CORRECTION: In a previous version of this article, Matt Friedman’s name was misspelled. The Daily Orange regrets this error.

WJPZ, the all-student-run radio station at Syracuse University, is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year. To commemorate this milestone, a documentary about the station will be released later this year.

Scott MacFarlane, a 1998 SU alumnus, is producing the documentary, called “Greatest Media Classroom,” with Oklahoma-based film specialist SVP Media. The documentary will tell the story of WJPZ, known today as Z89, and its effect on alumni and students.

The radio station’s alumni association commissioned the film and is funding its production, MacFarlane said in an email. The association’s board of directors determined the station’s history so “dynamic and rich” that a documentary highlighting its successes was a good idea. The board then chose MacFarlane to produce the documentary because of his experience as an investigative television reporter, MacFarlane said.

During filming Friday in the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, alumni documented their experiences working with WJPZ during their college years.

“We wanted a radio station that reflected the real world, to put education to work and be independent of the university,” said Bill Bleyle, who founded WJPZ with Craig Fox in 1973.

Bleyle and Fox insisted on having a station that was totally independent from the university so they could run things on their own terms.

It took a lot of people who loved radio and who wanted to put it into the hearts and souls of the community to take WJPZ to where it is today, Bleyle said.

“Not a day goes by that I don’t flashback to my time at WJPZ. It was a springboard for my career,” said Matt Friedman, a 1994 alumnus, during filming. “Someday, I’ll be in a nursing home and I’ll tell my neighbors about how I was part of an all-student-run radio station that operated professionally and commanded the market, and they won’t believe me.”

Freeman recounted his experience reporting live during the war in Iraq in 1991. Freeman and others were in the Carrier Dome watching Syracuse play UConn when it was announced the United States had invaded Iraq.

“The Dome filled with ‘U-S-A’ chants louder than any ‘Go Orange’ chant I’d ever heard,” he said. “After the game, we went straight to the station and joined the on-air coverage. After that, WJPZ went all news for a while.”

Alumni continued to express how WJPZ helped them in their careers during filming.

“WJPZ taught me how to work with people in a professional environment who may see things differently,” said Chris Velardi, a 1995 alumnus.

But WJPZ isn’t just for Newhouse students.

Marty Dundics, a 2001 alumnus of the College of Visual and Performing Arts who got involved in WJPZ as a freshman, said he has always loved radio. He began working the 2-4 a.m. shift and was then promoted to work at the “Z Morning Zoo” as a junior.

“WJPZ is what you make of it, you can get involved in so many different aspects of radio and apply it to almost any job,” he said.

WJPZ recently got a new studio, MacFarlane said, and even though many things have changed, “the spirit, energy and family atmosphere of WJPZ is the same now as it was in 1998.”

MacFarlane said viewers can experience a benefit of WJPZ that other clubs don’t offer: family.

Said MacFarlane: “We are the largest family in America.”

Published on March 4, 2013 at 2:16 am

Contact Leslie: laking04@syr.edu