Best Television Personality
|
37.56% Melissa Long/WPTA*
Others with Votes:
1998 Winner: NA
1997 Winner: Melissa Long
* On the ballot
|
Every time her name has appeared on the ballot, Melissa Long of WPTA-TV has won the whatzup Readers Best of Poll award, picking up her Whammy this
year over stiff competition. Frequency has not diminished her obvious happiness with winning.
"I’m delighted and flattered," the famously blonde Long said.
Long has spent her entire TV career in her hometown, working at WKJG-TV for eight years, before spending the last eight years at WPTA-TV, where she
anchors evening news broadcasts. There may be disadvantages for some to spending so many years in a high-profile job in their hometown, but Long suffers
none of them
"This is my home, and I know so many people. I really care about what goes on here, so I guess that makes me a little more interested in what’s going on. I’m
not looking for my next job, as so many TV reporters are," Long said.
And rather than craving anomymity in her non-TV life, Long relishes the gentle and easy-going atmosphere of living in the Summit City. Her trips to the grocery
store in old clothes and no makeup are nothing special, either for Long or for the people who see her on TV every evening. In Fort Wayne, a neighbor is a
neighbor.
Even a memorable trip to New York and backstage at ABC’s premiere news and entertainment show, "Good Morning America," failed to lure this
Midwesterner to the bright lights of the big city.
"I realized they do exactly what we do here. They have more help, and they do it better than we do, obviously, but it’s really the same stuff."
|
Copyright 2001 Ad Media Inc.
