AMERICAN PUBLIC TELEVISION ANNOUNCES
2008 FALL MARKETPLACE AWARDS

BOSTON (Nov. 16, 2008) – American Public Television (APT), a leading distributor of programming to the nation’s public television stations, announced several industry awards at its annual Fall Marketplace meeting held from Nov. 12-15 in Houston, Texas.

Industry leader David Liroff received APT’s inaugural Lifetime Achievement Award, recognizing his ongoing and distinguished career in public media.

APT President and CEO Cynthia Fenneman described Liroff as an “exceptional ambassador for public service media,” a “genius at collaborations” and an “expansive thinker” at the awards ceremony.

Liroff most recently served as senior vice president of system development and media strategies at the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. He has also held positions as program director at WOUB in Athens, Ohio, director of broadcasting for KETC in St. Louis, and vice president and TV station manager as well as chief technology officer of WGBH in Boston. During his career, he worked closely with national shows such as This Old House and The Victory Garden; pioneered numerous initiatives for IT, media archives and the digital transition; served as speaker at innumerable conferences, retreats and stations; created the first-ever public broadcasting “pledge free” campaign; and has championed the creation of software for digital asset management.

Fenneman also presented renowned author and television chef Lidia Bastianich with the 2008 MVP Award. The MVP Award honors a special person, program or entity for outstanding contributions to public television.

Hailed as the “Professor of Pasta” by People magazine, Lidia Bastianich has hosted the acclaimed cooking programs Lidia’s Family Table, Lidia’s Italy and Lidia’s Italian-American Kitchen for more than 10 years and has created nearly 120 hours of original programming on public television. Her television work earned her a daytime Emmy nomination in 2007 and a nomination for “Best National TV Food Show” at the James Beard Foundation Awards. She owns six restaurants located in Pittsburgh, New York City and Kansas City, and is the author of five cookbooks and a monthly newspaper column.

APT’s Fall Marketplace event also included several other public television awards. Fenneman honored four public television programmers with the 2008 Savvy Scheduler Award: Kevin Harris of WETA, David Rubinsohn (currently with WLIW) and Joni Helton for WHYY, and Bill Thrash of Oklahoma ETA. This award honors programmers who have used APT programs to the great advantage of their station. Each station uses a higher than average number of APT programs in its primetime schedule. They also earned higher gross rating points when using APT programs compared to the station's average in primetime.

In addition, Fenneman recognized six APT programs that have excelled in station schedules with 2008 Programming Excellence Awards. These awards are determined by a combination of importance, content, ratings, carriage and production excellence. This year’s winners include:

• Worldfocus, produced by Creative News Group for wnet.org, presented by WLIW New York
• Cook’s Country From America’s Test Kitchen, produced by America’s Test Kitchen
• America’s Test Kitchen from Cook’s Illustrated, produced by America’s Test Kitchen
• Spain…on the road Again, presented by frappe, Inc.
• Richard Bangs’ Adventures With Purpose New Zealand: Quest for Kaitiakitanga, produced by Small World Productions and presented by KCTS
• Mike Douglas: Moments and Memories, produced by Clear Cut, Inc.
• Here He Is...the One, the Only…Groucho, produced by Ellen M. Krass Production