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ZDF sports journalist Karl Senne
Photo:
IMAGO / Sven Simon
Karl Senne came to our home from the air.
In the 1970s and 1980s there wasn't much major sport in Paderborn, the football club was mostly in the third division, regional pride was focused on the VBC volleyball club and the Haxterberg gliding field.
In 1981 the world championship in gliding was held there, a world championship in Paderborn, and on this occasion you even got to see a live presenter from the ZDF sports studio.
One that you otherwise only knew from television.
That was a person of respect.
Gliding was Karl Senne's passion, he not only reported about it persistently, he flew himself - and even set several world records.
I remember excessively long articles in the ZDF sports reportage, in which Senne himself sat in the pilot capsule, Senne in the sky, and below him Australia, those were heavenly times in television journalism.
The sky was wide open.
As a hobby racing driver at the 24 Hours of the Nürburgring
When he was on the ground, Senne took care of motorsport. At that time, the afternoons in Formula 1 still belonged to the public sector, just like every sport belonged to them, from football to cycle ball to the Monte Carlo Rally.
Senne was the Formula 1 man.
In addition to the "Sportstudio", he also moderated the car show "Telemotor", he himself sat at the wheel as a hobby racing driver at the 24 Hours of the Nürburgring, Senne always wanted to know what he was reporting about, try it out for himself.
There was freedom then.
And driving a car was still part of the great freedom back then.
permanent guest on the screen
The people from the ZDF sports department were really part of our family back then.
The "Sportstudio", which Senne moderated 128 times himself, was a bit too late for us children, although it started at a quarter to ten at the time, which was prime time compared to today's broadcasting time.
Rather, our hearts belonged to the »sports reportage« on Sunday afternoon, and Senne was also there not only thanks to Formula 1 as a permanent guest.
Anyone who appeared on the screen back then, as a reporter, as a moderator, as a commentator, was a good friend, we knew all the faces, but above all we knew all the voices.
You could be in the next room and not see the TV picture, if you heard the voice you would know.
Oskar Wark, panting slightly, one could at best mistake him visually for the heavyweight ZDF newscaster Gerhard Klarner;
Wolfram Esser, who always seemed as if he didn't take what he was saying so seriously;
Arnim Basche, the horse specialist who always seemed slightly sour, of course Bruno Moravetz, who was hard to imagine without skis, Moravetz, who sighed his »Where is Behle« in the winter landscape of Lake Placid and thus made TV history.
Those at ZDF were always a bit more casual and stylish than at ARD: Harry Valérien with his sweater colors, who could conduct conversations in front of the camera like few others.
The two eponymous Werners Schneider with i and Schneyder with y, and there were also many other differences between the two, Magdalena Müller, the only woman in the group with her unmistakable Augsburg dialect, the boss Hanns Joachim Friedrichs, an authority in every respect.
In addition, the young wild ones Michael Palme, Günter-Peter Ploog.
The »Welt« columnist Oskar Beck once called them the »journalistic anarchists«.
They had no respect for anything.
What they have in common is that they are all already dead.
The time is over.
A grand seigneur in front of the camera
Karl Senne was certainly not a journalistic anarchist.
Mostly dressed elegantly for moderation, in a light summer suit, tanned, the side parting impeccable, a grand seigneur in front of the camera.
Motor sports had a lot more gentleman flair back then, and Senne fitted in well there.
In this way, he also led the department as ZDF sports director.
It was only when he resigned and Wolf-Dieter Poschmann succeeded him that the tone in the editorial office became rough.
It all seems as long ago as it actually happened.
Formula 1 has long since disappeared from ZDF, other broadcasters have paid a lot of money to secure the live rights, gliding is no longer an issue in sports reporting, and you can no longer recognize the reporters from the next room by their voices.
The Dazn generation is doing its job, but the distinctiveness is gone.
At the end of the year, Béla Réthy, one of the last recognizable ones, retires.
When ZDF was looking for a successor to Wim Thoelke for the quiz show »Der Grosse Preis« in the early 1990s, the name Karl Senne was also under discussion.
Nothing came of it, although the name »The Grand Prix« would have been tailor-made for a Formula 1 reporter.
But a game show, that would probably not have been the truth for the grand seigneur Karl Senne in the light-colored suit.
Karl Senne died at the age of almost 88.
He wishes there was a way to fly a glider up there.
Above the clouds.
