Sportscaster Jim McKay

[Kevin Vahey]

Showing my age here.

Early in 1969 ABC Wide World of Sports invaded the ultra modern
(cough) broadcast complex of WMUR at 1819 Elm.

They were covering a World Cup Ski Race on a few hours delay and the
closest entry point to ATT Long Lines was Channel 9.

They parked a mobile unit with color VTR's in the parking lot and
installed a switcher in master control that they wound up letting us
keep.

McKay was going to do voice over live and he used the announce booth
that was also the office of Uncle Gus. He never once complained about
the situation and just did his coverage of the race perfectly.

His son Sean helped in the studio with graphics that we shot using the
old TK-31's
and of course I got a thrill that my camera was being seen by milions.

Afterwards McKay made sure he thanked each of us personally.

His teenage son Sean who was the gopher is now the President of CBS
News and Sports.

I ran into him a couple of years ago at Gillette and he remembered the
high-tech Channel 9 complex vividly.

RIP JIm