William Douglas Weathers (born September 22, 1931) is a

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...

Savannah, Georgia Savannah ( ) is the oldest city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia and is the county seat of Chatham County, Georgia, Chatham County. Established in 1733 on the Savannah River, the city of Savannah became the Kingdom of Great Br ...

, USA, and the former WTOC-TV

news presenter A news presenter – also known as a newsreader, newscaster (short for "news broadcaster"), anchorman or anchorwoman, news anchor or simply an anchor – is a person who presents news during a news program on TV, radio or the Internet. ...

and news director. He presented his last broadcast on May 23, 2001. Weathers was born in Marianna, Florida.

Military career

According to a biography provided by WTOC-TV, Weathers served in the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

during the

Korean War , date = {{Ubl, 25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953 (''de facto'')({{Age in years, months, weeks and days, month1=6, day1=25, year1=1950, month2=7, day2=27, year2=1953), 25 June 1950 – present (''de jure'')({{Age in years, months, weeks a ...

, after which he re-enlisted and was ordered to Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah in 1954.

Broadcasting career

He began working for WTOC-TV in the station's launch in 1954 as a film editor. He worked his way up to running the Image projector, projector, operating the studio cameras and helping with the production of the news broadcast. In 1962, he was promoted to news director and presenter. He left WTOC-TV to present the news at WJCL-TV in 1973 when WJCL-TV gained the ability to broadcast in color. WJCL was, at the time, last in the 6 o'clock news Nielsen ratings, ratings. With Weathers on the news desk, it leapt to number 1 and stayed at, or near, the top until WTOC hired Weathers back in 1979. He was head of news and public affairs and presenter of WTOC ''The News at Six'' until his retirement in 2001.

Broadcast style

Weathers' style changed little over the years. He never abandoned his down-home approach to the news often featuring "hokey" stories about farmers and their giant vegetables or anglers with really big fish. Viewers claimed it was part of his appeal. His popularity never flagged and WTOC's newscasts remained firmly atop the local ratings.

External links

www.wtoc.com

''Broadcasting and Cable'' magazine *
State of Georgia Resolution
1931 births Living people American television news anchors People from Marianna, Florida {{US-tv-bio-stub