The Chris Moeller Archives

Harry Kalas 1936-2009

The voice of the Philadelphia Phillies, Harry Kalas, died today at the age of 73. Better known to national audiences perhaps as the distinctive voice of NFL Films and a series of football-inspired Campbell's Soup commercials, Kalas went out at the top in a manner of speaking-- in the broadcasting booth just before the Phillies afternoon game today in Washington D.C., and of course, with the Phillies as defending World Champions.

I had the privilege of watching Harry Kalas get inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2002 thanks to the happenstance of his getting inducted the same year as Ozzie Smith. Cardinals and Phillies fans made up about 90 percent of the audience in Cooperstown that summer afternoon, and I met Harry the previous day. He was having his picture taken in the Hall itself, and he stopped to pose for my camera as well. (This was prior to my participation in the digital camera revolution so I don't have the snapshot available to show you today. But stop by the house.)

When the Phillies won their previous World Series in 1980, network agreements in place at the time prevented local broadcasters from calling the action of the World Series games. The public dissatisfaction expressed by Phillies fans upon failing to hear Kalas helped to lift that restriction beginning in 1981.

Kalas, a former student at Cornell College in Mt. Vernon, Iowa, was a member of the graduating class of 1958 at the University of Iowa, and he was the voice of the self-guided tour of the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. I'll always remember him best, though, as one of Ozzie's companions along his Yellow Brick Road.

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The latest fad at Wrigley Field-- coupling with the established neighborhood pastimes of drinking to forget and threatening the kid with the headphones-- is hanging a bloody animal carcass from the Harry Caray statue. Results of an autopsy are pending.

posted by CM @ 2:36 PM