Harold Johnson (born ) is an American sportscaster. He was

sports director The title of sports director can refer to the director of a live sports broadcast. It can also refer to an individual at a television or radio station who is in charge of the sports department. Director {{Job-stub ...

for

WSOC-TV WSOC-TV (channel 9) is a television station in Charlotte, North Carolina, United States, affiliated with ABC and Telemundo. It is owned by Cox Media Group alongside Kannapolis-licensed independent station WAXN-TV (channel 64). Both stations s ...

Charlotte, North Carolina Charlotte ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. Located in the Piedmont region, it is the county seat of Mecklenburg County. The population was 874,579 at the 2020 census, making Charlotte the 16th-most populo ...

for 26 years, during which time he won four Emmy Awards and was nominated for two others. He was the 2010

Republican Republican can refer to: Political ideology * An advocate of a republic, a type of government that is not a monarchy or dictatorship, and is usually associated with the rule of law. ** Republicanism, the ideology in support of republics or agains ...

nominee for .

Early life, education and career

Johnson was born in Camden, New Jersey and moved to North Carolina in 1958. He graduated from Statesville Senior High School, and received an

economics Economics () is the social science that studies the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and interactions of economic agents and how economies work. Microeconomics analyzes ...

degree from Lenoir-Rhyne College in

Hickory, North Carolina Hickory is a city located primarily in Catawba County, with formal boundaries extending into Burke and Caldwell counties. The city lies in the U.S. state of North Carolina. At the time of the 2020 census, Hickory's population was 43,490. Hickor ...

. He also served in the

United States Marine Corps The United States Marine Corps (USMC), also referred to as the United States Marines, is the maritime land force service branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for conducting expeditionary and amphibious operations through combi ...

Camp LeJeune Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune () is a United States military training facility in Jacksonville, North Carolina. Its of beaches make the base a major area for amphibious assault training, and its location between two deep-water ports ( Wilming ...

Career as sportscaster

Johnson started his broadcast career at WSIC radio in Statesville, where he hosted a music program called "The HaJo Show". While at WSIC, he met Jim Thacker of

WBTV WBTV (channel 3) is a television station in Charlotte, North Carolina, United States, affiliated with CBS and owned by Gray Television. The station's studios are located off Morehead Street, just west of Uptown Charlotte, and its transmitter i ...

, where he acted as weekend

sports anchor In sports broadcasting, a sports commentator (also known as sports announcer or sportscaster) provides a real-time commentary of a game or event, usually during a live broadcast, traditionally delivered in the historical present tense. Radio wa ...

and later worked nights. On WBT, he was morning co-host with

Bob Lacey Robert Joseph "Bob" Lacey, Jr. (born August 25, 1953) is former professional baseball pitcher. He played all or part of seven seasons in Major League Baseball for the Oakland Athletics, Cleveland Indians, Texas Rangers, California Angels, and ...

and the

play-by-play In sports broadcasting, a sports commentator (also known as sports announcer or sportscaster) provides a real-time commentary of a game or event, usually during a live broadcast, traditionally delivered in the historical present tense. Radio was ...

announcer and pre-game host for the Charlotte Hornets of the World Football League. He also covered the

Masters Golf Tournament The Masters Tournament (usually referred to as simply The Masters, or the U.S. Masters outside North America) is one of the four major championships in professional golf. Scheduled for the first full week of April, the Masters is the first ma ...

for ABC radio. Late in 1979, Johnson moved to

. In 1980, Johnson became the station's sports director. During his 26 years there, "The Big Guy" covered the NBA Hornets and

Bobcats The bobcat (''Lynx rufus''), also known as the red lynx, is a medium-sized cat native to North America. It ranges from southern Canada through most of the contiguous United States to Oaxaca in Mexico. It is listed as Least Concern on the IUC ...

NASCAR The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and ...

, the NFL

Carolina Panthers The Carolina Panthers are a professional American football team based in Charlotte, North Carolina. The Panthers compete in the National Football League (NFL), as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) South division. ...

, and

college basketball In United States colleges, top-tier basketball is governed by collegiate athletic bodies including National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), the United States Collegiate Athleti ...

teams from North Carolina that reached the Final Four. In 1990, 1992, 1994, and 1995, Johnson received the Outstanding Sportscasting Emmy. He was also nominated in 1997 and 1999. Johnson also played a role in moving WSOC-TV from a distant second in the TV news ratings to first place. He was also noted for being the first to announce that Charlotte had its first NBA team, and he once had to break into regular programming to announce a regular news bulletin. In 2000, ''

Sports Illustrated ''Sports Illustrated'' (''SI'') is an American sports magazine first published in August 1954. Founded by Stuart Scheftel, it was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the National Magazine Award for General Excellence twi ...

'' referred to Johnson as "the dean of Charlotte sportscasters" who had become "an expert in broadcasting sports sorrow"; the magazine listed the many tragedies he was known for reporting, including the deaths of Kenny Irwin, Fred Lane,

Adam Petty Adam Kyler Petty (July 10, 1980 – May 12, 2000) was an American professional stock car racing driver. He was the fourth generation from the Petty family to drive in races in the highest division of NASCAR racing, mostly in what was then kno ...

and

Bobby Phills Bobby Ray Phills II (December 20, 1969 – January 12, 2000) was an American professional basketball player. He played shooting guard and small forward for the National Basketball Association's Cleveland Cavaliers and Charlotte Hornets. A ...

. Other events included the murder trial of

Rae Carruth Rae Theotis Carruth (born Rae Lamar Wiggins; January 20, 1974) is a former American football wide receiver, and convicted murderer. After playing college football at Colorado, Carruth was drafted in the first round of the 1997 NFL Draft by the ...

, the sexual assault trial of

George Shinn George Shinn (born May 11, 1941) is the former owner of the Charlotte/New Orleans Hornets, as well as the Charlotte Knights and Gastonia Rangers minor league baseball teams, along with the Raleigh–Durham Skyhawks, of the World League of Americ ...

, and other legal troubles facing the area's major sports figures. Johnson retired from WSOC in 2006 to spend more time with his family. In 2009, ''

The Charlotte Observer ''The Charlotte Observer'' is an American English-language newspaper serving Charlotte, North Carolina, and its metro area. The Observer was founded in 1886. As of 2020, it has the second-largest circulation of any newspaper in the Carolinas. I ...

'' named Johnson as number one on the newspaper's list of top sportscasters in Charlotte. Langston Wertz Jr. said "His 'big guy' persona was

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). Th ...

before there was ESPN."

Political activity

Johnson is a

. In 1986, he was asked to host a rally at

Charlotte/Douglas International Airport Charlotte Douglas International Airport ( IATA: CLT, ICAO: KCLT, FAA LID: CLT), typically referred to as Charlotte Douglas, Douglas Airport, or simply CLT, is an international airport in Charlotte, North Carolina, located roughly six miles we ...

during a visit by then-President Ronald Reagan. He also has a "deep-rooted" Christian faith. In a 2018 interview, Johnson described his political views as

socially liberal Cultural liberalism is a social philosophy which expresses the social dimension of liberalism and advocates the freedom of individuals to choose whether to conform to cultural norms. In the words of Henry David Thoreau, it is often expressed a ...

and

fiscally conservative Fiscal conservatism is a political and economic philosophy regarding fiscal policy and fiscal responsibility with an ideological basis in capitalism, individualism, limited government, and ''laissez-faire'' economics.M. O. Dickerson et al., '' ...

, and also voiced his support for then-President

Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of P ...

2010 congressional campaign

On December 4, 2009, at age 68, Johnson announced he would run against Democratic Representative

Larry Kissell Lawrence Webb Kissell (born January 31, 1951) is an American politician who served as the U.S. representative for , a district that stretched from Charlotte to Fayetteville. A member of the Democratic Party, he served from 2009 to 2013. In 201 ...

in . His reasons for running included high unemployment and numerous closed factories, as well as the overall state of the country. He said, "I speak from the heart... this isn't the America I know." He said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi led Democrats "off a cliff". Johnson also criticized "big government spending" and "absence of leadership". To create jobs, he hoped to lower taxes and offer incentives. He officially filed as a candidate on February 23, 2010. Though he had less money to spend than some of his five Republican competitors, and he was new to the district, Johnson hoped to take advantage of his familiarity to TV viewers in the western part of the district, which stretches from Concord to Fayetteville. On May 4, 2010, Johnson received 33 percent of the vote compared to 37 percent for Tim D'Annunzio; he then defeated D'Annunzio by 22 points in a bitterly contested

runoff Runoff, run-off or RUNOFF may refer to: * RUNOFF, the first computer text-formatting program * Runoff or run-off, another name for bleed, printing that lies beyond the edges to which a printed sheet is trimmed * Runoff or run-off, a stock marke ...

on June 22, 2010. Late polling in the general election showed Johnson within a point of Kissell, and several experts called the race a tossup. Ultimately, Kissell was reelected fairly convincingly, taking 53 percent of the vote to Johnson's 44 percent.

Later broadcast career

, Johnson co-hosted a morning show on WSIC in Statesville, he has since retired.

Personal life

Johnson lives in

Statesville, North Carolina Statesville is a city in and the county seat of Iredell County, North Carolina, United States, and it is part of the Charlotte metropolitan area. Statesville was established in 1789 by an act of the North Carolina Legislature. The population was r ...

. During his 2010 congressional campaign, he temporarily moved to

Concord Concord may refer to: Meaning "agreement" * Pact or treaty, frequently between nations (indicating a condition of harmony) * Harmony, in music * Agreement (linguistics), a change in the form of a word depending on grammatical features of other ...

. Johnson was married to his wife, Linda, for 44 years, until her death from cancer. They have three children.

Electoral history

References

External links

Candidate web site
*
Financial information
at

OpenSecrets.org OpenSecrets is a nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C., that tracks data on campaign finance and lobbying. It was created from a merger of the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP) and the National Institute on Money in Politics (NIMP). ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Johnson, Harold 1940s births 20th-century American journalists 21st-century American journalists American male journalists American radio sports announcers American television journalists Candidates in the 2010 United States elections College basketball announcers in the United States Lenoir–Rhyne University alumni Living people National Football League announcers North Carolina Republicans People from Concord, North Carolina People from Statesville, North Carolina Politicians from Camden, New Jersey United States Marines