Member Profile

Meet Bernice Wissler
By Brian Lang

To some extent, radio remains a viable media format because we can listen to it while performing a variety of everyday tasks.

WHYY member Bernice Wissler says she finds that she relies on 91FM for this very reason. "It's so great to be amused and informed while cooking, tooth-brushing or lawn mowing." Her favorite radio program is Car Talk, and she admits to occasionally rearranging her schedule to listen to it.

One of the other reasons Wissler says she loves WHYY is because of the power of the programs on 91FM to teach people things about which they may know little. She claims that while she never took a course in economics, she now faithfully listens to Marketplace, a daily program that examines business, the global economy and finance.

Wissler, who resides in Roslyn, PA with her husband Ken, became a WHYY member shortly after returning to live in the United States from Nova Scotia in 1981. While in rural Canada, with a newborn child and little money, she was big fan of the CBC (the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) and says it provided her with things to think about, intelligent adult company and a sense of community.

Since last summer, Wissler has worked as the senior medical editor of the nonprofit Web site epilepsy.com. The site's goal is to provide in-depth information for people with epilepsy and their families, including point-of-view articles from experts and readable accounts of current research. Judging from the feedback she has received, Wissler says she feels that, like WHYY, she is doing "a real public service for people."