At KTUL-TV in Tulsa we had a secret. The other stations in the area tried and spied but they never figured it out. Our sister station was in Oklahoma City, just 80 miles down the big superhighway toll road from us.

Long before satellites and video tape, television news pictures were captured on 16 mm film. And getting that film from point A to point B was often the difference in being first in the market to air a story.Our station was out on the edge of town on a mountain top, all the way across the city from the airport. Some of the stations hired a man on a motorcycle to stand by to run film to the airport or bring it back. We usually got the film from Oklahoma City on the air first.

Our secret weapon was simply that we would go to where cars were stopped to pay their tolls. We would ask if they were going straight through to Oklahoma City and if they answered that they were, we asked them if they would mind carrying a package to the other end of the toll where someone from our sister station would pick it up.

A long distance call provided a newsperson at the other end with the color, make and license number of the car. It worked nearly every time. The exceptions were when the driver decided to stop at the Howard Johnson's about midway on the toll road for dinner.