Harry Caray
| Harry Caray | |
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Caray in the Wrigley Field booth in 1988
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| Broadcaster | |
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Born: March 1, 1914 St. Louis, Missouri, U.S. |
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Died: February 18, 1998 (aged 83) Rancho Mirage, California, U.S. |
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As Broadcaster
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| Career highlights and awards | |
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As Broadcaster
Harry Caray, born Harry Christopher Carabina (March 1, 1914 – February 18, 1998) was an American sportscaster on radio and television. He covered five Major League Baseball teams, beginning with 25 years of calling the games of the St. Louis Cardinals with two of these years also spent calling games for the St. Louis Browns. After a year working for the Oakland Athletics and eleven years with the Chicago White Sox, Caray spent the last sixteen years of his career as the announcer for the Chicago Cubs.
Caray was born Harry Christopher Carabina to an Italian father and Romanian mother in St. Louis. He was an infant when his father died. His mother remarried with a French-American, but after her death when Caray was eight, he went to live with his aunt Doxie at 1909 LaSalle Street in a tough, working-class section of St. Louis. As a young man, Caray played baseball at the semi-pro level for a short time before auditioning for a radio job at the age of 19. He then spent a few years learning the trade at radio stations in Joliet, Illinois, and Kalamazoo, Michigan. While in Joliet, WCLS station manager Bob Holt suggested that Harry change his surname from Carabina (because according to Holt, it sounded too awkward on the air) to Caray. Caray did play-by-play for the St. Louis Hawks professional basketball team (now the Atlanta Hawks) and the University of Missouri football team, and he announced three Cotton Bowl games.
Caray caught his break when he landed the job with the Cardinals in 1945 and, according to several histories of the franchise, proved as expert at selling the sponsor's beer as he'd been in selling the Cardinals on KMOX. Immediately preceding the Cardinal job, Caray announced hockey games for the St. Louis Flyers. Caray co-announced with Ralph Bouncer Taylor, former NHL player. On one occasion Taylor temporarily ended his retirement when he volunteered to play goalie for the Flyers in a regular season game with the team from Minnesota. (Caray and broadcast partner Gabby Street also called games for the St. Louis Browns in 1945–1946.) Caray was also seen as influential enough that he could affect team personnel moves; Cardinals historian Peter Golenbock (in The Spirit of St. Louis: A History of the St. Louis Cardinals and Browns) has suggested Caray may have had a partial hand in the maneuvering that led to the exit of general manager Bing Devine, the man who had assembled the team that won the 1964 World Series, and of field manager Johnny Keane, whose rumored successor, Leo Durocher (the succession didn't pan out), was believed to have been supported by Caray for the job. Caray, however, stated in his autobiography that he liked Johnny Keane as a manager, and didn't want to be involved in Keane's dismissal. As the Cardinals' announcer, Caray broadcast three World Series (1964, 1967, and 1968) on NBC. In November 1968 Caray was nearly killed after being struck by an automobile while crossing a street in St. Louis; he suffered two broken legs in the accident, but recuperated in time to return to the broadcast booth for the start of the 1969 season. Following the 1969 season, Caray was fired by the Cardinals after having called their games for 25 years, his longest tenure with any sports team.
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