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been a downtown Des Moines landmark for decades. But for most of that time, it was also a beacon so powerful, it could forecast the weather and make people rhyme. "Weather beacon white, colder weather is in sight. Weather Beacon Green, no change in temperature is foreseen." THE WEATHER BEACON LIGHTS GAVE IOWANS THE FORECAST AT A GLANCE BEFORE CELL PHONES. IT WENT DARK IN 2012 WHEN STRUCTURAL CODES CHANGED. But even the beacon isn't ����vlog's most nostalgic weather tool. A STORY BELOW GROUND LEVEL, JUST DOWN THE HILL FROM THE STATE CAPITOL, IOWA'S STATE HISTORICAL BUILDING IS PACKED WITH TREASURES. A FEW AISLES AWAY FROM CENTURY OLD WASHING MACHINES AND FURNITURE, YOU CAN FIND TINY TUBE TVS FROM THE 50S, ����vlog'S FIRST STUDIO CAMERA THAT CAPTURED LIVING COLOR AND -- <The gloves are to protect the artifact.> A BROADCASTING ARTIFACT SO LEGENDARY-- <Alright, slowly over the crack.> ITS FOUR TINY WHEELS RARELY ROLL. <Wheels.> BUT WHEN A DOZEN IOWANS WITH THE LAST NAME OF VAN DYKE SHOW UP IN THE LOBBY-- <Way back.> EXCEPTIONS ARE MADE. <I'll go right, you go left.> BECAUSE THE ONLY THING MORE POPULAR THAN THAT ARTIFACT-- <Is this the side we want out? I think so, yeah. OK> WAS THE MAN WHO MADE IT FAMOUS. <That FBI probe of Congress may grow.> THE LEGEND WITH THAT VOICE - RUSS VAN DYKE. <That easy and yet at the same time very confident and trustworthy delivery made him stand out on camera.> <Russ just transferred what he had off of radio. I've never seen a guy, he had the local audience here and he took it right to television with him.> <He was a newsman who was a reluctant star. He was really the patriarch of not only TV 8 but central Iowa.> FROM 1955 TO 1983, RUSS WAS IOWA'S NEWS AUTHORITY. NOT ONLY DID HE HAVE THE MOST TENURE OF ANY NEWS ANCHOR IN THE UNITED STATES, ENDING NEWSCASTS BY DRINKING A GLASS OF SPONSOR ANDERSON- ERICKSON MILK, HE ALSO DID THE WEATHER. <57 over in St. Louis, 45, Chicago.> FOR CHANNEL 8'S FIRST 18 YEARS, RUSS' SEE-THROUGH GLASS WEATHER MAP BECAME áTHE SOURCE FOR IOWA FORECASTS. A HOMEMADE ARTIFACT THAT ALMOST LANDED IN THE DUMPSTER AFTER ITS FIRST WEEK ON THE AIR. <Russ got a message from Bob Dylan, the general manager of the station. He wrote a message, referring to the map as, "Get rid of it. It's the stupidest thing I've ever seen." Well, unfortunately, or fortunately, they didn't have any other map at the time so they had to continue to use the see-through map. And within a matter of days, the viewers began to respond and comment about how unique it was and how much they liked it. > > BY THE TIME RUSS RETIRED, HIS WALL HAD BECOME SUCH AN INSTITUTION, HE DONATED IT TO THE STATE OF IOWA IN 1988. <On behalf of ����vlog-TV, we present this to you and the historical museum...> WHERE IT'S SAT IN STORAGE - <Laugh.> UNTIL THAT ARMY OF VAN DYKE'S SHOWED UP WITH SOME ����vlog COWORKERS - <Door.> JUST IN TIME TO CATCH THE COLLECTION'S OVERHEAD DOOR ROLL UP- <That's awesome.> REVEALING THE STATE'S BEST-KNOWN BROADCASTING ARTIFACT. <Still got the numbers on it. Wow.> AND THE NUMBERS JIM AND BOB VAN DYKE IMMEDIATELY RECOGNIZED. <That's dad's handwriting, yeah.> THOSE NUMBERS WERE JUST LIKE THE ONES KEVIN COONEY WIPED OFF EVERY NIGHT IN HIS FIRST JOB AT THE STATION - AS A TEENAGE STUDIO ASSISTANT. <What kind of special cleaner did you have? Glass Wax. For a long time, I had a great aversion to glass wax.> BUT NO ONE EVER WIPED OFF RUSS' LAST FORECAST. <Yeah, you can see he's got the fronts here.> IT'S STILL ON THERE. <I can't believe this is the actual.....> WHEN THE WHITE GLOVES ROLLED THE CASTERS INTO PLACE AND PARKED IT IN FRONT OF A LIGHT WALL? <Yep, that's the way it looked.> GRANDKIDS AND GREAT-GRANDKI DS WHO'D NEVER SEEN IT IN PERSON SAW THE PROBLEM. <But wait. Maine is over there. California is over there.> FROM THE CAMERA'S PERSPECTIVE, THE UNITED STATES WAS - BACKWARDS. <People were fascinated by this. And for years, I'm sure you ran into this. They wanted to know how your dad learned to write backwards. I still get that question.> ESPECIALLY BACKWARDS WITH HIS LEFT HAND. IN THE BLACK AND WHITE DAYS, A SWITCH REVERSED THE SCAN, FLIP FLOPPING THE PICTURE. BUT WHEN COLOR CAME AROUND, THE SECRET WAS A 45 DEGREE MIRROR. <So if you, if you shot it that way you know right there obviously the map would appear backwards. But if you bounced it off a mirror, if the camera actually shot off a mirror, it reversed a double negative, so to speak, makes a positive. And and that's how it works.> <Once you explain it, then people would see that his handkerchief pocket was on the wrong side.> <Notice the high tech lighting. Two florescent bulbs.> <So laugh, it was it was high tech. It was really high tech.> SO WERE HIS NOTES, WRITTEN WITH A THIN WHITE PENCIL. <You can't see it on the camera, you know. But if you get in real close, you can see he's got a low pressure system here and a front and the lows. But in that direction you can see it. All his cues are here along with all the temperatures.> ALL STILL THERE FROM HIS LAST FORECAST - SO THE GREAT-GRANDCH ILDREN HE NEVER MET COULD EXPERIENCE HIS MAGIC. <I think that's really cool because it's fascinating to see his writing because I, unfortunately, never got to meet him. So it's really cool to be this close to him, just looking at this map.> ESPECIALLY CONSIDERING ADDIE VAN DYKE IS STUDYING - METEOROLOGY AT IOWA STATE. <I've heard all about it and it's really inspiring to be in classes and think about this and look at the computer models we have now and think about him doing stuff like this. It's really inspiring.> RUSS' SONS REMEMBER WHEN THE TWO-BY-FOURS AND GLASS WERE BUILT IN THEIR WINDSOR HEIGHTS BASEMENT. <Yeah, he was good woodworking. So part of this was Russ's original woodworking.> BUT TO HIS GRANDKIDS, LIKE - RUSS VAN DYKE - WHO GETS IT ALL THE TIME? <Yeah, like THE Russ VanDyke? Yeah, like the one you watched on the news.> THE WALL WAS ALWAYS JUST A FAMILY STORY THE KIDS HAD NEVER SEEN. < Yeah, it's part of Iowa history, not just our family.> BUT STANDING THERE, AS A FAMILY-- <Oh my gosh.> GATHERED AROUND A LAPTOP SHOWING HIS NEWSCAST - <Oh yes.> SOAKING IN HIS VOICE-- <Quick Russ nat audio only.> <That voice.> IN FRONT OF HIS WEATHER WALL-- <Silent tears.> IT ALL CAME BACK. < It got me.> It got me.> RUSS VAN DYKE DIED IN 1992. BUT HIS FAMILY SAYS SOMETIMES THEY CAN HEAR GRANDPA'S DELIVERY IN EACH OTHER'S VOICES. <It's still there. We all still do it. We grew up hearing that.> WHILE POSING FOR A PICTURE BEHIND RUSS' SIMPLE, CLEAR, REVERSED WALL, THEY SAW IT - UP IN THE CORNER, SCRIBBLED IN YELLOW. <Well somebody wrote up there. Don't forget me. That's dad's handwriting. Yeah.> RUSS' LAST MESSAGE PERSONALLY JOTTED ONTO HIS WEATHER WALL. DON'T FORG