Ebel, A. James

Engineer and broadcasting executive A. James Ebel was born in Waterloo, Iowa on May 30, 1913 and attended Iowa State Teacher's College and the State University of Iowa where he graduated with a B.A. in Math and Physics in 1937. His long career in public broadcasting started in 1937 when he moved with his wife and the first of their four children to Indiana to work part time for radio station WBAA and to start a masters degree at Purdue. One day, after working at the station only a month, he returned home to find the broadcaster Joe Wright sitting on his front porch and speaking highly of his recent article in Electronics Magazine. Wright offered Ebel a job as chief engineer with the University of Illinois' WILLin Champaign, where Ebel worked until 1946.
In addition to working at WILL, Ebel also finished his master's degree in Electrical Engineering, announced Big Ten basketball and football games, and became executive secretary for the National Association of Educational Broadcasters (NAEB).

In 1946, Ebel began work in commercial broadcasting by taking a position as director of engineering with WMBD of Peoria and its sister station WDZ of Decatur. In 1952, he became president of KXIC in Iowa City, and in 1954 he moved to Lincoln as vice president and general manager of KOLN-TV, a station owned by Fetzer Broadcasting. When Mr. Fetzer decided to sell this station, Ebel, showing concern for educational television, persuaded him to give the equipment to the University of Nebraska. Ebel managed a number of Fetzer's stations including KGIN-TV in Grand Island, Nebraska and KMEG-TV in Sioux City, Iowa. He also became director of Fetzer Broadcasting and Fetzer Communications. In 1988 he retired and continued consulting.

A. James Ebel died in 1998.