. Mike Reiss, who was the showrunner with Al Jean. I did a few interviews with Mike Reiss and Al Jean. You always have to find the local angle. They inducted Homer into the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, and that gave me a chance to interview Al Jean about ‘Homer at the Bat.’ And then I did wear my Springfield Isotopes shirt to the induction in Cooperstown that day.
Full circle moment right there. So you were News Director at WAMC for 12 years, and you had already mentioned some of the crazy politics and things that have happened in your time as News Director at WAMC. But how have things changed? Has there been a fundamental change in terms of access, in terms of getting answers out of those that are in power? Have there been new challenges with covering the news? Has there been a shift in the dynamic?
There really has, and I think this is something I regret a lot as I'm taking my leave here, which is that we know in our coverage area that there are certain elected officials who, when the rescission vote went through and so many public media stations are facing anywhere from 5% to 15% to 25% cuts to their budget, they were cheering that development because they've made an enemy out of public media, which is really like the voice of your backyard, your community. It's one of the rare remaining common gathering places. And so there are officials that I've seen in our time who, at one point, pre-the Trump takeover of the Republican Party, were accessible, who would answer questions, who would show up, they would talk to reporters. They might not always like it, but they would do it because they knew it was an important part of the job. Now, you can't get them on the show, but they also would undercut fair reporting or question the veracity of obviously true facts, and that is a systemic societal issue that we've got to look at right now.
The other experience I've had is that a lot of people still do really recognize the importance of coming on and answering questions, and so I'm very grateful that a lot of people, when we ask, will say, ‘Yes, let me go on,’ because they're not just talking to us, they're really talking to their constituents, or the people who live in their district, or that kind of thing. I do sometimes remember fondly and wish it was like this, how we could call up Speaker Sheldon Silver on a Monday and lock down a time for Wednesday for the ‘Capitol Connection,’ and get a very newsworthy interview about New York state government. It's gotten much harder. There's no question about it.
And so now I have to ask, because we've talked so much about what you've done here, but why are you leaving and what's coming up next for you?
Well, as I mentioned, when I got here, I was kind of a pup. I was new, and I've lived a lot of life in between walking in here for the first time in 2008 and 2025. I've had some challenges in my family and my personal life this year that just caused me to look at things and what I want to be doing in this next portion of my life, and then I've got a big milestone birthday coming up. You don't see, at least from my cohort, too many people able to stick it out in the field as long as I have. I can't sugarcoat it: it's taken a lot of sacrifice to do this job correctly. You know, a lot of times things are going wrong. You're problem solving. People are mad at you. There's breaking news at inconvenient times, as you know, you've been a big part of it, too, Lucas. You never really turn off from being in the news, and you've got to put yourself second. And I'm just getting to a point where I'm ready to try a new challenge. It's a pretty dispiriting time to be here in the press, and as important as I think it is, for me, it's time to do something different. I'll be going into New York state government, and I'll be on the other side of the coin, and I'm hoping that everything I've learned over here will help me in that new position.
The timing is very ironic, in a way, to see the vote, the rescission package coming at the same time that I'm getting ready to leave. I promise I didn't plan it that way. And I've said this to everyone — WAMC is like my home. It has been for this whole time. I've spent more time here than anywhere else, including probably my bed.
What are you going to miss?
I think what I'll miss the most is the people. Because we have a lot of laughs, despite how hard it can be sometimes or how grim the news can be. I love being part of a team and being able to lean on each other and look at things from a different perspective, or just walk around the block and unpack whatever we've been working on. We've done a lot of special projects together, news series, election nights, live broadcasts, the eclipse broadcast I got to do with Sarah LaDuke last April.
Things like that, I think, will loom much larger than the headaches that come up any given day. The other thing I'm going to miss, I think, is the feeling of being able to do something in those breaking news periods. I've always known what to do when there's a big story, which is just start working.
Last summer, when President Trump was shot at in Pennsylvania, I was out on the deck. The grill was on. I was trying to have a summer day. And you know, immediately you’ve got to drop what you're doing and start getting reaction. Get the website updated, see what the breaking news coverage is going to be on the air, find out what happens next. What do we know? What don't we know? Same thing when President Biden dropped his re-election bid. I was sitting on a beach, and within an hour, I was here in the newsroom to try to steer that coverage and figure out how we're going to cover this. And I think that instant gratification of knowing this event is happening, and now we've got to respond…the next time there's a big news story here in our coverage area, I may have some FOMO, there's no question about it.
And then I think the last thing is the most important. The reason why we all have our jobs here at the station is that we've got an audience that really cares about it. They'll tell you when they're happy, they'll tell you when they're unhappy. They'll give you tips. They'll give you ideas for stories. They'll call in during the Fund Drive. Every once in a while, you'll get recognized out in public, and they'll tell you, ‘Oh, I never miss ‘Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me.’ And here at WAMC, for people who haven't been in here before, a lot of this happens in a dark room. You go into a studio, it's you and a microphone, and you don't always think about the audience that's eventually going to consume this stuff. And that, to me, is the most important part of this — that there are people who care about it, and they care about it because it's relevant to their lives, and to their backyard, and to their future. And so having that feedback from a very passionate group of people is going to be something I think I’ll miss the most.
WAMC’s Ian Pickus is leaving WAMC after 17 years, the last 12 as News Director. Ian, we’ll miss you. Thanks so much for speaking with me. I appreciate it.
Lucas, thank you, and I'll be listening.
