`Unsolved Mysteries' Gets Its Man In Rural Oregon

WOLF CREEK, Ore. - When the fax machine beeps for Dan Gomez, it tolls the beginning of a new adventure.

It has called him to Saipan in the western Pacific to track the faded trail of vanished aviator Amelia Earhart. To the mountains of southern New Mexico to mine for clues about the disappearance of millions of dollars of gold from Mount Victorio. To Florida to stalk a con man on the lam.

Twelve to 15 times a year, Gomez is summoned from his rural Wolf Creek home to lead 15 million television viewers into the heart of an unsolved mystery.

" `Unsolved Mysteries' is important," says Gomez, who has directed segments of the popular NBC television series for four seasons. "It's important in the way `60 Minutes' or `20/20' is important.

"Criminals get taken off the street. That sounds corny, but it's true. I'm not a cop, but some days I feel like one."

About 25 percent of the wanted men and women shown on the series are captured or surrender. About one-third of the lost loves and broken families are reunited.

Since it went on the air more than 100 episodes ago, the program has built its reputation re-creating real whodunits.

The Nielsen ratings agree it is a winning formula. "Unsolved" ranked 12th in national prime-time ratings through January, making it NBC's second most-popular series after "Cheers."

Gomez has been with the program since it went on the air, weighing fact against could-have-been as a freelance director who

confounded the industry just as he was focusing on the big time.

Cut to 1984. Gomez had climbed from Loyola University graduate to television editor to director. Then, fed up with the feeding frenzies of Los Angeles, he escaped to Wolf Creek in southern Oregon.

His colleagues thought he'd stepped into oblivion.

"Somehow they didn't believe that I really left," Gomez says. "It took a year of working at KOBI before I started getting calls."

At the Medford television station, he hosted "Dialing for Dollars," sold air time, reported news stories and directed the late news program. Gradually, producers rediscovered him.

"In the past four years," he says, "I haven't had to pick up a phone to look for work. I don't have to client shop. I have one client."

The client, Cosgrove-Meurer Productions Inc. of Burbank, Calif., produces "Unsolved Mysteries."

Producers fax him research reports outlining story leads and listing telephone numbers of key players. Gomez reviews the material and spends a couple of scout days on location, interviewing participants and unfolding story details.

Then he returns to Wolf Creek to write a shooting script. When that is approved, he's back on location, casting local actors and actresses and shooting the reconstructed case over four days.

The story of Tommy Gibson, the missing Azalea, Ore., youngster, was an ideal "Unsolved" drama.

Police speculate his father, a former Douglas County deputy, killed the 2-year-old boy. The family maintains Tommy was kidnapped.

"You show one story, then you show the other and you let the audience decide which one is true," says Gomez, who has between $150,000 and $250,000 to spend for each 10-minute segment.