WNDU celebrates 70th anniversary, honors employee milestones

SOUTH BEND, Ind. (WNDU) - Here at WNDU, we’re continuing to celebrate our 70th anniversary.

Over our 70 years on air, there have been a lot of people that have contributed to our success here. That’s why our team came together on Wednesday for a celebration to honor WNDU’s past and present.

We also celebrated some major station milestones. Our First Alert Chief Meteorologist Matt Engelbrecht is celebrating 15 years with our parent company Gray Media.

He was joined by several other members of our team including our Chief Photographer Don Schoenfeld, who has been working at WNDU for 30 years!

“It really is a family station, and I can’t say enough about being here for 30 years,” Schoenfeld said. “Sometimes it’s my first home, you know. It’s my second home, but sometimes it’s my first home, and it’s great to be working with a bunch of people who care about their jobs and are dedicated and who mean a lot to the community.”

Several other WNDU team members from the past returned to The WNDU Studios for the celebration. They also spoke about what the station means to them.

“I started anchoring the news, and I never anchored the news before. I was in radio, and I did it in black and white, and then I stayed after all those years. My greatest heartfelt achievement are the people I hired,” said former WNDU News Director Mike Collins “I loved being here and it will always be my broadcasting home — always.”

“Mike was my first co-anchor here at WNDU. I started working a post-graduation internship because I lived here and it didn’t matter if I was paid because I could live at home,” said former WNDU anchor Maureen McFadden. “I ended up going into radio on U93 as the morning drive radio news anchor where I met my husband, Jim.”

For a look back at all our 70th anniversary celebration stories, click here!