Former long-time Westporter Jim McKay, the legendary sports broadcaster who covered 12 Olympic Games for ABC as well hosted its “Wide World of Sports” sports anthology series for 37 years, died today in Monkton, Md. He was 86.
Jim McKay: raised his family in Westport. ABC Sports photo
McKay, who raised his family in Westport in a house on Compo Parkway, died of natural causes, according to a spokeswoman for CBS Sports. His son Sean is president of CBS Sports as well as CBS News.
McManus said that his father, who hosted and commented on Triple Crown races for ABC, might have only one regret: missing Big Brown’s chance today to be the first winner of the Triple Crown since 1978, The New York Times reported on its Web site.
McKay won numerous awards for journalism, including the George Polk Memorial Award and two Emmys—one for his sports coverage, the other for his news reporting—for his work at the 1972 Munich Olympics when Black September terrorists attacked Israeli athletes in the Olympic Village.
“In the long run, that’s the most memorable single moment of my career,” McKay once said.
“He had a remarkable career and a remarkable life,” said McManus in a statement. “Hardly a day goes by when someone doesn’t come up to me and say how much they admired my father.”
McKay was the first sportscaster to win an Emmy Award and eventually had 12 of them, the last won in 1988. ABC calculated that McKay traveled some 4 1/2 million miles to work events. He covered more than 100 different sports in 40 countries.
“There are no superlatives that can adequately honor Jim McKay,” said George Bodenheimer, president of ESPN and ABC Sports.
“He meant so much to so many people. He was a founding father of sports television, one of the most respected commentators in the history of broadcasting and journalism.
Jim Nantz, the CBS sportscaster and Westport resident, said McKay was his boyhood idol and influenced his decision to move to Westport.
“Jim McKay raised his family there. If it’s good enough for him, it’s good enough for me,” Nantz told his wife, according to Sports Illustrated in 1990.
“McKay’s voice is loaded with drama, emotion, the culture of all the world,” Nantz said in the same interview. “He’s got all the ‘-ity’s’: dignity, credibility and sincerity.”
McKay was inducted into the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame in 1988.
Born Jim McManus in Philadelphia in 1921, he moved to Baltimore when he was 15 and later worked as a newspaper reporter for the Baltimore Evening Sun before becoming the first anchor of the city’s new television station.
McKay rose to fame at ABC sports, winning awards for both his on-air broadcasting and his writing, and hosted major horse racing events, college football and the Indianapolis 500 auto race.
His introduction to the popular “Wide World of Sports” program, with the phrase “the thrill of victory, the agony of defeat,” entered pop culture.
