john amos played gordy the weather guy but I thought he would have been much better as a sports announcer, with his size he could have been a former football player turned announcer.
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I wonder if the casting of John Amos as Gordy might have been inspired by KTLA's Larry McCormick. McCormick was one the first black TV news anchors, starting out at tiny Los Angeles independent KCOP in 1969, a year before MTM went on the air.
He jumped to the local KABC affiliate in 1970, where he was the weatherman.
McCormmick finally landed at the larger LA independent station, KTLA, in 1971, where he started out as a weathercaster, but later became one of the anchors. He stayed there until his death in 2004.
MTM had already taken inspiration from a couple of other local anchormen, George Putnam and Baxter Ward, in the creation of Ted Baxter. [Ted's personality was also based on Jack Cassidy's "Oscar North" character from the 1967 sitcom, "He & She."]
I wonder if the casting of John Amos as Gordy might have been inspired by KTLA's Larry McCormick. McCormick was one the first black TV news anchors, starting out at tiny Los Angeles independent KCOP in 1969, a year before MTM went on the air.
He jumped to the local KABC affiliate in 1970, where he was the weatherman.
McCormmick finally landed at the larger LA independent station, KTLA, in 1971, where he started out as a weathercaster, but later became one of the anchors. He stayed there until his death in 2004.
If I had to guess there were not many black guys doing the local news period back in 1970 never mind sports or any one segment of the news. Sports at that time did not matter to the population at large like the weather did. Probably in part inspired by the LA broadcaster and in part wanting to make Amos prominent in the scheme of the Minneapolis TV station.
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