I might be showing my young age here (28), but who were some of the guys who broadcast the Ags on radio before Dave South? For the life of me, Dave's the only one I can remember. Who were the past "voices of Aggie football?"

Did Mike Mistovich do football? I know he did basketball.

The greatest radio voice ever was Kern Tips, who did SWC games for the old Humble network.

Ahhhh Kern Tipps.....

In the days of radio only, Kern could create an image in the mind as vivid as TV. I will never forget "and rumbling, stumbling Jack Pardee powers his way for 10 more yards".....

Yes, Kern Tipps was absolutely the best I ever heard. I remember listening to him on an old tube radio when I was a kid. But, does anyone else remember Connie Alexander, another voice of the Humble radio network? He did the Aggie game with LSU in 1975, which we won 39-8 I believe. George Woodard rumbled for about 175 yards and a couple of TDs that night. I'll never forget it. Anyway, Alexander had a fanastic voice for radio and just never made any mistakes. I wonder what happened to him.

Fess Box (sp?) was another great one who followed Kern Tipps in the late 50s or early 60s.

Pup, oh sorry you said 'historical'; I thought you mean 'histerical'...

Thanks Fossil for mentioning Fess Box. I have been trying to recall that name for a long time as it had somehow escaped my memory. Hahvaard, I "spotted" an Ag/LSU game in Baton Rouge in either '61 or 62 and Connie Alexander did the Humble play-by-play. He was no spring chicken then. If he's still with us he has to be in his eighties. I also remember Mike Mistovich. He was the local ( Bryan ) radio czar. Either owned or managed the old KORA. Also did Bryan High School games along with another station employee named Roy Greer.

Thanks Fossil for mentioning Fess Box. I have been trying to recall that name for a long time as it had somehow escaped my memory. Hahvaard, I "spotted" an Ag/LSU game in Baton Rouge in either '61 or 62 and Connie Alexander did the Humble play-by-play. He was no spring chicken then. If he's still with us he has to be in his eighties. I also remember Mike Mistovich. He was the local ( Bryan ) radio czar. Either owned or managed the old KORA. Also did Bryan High School games along with another station employee named Roy Greer.

So no one remembers who was before Dave South? I can't believe that. What about in the Bellard glory days in the 70s?

For all of you who yearn for those thrilling voices of the past, I found a website that has a bunch of SWC highlight videos featuring Kern Tipps, Connie Alexander, and even Vern Lundquist. RCII, Connie may have been getting up there in years, but he broadcasted until at least 1977.

http://www.tshof.org/gift_shop.htm

I may be wrong, but I don't think there WAS an official voice of Aggie football before Dave South. In the days of the old Humble network in the SWC, the best announcers got the best games, so the play by play man would change from week to week. I'm not sure when schools began putting together their own announcing teams, but my guess is that A&M lagged behind in that area, so south may have been the first full time guy.

BostonAg is right. Esso or Humble had a group of announcing teams with Tips and Alexander doing the marquee games. Mistovich did the video replay of our home games on the public access channel on Sundays.

Indianag,

You are not dreaming this up. I think it was about the mid 80s, because I remember it too. I know the legendary Frank Fallon was the voice of Baylor and Brad Sham did TCU and Ron Franklin did t.u., so you would have pairs like:

t.u. @ TCU - Brad Sham (PBP), Ron Franklin (color)
Baylor @ A&M - Dave South (PBP), Frank Fallon (color)

And you're right, it didn't last too long, but you had the possibility of some great announce teams.

I thought Dewayne Stats, the former Astros play-by-play man, did some aggie football in the 1980's.

thumbs up on frank fallon

Didn't a guy named Duke Fry broadcast for a year or two right before South came on board?

Those radio voices are great memories of the old SWC days....when all the players were Texas boys....and some were home town kids who created a community sensation when their names were mentioned. Humble Oil and Refining knew quite well the PR value of having Tipps, Box or Alexander, etc., also say the name of the home town of the players involved in spectacular play...Iraan, Pampa, Breckenridge, Highland Park, Cristoval... Rural party lines would be buzzing when the local town and its kid hero "made the radio."

And don't forget the greatest voice of them all: C. K. Estin, the Voice of Kyle Field, for 30 years that I know of. Games at Kyle Field in the last few years have not been the same without the opening line from C.K.----"Good Afternoon Ladies and Gentlemen, Welcome to Kyle Field, Home of the Fightin' Texas Aggies."

The other great thing about the Humble Oil network was that you could actualy find the games. No large areas of the state without coverage thanks to Humble. I know that in the area of formats, most stations would not consider broadcasting Texas Aggie football. It's a challenge to hear our games at night, and if you want to list to the Texas game, good luck finding that station. You either have pay out big bucks like Baylor did to WBAP to get airtime, or fight to get on a station that would rather be broadcasting an "investment" show or the Music of India.

Kern Tipps had to be one of the best football announcers ever. I can still remember him on the Esso radio network doing SWC football games.

You are right FossilAg, if you notice Ron Franklin still does that alot, especially if the kid is from Texas!!

Some really old geezers could probably give you more details, and it has been touched on above, but I think some further explanation is in order.

Prior to 1988, or thereabouts, all the SWC schools (Arkansas may have gotten out a little before then) sold their football radio rights as a package deal, and for several decades, the rights to these broadcasts were owned by Humble/Esso/Exxon (for simplicity, we'll just say Humble). When Humble had the network (until about 1977), the games were broadcast without commercial intterruption, other than the announcers reading a commercial for Humble intermittently throughout the broadcast. Each school had their own set up for basketball, but by combining the rights for football, you only need four stations in a market to carry the games and cover all the conference action (at least when it was an 8 team league and they were all playing conference games). Humble also got the big stations to broadcast games, unlike today when its a rarity.

Humble maintained a staff of announcers much like the TV networks do now: In the '50s, if Kern Tipps was calling your game, you knew that it was the marquee game of the day--in the early '70s, Connie Alexander was the lead guy. Legends like Frank Fallon and Jack Dale, who were the basketball voices of Baylor and Tech, respectively, might be sent to broadcast an A&M-Rice game, or what have you. Dave South was one of the last guys to join the old Humble (then Exxon) network.

About 1977, Exxon gave up this arrangement, and the rights were sold to Mutual, who maintained the same system for a few years. Then, in the early '80s, mostly to placate the Horns, they began to assign announcers to specific teams, with the home team announcer doing play-by-play, and the visiting team announcer doing color. If you've downloaded the highlight clip of the '86 A&M-Baylor game, you will hear a much more neutral Dave South doing play by play with an occassional color comment from Frank Fallon. It wasn't until '85 or '86 that Dave South actually became the A&M announcer (Dave was working in Waco all the time previous to this).

Finally, in '88 or thereabouts, the schools set up their own football broadcasts, and thus ended the legacy of the old Humble network, leaving us with the every man for himself approach that is utilized today (and which probably makes sense now that we're in a different conference).

Final note: Some poster above mentioned Dewayne Staats. Dewayne never broadcast Aggie football--while he was in this part of the country, working for the Astros, Mutual ran the SWC radio broadcasts and Dewayne was committed to baseball through September. However, his offseason job for several years, and during Shelby Metcalf's greatest days, was calling A&M basketball. Back then, our games were broadcast on KRLD in Dallas and WOAI in San Antonio, both clear channel stations that could be heard throught the state at night.

[This message has been edited by twk (edited 5/7/2003 8:59a).]

twk-

That's what I was looking for...thanks!

I guess I started listening around the time they started assigning announcers to a team. And yes, Frank Fallon was the man. The PA announcer for the Final Four for many years also, I believe.

[This message has been edited by BohunkAg (edited 5/7/2003 1:17p).]

Didn't Dewayne Staats call Cubs and ESPN games later?

For those of you old enough to remember Kern Tipps, here is a Tipps "special" that I saw in an Arkansas newspaper article from February.

"TCU takes Jim Swink out of the bait box and lets him go fishing for 9 yards".

Tipps also referred to a fumble as a "malfunction at the junction".

That guy could bring a game to life on the radio like no one else. Man, those were the days!

Those Humble broadcasts were so enjoyable. I think, in part,it was because so few games were televised (remember, we only had a few channels- no cable). But also those guys (Tipps, Alexander, etc) were so good- they were gentlemen in their on-air demeanor--they knew what they were doing (that is, they did their homework on the teams they were covering)--and they weren't ashamed to get excited.

"...as he clicks his heels and goes down in a cloud of dust."

It's hard to beat the style of Kern Tips.

More on Kern Tips:
He would be 99 this August.
He died in 1967.
He broadcast SWC Games for 32 years.
He went to school at Texas A&M and Rice.
Here is a link to the Texas Handbook about Kern.
http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/view/TT/fti5.html

How many remember during the 50s and early 60s opening the Fort Worth Star-Telegram to the Sports pages to see the fantastic sequence photos of great SWC runs of the day before. The pics of the field were taken at about 10 yard intervals and fit together then the route of the ball carrier connected by dotted line. Most of the players of both teams were in the shots so you could see every move, block, and miss. Frequently these montages would take up most of the front page. They were very effective portraying the action.....and were the best we had before TV reruns. It is a lost art and I recommend you newbies interested in that kind of journalistic and football history make an effort to dig into the old FWS-T files to check it out. I wish I knew the name of the photographer/writer responsible so I could give due credit.....

The caption under the photo usually cited "Al Panzera".

There were giants at the S-T in those days: Jim Trinkle, Dick Moore, Flem Hall, Bill Van Fleet.....plus Panzera manning the lenses.

BTW, the neat little schedule books also mentioned above were called "Peeksize Football" guides. They were loaded with information...not just schedules, but previous year's all-America team, guide to referees' signals, etc. I still have a few of them.

Bill, '67

What great memories. When I was in grade school and junor high growing up in Bandera we would play touch football on Saturdays at the football staduim. While we were playing the men in town would be playing dominoes in the bleachers and the Southwest Conference games would be broadcast over the loud speaker with Kern Tips calling the plays. One game I remember is when Ags were playing Baylor and Kern Tips would say Mr Crow hit on the 10 and cartwheel to the 3. Also Mr. Bull (Ronnie)Baylor lost his chin strap when hit by Mr. Krueger. Also would be back to the stadium to listen to night games. What great memories. I really miss those great times.
Also would get Humble Fottball College stickers showing the football schedule to put on your car.