Producer Accepts Responsibility for Airing Smith Broadcast

Officials of the New Jersey Council of Churches and the Mutual Broadcasting System told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency today that sole responsibility for the Gerald L.K. Smith broadcast carried by MBS and later by the Defense Department’s Armed Forces Radio and Television Service rested with the man who produced the program, William Bertenshaw. Bertenshaw, an independent radio and tv producer of Maplewood, N.J., accepted the responsibility.

This emerged from JTA telephone interviews with Hal Wagner, director of the MBS special events and public service programs in Washington, James Roberts, the New Jersey Church Council’s director of radio and television in East Orange, N.J. and Bertenshaw.

The program aroused angry protests in the Jewish community after the JTA revealed last Friday that the Smith broadcast was picked up from MBS by the AFRTS and transmitted to its 492 stations serving some 2 million U.S. servicemen all over the world. Smith, a professional anti-Semite and white racist with a 40-year record of hate-mongering, used the broadcast to promote his “Christian shrine” at Eureka Springs, Ark., as a substitute for Christian holy places in Israel which he alleged were “marred and scarred.”

CHURCH COUNCIL NOT ASSOCIATED WITH SERIES

The broadcast was one of a series of “public service” programs produced and packaged by Bertenshaw under the general title, “Suggested Solutions.” Roberts informed the JTA that he had told Bertenshaw last Sept. to delete the association of the New Jersey Council of Churches from his series after the American Jewish Committee in St. Louis complained about a program that featured Smith’s wife. Roberts emphasized that the Council had been associated with only the first four programs in Bertenshaw’s series, about three years ago. But apparently, the producer continued to use the Church Council credit at the tag end of the show.

Wagner said that MBS “found out” only last Friday that the New Jersey Church Council was no longer associated with the series. “It was news to me,” he said. Bertenshaw said that he couldn’t recall whether he had informed MBS of the NJCC’s request to be dissociated from the series. He said, however, “In regard to this program neither MBS nor the New Jersey Church Council have any responsibility. I taped the program. I take full responsibility for the broadcast.”

Referring to Smith, Bertenshaw claimed, “I personally knew nothing about the guy” when he produced the program. “But I know now,” he added. He said “I would not have put the show on if I had the background I have now.” He said that his series also included a program about Israel.

Wagner told the JTA that there was no directive prohibiting Smith’s appearance on the MBS network but that “he could not appear as a guest on the public service programs.” He said that MBS did not dictate guests to Bertenshaw.