Joe Teeples, a video journalist for C-SPAN, films B-roll in downtown Laramie Monday afternoon. C-SPAN is filming around Laramie this week for its Cities Tour programming, which will highlight Laramie history and nonfiction authors when it airs in early November.
Joe Teeples, a video journalist for C-SPAN, films B-roll in downtown Laramie Monday afternoon. C-SPAN is filming around Laramie this week for its Cities Tour programming, which will highlight Laramie history and nonfiction authors when it airs in early November.
Laramie’s rich history and local authors will be on the national stage next month as C-SPAN films its Cities Tour series in Laramie this week.
The pay television network’s Book TV on C-SPAN 2 and American History TV on C-SPAN 3 will feature an entire weekend of Laramie-related programming November 2-3.
On American History TV, various historic places and events will be featured including the Laramie Plains Museum and Ivinson Historic Mansion, the Ivinson Home for Ladies, Wyoming Territorial Prison Historic Site and the Deerwood Ranch Wild Horse EcoSanctuary.
Between the territorial prison, ties with Union Pacific and a lot of women’s firsts for Wyoming, the “sort of Great Plains story that’s so important to tell” was one of the driving factors to feature the town, said Debbie Lamb, C-SPAN coordinating producer.
“There’s a lot that draws you here,” Lamb told the Boomerang Monday. “There’s a lot of interesting stories to tell, and we’re not going to be able to get to all of them, but we hope we give our audience sort of an inside look.”
On Book TV, C-SPAN 2 will feature stories including Jeff Lockwood’s “Behind the Carbon Curtain: The Energy Industry, Political Censorship, and Free Speech” as well as Renee Laegreid’s “Women on the North American Plains.” Many of the nonfiction authors featured are professors or researchers with the University of Wyoming.
Lamb said one of the unique parts of C-SPAN’s storytelling “is that the individuals that we interview are the ones that will tell the story.” C-SPAN will have no pundits, hosts or moderators assist with the storytelling.
The programming will also feature an interview with Laramie Mayor Joe Shumway, giving viewers an inside look at what living in Laramie is like and its economic drivers.
Residents may see the C-SPAN vans and producers while they’re in the area through Wednesday; none of the filming locations will be closed during shooting. Lamb said the crew would love to say hi, especially considering how friendly and accommodating residents have been so far.
“While we’re at a shoot location sometimes we’re not necessarily able to just stop and chat, but we can either before or afterward,” Lamb added.
Laramie is the second city in Wyoming the news source has featured so far this year, with the first being Sheridan.
“There’s a lot of interesting stories to tell here that are different from Sheridan, and it’s really been an interesting thing,” Lamb said.
The programming is sponsored in part by Spectrum, and Lamb said the cable company originally suggested Laramie as a potential location. It’s common for the Cities Tour series, she added, for C-SPAN to partner with the cable companies located within the community.
“C-SPAN was founded by the cable television industry as a public service,” Lamb said. “In a nutshell, the cable industries let us provide our national audience with a window into their government without commercials or advertising or editorializing on our part. They don’t make any money off us.”
Spectrum customers in town can watch the Laramie specials on C-SPAN 2 on channels 19 and 618 as well as C-SPAN 3 on channels 13 and 619 November 2-3.
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