The 3AW Nightline radio program, hosted by Bruce Mansfield and Philip Brady, was a ratings juggernaut. Year after year, the 8pm-Midnight show consistently topped the ratings surveys for audience numbers.

I had met Bruce Mansfield in 1996 at an Old Ivanhoe Grammarians Football Club match at Chelsworth Park, where he appeared as a lonely character, standing alone, watching his son John play for the Hoes.

Bruce told me of his admiration for Sydney radio personality John Laws, and his ability to have best-seller poetry books and CDs published. Bruce was envious of Ernie Sigley’s daily TV advertorial program produced from the Ballarat studios of BTV-6. At that stage, I had experience in neither.

We quickly assembled the first of the Nightlines books, which sold 8000 copies at $5 each, mainly at personal appearances by Bruce and Phil at venues across Melbourne and Geelong. Not only was it a commercial success for the radio pair, but the ratings soared.

Next project in the Christmas-New Year week of 1996 was to sell a double broadsheet 1997 wall chart calendar with 56 advertising spots sold for $100 each. Bruce and Phil shared two-thirds of the total revenue, and gave each advertiser a free mention on radio, with the blessing of station management.

To satisfy the curiosity for a television program, I approached Optus Local Vision, and arrangements were made for my company to package a nightly 30-minute show from their studios in South Melbourne. No money was to change hands between Optus and my company. They would provide a studio and editing facilities; I would provide the talent, and a packaged broadcast-ready program. I would fund the enterprise by selling advertising spots within the program. Optus were obviously keen on using Bruce Mansfield’s celebrity, and the free radio spots that would undoubtedly come. The TV program started in February 1997, and went to air six nights a week.

I had heard of personalities and shows being axed, but never the station facing the chop. Optus management, soon after winning their licences to start cable television, were quick to axe Local Vision, early in its life. We found another outlet, the Channel 31 community TV station, who agreed to put Mansfield’s Melbourne episodes to air, as long as each 28-minute tape was accompanied by a $220 payment. To fund that fee, we simply sold another advertising spot.

Channel 31 claimed that our Saturday night episodes, aired just before the harness racing broadcasts, had audiences of approximately 200,000. I’m not sure about that.

Another development was the Nightline free magazine, launched in January 1998. Philip Brady raised some concerns, so the publication became Mansfield’s Melbourne Magazine, distributed free through hundreds of outlets across Victoria. The April-May 1998 edition was 112 p[ages, sold for $2 at newsagents, and included a reader prize of a trip for two to London. Early editions were printed at Rural Press Ballarat, and later at Enterprise Web in South Yarra.

After a split with Bruce Mansfield in 1999, our link with other 3AW personalities continued. The most successful partnership was between our Melbourne Observer newspaper and Keith McGowan’s Overnighters radio program.