Merle Harmon
Merle Reid Harmon (June 21, 1926 – April 15, 2009) was an American sportscaster who was the play-by-play voice for five Major League Baseball teams, two teams in the American Football League and the World Football League's nationally syndicated telecaster. Harmon also owned a chain of sporting good clothing stores. On July 1, 1987, at 3:00pm EDT. Merle Harmon was the first voice heard on WFAN Sports Radio 1050 in New York. His recorded call of the New York Jets winning Super Bowl III was played prior to Suzyn Waldman’s first live update. Early life and career Born and raised in Salem, Illinois, Harmon served with the United States Navy in the Pacific during World War II. After the conflict ended, he attended Graceland College on the G.I. Bill, earning an Associate of Arts degree in 1947. He graduated from the University of Denver with a Bachelor of Arts degree in radio & television broadcasting and marketing in 1949. He began his broadcasting career later that same year wit ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Kansas City Athletics
The history of the Athletics Major League Baseball franchise spans the period from 1901 to the present day, having begun as a charter member franchise in the new American League in Philadelphia before moving to Kansas City in 1955 for 13 seasons and then to its current home on the San Francisco Bay in Oakland, California, in 1968. Philadelphia (1901–1954) Kansas City (1955–1967) The Johnson era In 1954, Chicago real estate magnate Arnold Johnson bought the Philadelphia Athletics and moved them to Kansas City, Missouri. Although he was initially viewed as a hero for making Kansas City a major-league town, it soon became apparent that he was motivated more by profit than any particular regard for the baseball fans of Kansas City. He had long been a business associate of New York Yankees owners Dan Topping, Larry MacPhail and Del Webb, and had even bought Yankee Stadium in 1953, though the league owners forced Johnson to sell the property before acquiring the Athletics. ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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College Football
College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States. Unlike most other sports in North America, no official minor league farm organizations exist in American or Canadian football. Therefore, college football is generally considered to be the second tier of American and Canadian football; one step ahead of high school competition, and one step below professional competition (the NFL). In some areas of the US, especially the South and the Midwest, college football is more popular than professional football, and for much of the 20th century college football was seen as more prestigious. A player's performance in college football directly impacts his chances of playing professional football. The best collegiate players will typically declare for the professional draft after three to four years of colleg ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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ESPN On ABC
ESPN on ABC (formerly known as ABC Sports from 1961 to 2006) is the branding used for sports event and documentary programming televised by the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) in the United States. Officially, the broadcast network retains its own sports division; however, in 2006, ABC's sports division was merged into ESPN Inc., which is the parent subsidiary of the cable sports network ESPN that is majority owned by ABC's corporate parent, The Walt Disney Company, in partnership with Hearst Communications. ABC broadcasts use ESPN's production and announcing staff, and incorporate elements such as ESPN-branded on-screen graphics, '' SportsCenter'' in-game updates, and the BottomLine ticker. The ABC logo is still used for identification purposes such as a digital on-screen graphic during sports broadcasts on the network, and in promotions to disambiguate events airing the broadcast network from those shown on the ESPN cable channel. The broadcast network's sports event c ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Kansas City Star
''The Kansas City Star'' is a newspaper based in Kansas City, Missouri. Published since 1880, the paper is the recipient of eight Pulitzer Prizes. ''The Star'' is most notable for its influence on the career of President Harry S. Truman and as the newspaper where a young Ernest Hemingway honed his writing style. The paper is the major newspaper of the Kansas City metropolitan area and has widespread circulation in western Missouri and eastern Kansas. History Nelson family ownership (1880–1926) The paper, originally called ''The Kansas City Evening Star'', was founded September 18, 1880, by William Rockhill Nelson and Samuel E. Morss. The two moved to Missouri after selling the newspaper that became the '' Fort Wayne News Sentinel'' (and earlier owned by Nelson's father) in Nelson's Indiana hometown, where Nelson was campaign manager in the unsuccessful Presidential run of Samuel Tilden. Morss quit the newspaper business within a year and a half because of ill health. At ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Charlie Finley
Charles Oscar Finley (February 22, 1918 – February 19, 1996), nicknamed Charlie O or Charley O, was an American businessman who owned Major League Baseball's Oakland Athletics. Finley purchased the franchise while it was located in Kansas City, moving it to Oakland in 1968. He is also known as a short-lived owner of the National Hockey League's California Golden Seals and the American Basketball Association's Memphis Tams. Early life Finley was born in Ensley, Birmingham, Alabama, attended Ensley High School but was further raised in Gary, Indiana, and later lived in La Porte, east of Chicago. In 1946, he suffered a bout of tuberculosis that nearly killed him, until his wife's obstetrician, H. Close Hesseltine, convinced him that he could beat it, if he put his mind to it and he successfully did. Finley made his fortune in the insurance business, being among the first to write group medical insurance policies for those in the medical profession. Finley showed a penchant fo ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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1961 In Baseball
Headline event of the year *Roger Maris hits 61 home runs, breaking Babe Ruth's record. Champions Major League Baseball *World Series: New York Yankees over Cincinnati Reds (4–1); Whitey Ford, MVP * All-Star Game (#1), July 11 at Candlestick Park: National League, 5-4 (10 innings) * All-Star Game (#2), July 31 at Fenway Park: 1–1 tie (9 innings, rain) Other champions *College World Series: USC *Japan Series: Yomiuri Giants over Nankai Hawks (4–2) *Little League World Series: Northern, El Cajon, California *Senior League World Series: Natrona Heights, Pennsylvania Awards and honors *Baseball Hall of Fame ** Max Carey ** Billy Hamilton *Most Valuable Player **Roger Maris (AL) **Frank Robinson (NL) *Cy Young Award **Whitey Ford, New York Yankees * Rookie of the Year **Don Schwall (AL) ** Billy Williams (NL) *Gold Glove Award **Vic Power (1B) (AL) **Bobby Richardson (2B) (AL) ** Brooks Robinson (3B) (AL) **Luis Aparicio (SS) (AL) **Jim Landis (OF) (AL) **Al Kaline (OF) ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Bill Grigsby
William W. Grigsby (February 13, 1922 – February 26, 2011) was an American sportscaster and member of the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame. Grigsby was best known for his work with the Kansas City Chiefs. Personal life Bill Grigsby was born in Wellsville, Kansas in 1922, the youngest of three sons of Harry Ludwell Grigsby and Elanore Amelia Grigsby. His father was a geologist, frequently unemployed during the Great Depression so the family moved to Lawrence, Kansas when Bill was in third grade. After graduating from the University of Kansas, Grigsby served three years in the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) during World War II as a cryptographer. He married wife Frances in 1949 and they would have five children: three sons and two daughters. Professional career Following his discharge from the USAAF Grigsby took a job with the ''Joplin Globe'' newspaper in Joplin, Missouri, advancing from copy boy to sports reporter. It was while in Joplin he began his first foray into bro ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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WDAF-TV
WDAF-TV (channel 4) is a television station in Kansas City, Missouri, United States, affiliated with the Fox network. The station is owned by Nexstar Media Group, and maintains studios and transmitter facilities on Summit Street in the Signal Hill section of Kansas City, Missouri. WDAF-TV also serves as an alternate Fox affiliate for the St. Joseph market (which borders the Kansas City market to the north), as the station's transmitter produces a city-grade signal that reaches St. Joseph proper and rural areas in the market's central and southern counties. WDAF previously served as the default NBC station for St. Joseph until it disaffiliated from the network in September 1994 (presently, NBC programming in St. Joseph is provided by KNPG-LD), and as the market's default Fox affiliate from that point on until KNPN-LD (channel 26) signed on as an in-market affiliate on June 2, 2012. History As an NBC affiliate On January 30, 1948, The Kansas City Star Co. – the locally based p ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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KCSP (AM)
KCSP (610 kHz) is a commercial AM radio station licensed to Kansas City, Missouri. The Audacy, Inc.-owned station broadcasts a sports radio format. The studios and offices are located on Squibb Road in Mission, Kansas. KCSP is one of the oldest radio stations in the Kansas City metropolitan area, going on the air in 1922, just after KMBZ, and several months before WHB. Broadcasting Yearbook 1977 page C-122 KCSP is a Class B regional station, with a power of 5,000 watts, both the daytime and nighttime, using a non-directional antenna on one tower. The transmitter is off Mission Road in Prairie Village, Kansas. Programming is also heard on the HD Radio, HD2 channel of WDAF-FM. Local sports shows are heard from mornings to early evenings on weekdays, with programming from Fox Sports Radio airing nights and weekends. Although the station had the slogan "The American football, Football Channel" when it began in June 2003, it is currently the flagship (broadcasting), flagship st ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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KMBZ (AM)
KMBZ (980 kHz) is a commercial AM radio station licensed to Kansas City, Missouri. KMBZ is owned by Audacy, Inc. and it airs a talk radio format. Its studios and transmitter tower are in suburban Mission, Kansas, at separate locations. After a local morning drive time news show, simulcast with co-owned 98.1 KMBZ-FM, KMBZ's weekday schedule is made up of nationally syndicated talk programs including Dana Loesch, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Tom Sullivan, Joe Pags, Joe Pags and ''Coast to Coast AM'' with George Noory. World and national news is supplied at the beginning of each hour by ABC News Radio. Weekend programming includes shows on money, health, computers and cooking, as well as paid brokered programming. KMBZ's sister station, KMBZ-FM, airs mostly local talk shows. KMBZ operates at 9,000 watts with a non-directional antenna by day; at night, however, it reduces power to 5,000 watts and uses a directional antenna to protect other stations on AM 980 from interference. O ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Philadelphia Phillies
The Philadelphia Phillies are an American professional baseball team based in Philadelphia. They compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member of the National League (NL) National League East, East division. Since 2004, the team's home stadium has been Citizens Bank Park, located in the South Philadelphia Sports Complex. Founded in 1883, the Philadelphia Phillies are the oldest continuous same-name, same-city franchise in all of American professional sports. The Phillies have won two World Series championships (against the Kansas City Royals in and the Tampa Bay Rays in ), eight National League pennants (the first of which came in 1915), and made 15 playoff appearances. As of November 6, 2022, the team has played 21,209 games, winning 10,022 games and losing 11,187. Since the first modern World Series was played in , the Phillies have played 120 consecutive seasons and 140 seasons since the team's 1883 establishment. Before the Phillies won their first World Series in 19 ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |