Graham McNamee

Graham McNamee
Graham McNamee in 1915
Born	(1888-07-10)July 10, 1888 Washington, D.C.
Died	May 9, 1942(1942-05-09) (aged 53) New York City

Graham McNamee (July 10, 1888 – May 9, 1942) was an American radio broadcaster, the medium's most recognized national personality in its first international decade.

Graham McNamee's father, John B. McNamee, was an attorney and legal advisor to President Grover Cleveland's cabinet, and his mother, Anne, was a homemaker, who also sang in a church choir. Born in Washington, D.C. and raised in St. Paul, Minnesota, McNamee had early aspirations of being an opera singer. He studied voice as a youth and sang in churches, and in 1922 gave a concert in Aeolian Hall, New York. In 1922, while serving jury duty in New York City, he visited the studios of radio station WEAF en route to the courthouse and, on a whim, went to audition as a singer. Someone noticed his voice and asked him to speak through a microphone. He was given an audition and hired as a staff announcer on the spot.

Radio broadcasting of sporting events was a new thing in the 1920s. The play-by-play announcements were performed by a rotating group of newspaper writers. Their descriptions were matter-of-fact and boring at best. In 1923, announcer McNamee was assigned to help the sportswriters liven up their broadcasts. He wasn't a baseball expert, but had a knack for conveying what he saw in great detail, and with great enthusiasm. He began broadcasting first as a color commentator, bringing the sights and sounds of the game into the homes of listeners.

McNamee had various on-air responsibilities at WEAF, including baseball color commentary culminating in play-by-play of the 1926 World Series. Over the course of the next decade, first with WEAF and then with the national NBC network, McNamee broadcast numerous sports events (including several World Series, Rose Bowls, championship boxing matches), Indianapolis 500, national political conventions, presidential inaugurations and the arrival of aviator Charles Lindbergh in New York City following his transatlantic flight to Paris, France in 1927. Later that year, McNamee was featured on the cover of Time (October 3, 1927).