Matt SoergelJacksonville Florida Times-Union
On Friday, Tom Wills' last day as a regular TV anchor at News4Jax, the clock turned to 5 p.m., an hour to go before his usual broadcast. But for Wills, who's retiring after 49 years at the station, this day was anything but usual.
He was at his usual desk, at his usual desk chair, a beat-up thing whose black finish is worn down to white threads.
But instead of his usual practice of writing and rewriting his script, he was scrolling through his phone, answering texts from well-wishers. He mock-complained: The whole half-hour show is dedicated to him, so what's he going to prepare for?
Though the appearance of a brand-new baby in the newsroom made for some distraction, Wills was still the center of attention that afternoon. One after the after, staffers came up to him, saying their goodbyes.
"It's been an absolute honor," Carianne Luter, the station's digital media manager, told him. "Your kindness is unmatched. I'm so appreciative for everything you taught me." Then she leaned in and posed for a photo.
Luter was born and raised in Jacksonville, and began at the station at age 23. It was a bit surreal, she said, working with someone she'd grown up watching.
"Tom Wills knows my name?" she said. "That's something you go home and tell your parents — Tom Wills knows my name!"
Ace city government reporter Jim Piggott took his chance to visit before the broadcast, which would be Wills' last regular appearance, though he plans to return for one more shift (more on that later).
They chatted nostalgically for a little before Piggott, who like Wills has taken a buyout (he leaves in a few weeks), turned serious. "Easing my burden in leaving is knowing that you're not going to be here," he said. "There's never going to be another you."
Wills quietly thanked him, and told him about a longtime viewer named Jeremiah who had called Channel 4 asking to speak to him; he doesn't have a computer, so he couldn't email.
Wills called him back, and Jeremiah actually wept as he told the newsman how much he meant to him. Telling that story, Wills reflected, not the first time, on what it means to be invited into viewers' homes, night after night.
"Is it possible," he asked Piggott, "to get PTSD from too much love?"
A half-hour or so later, a script popped up on his computer. Turned out there was a little bit of news to deal with at 6 before all the on-screen accolades for Wills.
"Oh boy, a script," he said. "Hot-diggity: I'm so excited."
He was joking around, but perhaps not really. He quickly turned to the script, making some rewrites, getting ready as he's done so many times before, one last time.
Almost a half-century in Jax
After doing his own makeup in the rest room a floor above the newsroom (everyone does their own makeup, he says), Wills was asked to look back a little at his career.
For 60 years, he's been in broadcasting. It began in 1964 at the college station at American University; he says he was pulled into the station and put to work at a mic, and found he liked it.
In 1969, he moved on to radio and then TV at stations in Washington D.C., owned by the Graham family. In 1975 he came to Jacksonville as a reporter/anchor for the same corporate owners. He figures it was seen as a chance to get more seasoning before an eventual return to D.C., but he discovered he liked Channel 4 and Jacksonville.
He mentions that he back in D.C., when he had long hair, he was asked to cover antiwar protests, in the early days of his long, fruitful time behind a microphone. "You know," he said, "I have had the most thrilling career."
For decades, Wills was part of the longest-running anchor team in Jacksonville history, including co-anchors Mary Baer and Deborah Gianoulis, sports anchor Sam Kouvaris and the late chief meteorologist George Winterling.
He became the longest-serving of that crew.
"Forty-nine years later, here we are," he said. "And I still love Jacksonville."
More on Tom Wills: Longtime TV news anchor announces retirement from Jacksonville's WJXT/Channel 4
Back in the newsroom, anchor Kent Justice, who will take over Wills' 6 p.m. anchor slot next to Joy Purdy, said Wills leads by example and unfailing good will. He was joshing with Wills when Purdy came up to join in with words of support on this final day.
After they left, Wills got a little serious. "You see who I work with? This place is incredible. It'll be in good hands."
'Tom Wills: Our Newsman'
Shortly before the last newscast began, his wife, Gina (they'll have been married 50 years in September) and son Mike arrived to watch. They were joined in the studio by a number of Channel 4 staffers who wanted to be on hand for the farewell show, which was highlighted by a long segment titled "Tom Wills: Our Newsman."
Behind the anchor desk, Wills looked up as the seconds ticked down. "So let's do this puppy," he said.
"Okey-dokey," Purdy replied.
"Ten seconds," said floor manager Jalen Chance. "Stand by."
Showtime.
Lynyrd Skynyrd, Hurricane Matthew ...
"How are you feeling?" Purdy asked him on air.
Wills gave a variation of a sentiment he'd shared with Piggott. It had clearly been on his mind.
"If it is possible to feel shell-shocked by love, that's how I feel," he said.
As a pre-taped retrospective on his career played, Wills and Purdy were joined at the anchor desk by meteorologist Richard Nunn, Justice and anchor/reporter Tarik Minor.
Wills chuckled, off air, as an old picture of himself came on the screen.
"I loved that corduroy suit," he said. "Anyone wear a corduroy suit these days?"
Read more: Meteorologist George Winterling shared tales of life, weather in new book
"Tom Wills: Our Newsman" covered Wills covering some of his biggest stories, such as when he traveled to southern Mississippi in October 1977 after the crash of the plane carrying Jacksonville's Lynyrd Skynyrd band. It killed lead singer Ronnie Van Zant, guitarist Steve Gaines, singer Cassie Gaines, the band's road manager and two pilots.
That segued to Wills' emotional plea to Channel 4 viewers — "we've been together 40 years, you and I," he said — as he tried to stress just how seriously they should take Hurricane Matthew as it took aim on Northeast Florida in 2016.
He choked up on air back back then, and he choked up again re-watching it, dabbing his eyes with a few tissues from a box helpfully placed on the anchor desk for just that occasion.
And the broadcast relived his trip, with Kouvaris, to Chicago in 1993 to break the news that the NFL had, however improbably, chosen Jacksonville to get the league's newest expansion team
The retrospective noted how eople would say, "There's the newsman!" when Wills came to cover a story. And that's how he still thinks of himself, as their newsman.
Then Wills got the chance to say the words he'd prepared for viewers.
"What I really want to tell you this evening is how humbled I am to have earned your trust," he said in part, "and how grateful I am to have been invited into your home all these many evenings. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart ... I just love you people, and I feel your love back."
After tributes from his colleagues at the anchor desk, Wills wrapped it all up, one last time.
"Thanks for watching," he said. "Stay with us. There is more to come."
'See you in Publix'
After the broadcast, Wills sought out two young staffers. "Best of luck to you," he told Chance, the floor director. "You're going to do great things." And then he went to the separate control room to say goodbye to those there, and told Reagan Fink, the show's producer: "You have a bright future."
Back in the newsroom, he got a standing ovation and more congratulations.
"See you in Publix," a staffer said as things quieted down.
Wills chuckled, imitating a shopper meeting him in the store: "Hey, didn't you used to be somebody?"
Then he sat again at his threadbare desk chair — really, it belongs in a museum somewhere — and hit the sign-off prompt on his computer, one last time. "Signing out," it said, and the screen went dark.
"Goodbye laptop," Wills said, packing it up in its case.
After that, Jacksonville's newsman said a few more goodbyes, gave a few more hugs. "I love you," he told one person. "I love you," he told another.
Then he hoisted his suit jacket over one shoulder and just walked out of the door at Channel 4 for the umpteen-zillionth time, heading toward Gina, who was getting in the passenger seat of their SUV, and Mike, who was holding one last box of his dad's stuff from the last 49 years.
It was a nice, understated final moment, although technically it won't be his absolute last trip through those doors. He'll make that exit one more time, as comes back for one more shift, on Nov. 5. Election night.
It'll be his 16th presidential election, and the newsman just couldn't stand to miss that.
"Indications are," he said, "it's going to be a doozy."
