R.I.P. Curt Gowdy

I'm gettin' old. Curt Gowdy was the network sports announcer in the late 60s/early 70s, when I first started watching the game:

Gowdy made his broadcasting debut in 1944 and went on to call the first Super Bowl in 1967 as well as 13 World Series and 16 All-Star games. He also called the famous “Heidi” game in 1968.

In 1951 Gowdy became the main play-by-play voice on the Red Sox broadcast team. He left the Red Sox in 1966 for a 10-year stint as “Game of the Week” announcer for NBC. He also was the longtime host of the “American Sportsman” series.

“He’s certainly the greatest play-by-play person up to this point that NBC sports has ever had,” NBC Universal Sports chairman Dick Ebersol said from the Turin Olympics. “He literally carried the sports division at NBC for so many years on his back. ... He was a remarkable talent and he was an even more remarkable human being.”

Childhood memories you forget about until, well, somebody dies.

And a little piece of you does too.