Gayle Gardner (born 1950) is an American sportscaster….who worked for ESPN and NBC Sports beginning in 1987 until 1993….and is considered a pioneer in sports broadcasting….after having been the first female sports anchor to appear weekly on a major network….when afer being hired by ESPN in 1983….Gardner served as a SportsCenter anchor for three years…..as seen in this video herewith co-anchor Chris Berman. Following moving to NBC, Gayle Gardner had assignments that she undertook which included anchoring NBC’s New Year’s Day college football bowl game coverage, NFL Live!….Major League Baseball: An Inside Look….NBC’s 1988 Seoul Olympics and 1992 Barcelona Olympics coverage….the French Open…. Wimbledon….and NBC’s “Prudential Sports Updates”.
Gardner’s partner in crime on this video was the legend himself, Chris Berman….Boomer / The Swame ….whose sportscasting career began at Hartford’s WVIT-TV as a weekend sports anchor….when he joined ESPN in 1979….just a month after its founding….and has been with the network ever since….who along with Bob Ley, is one of ESPN’s longest-tenured employees. Berman and Ley are the only remaining SportsCenter anchors from 1979. Boomer spent 31 years as the host of both Sunday NFL Countdown, and ten years hosting Monday Night Countdown….where in addition during the NFL season ….he hosts the evening SportsCenter….which aired generally at either 7:30 PM Eastern Time or 11 PM ET along with Herm Edwards….who replaced Tom Jackson for the 2016 season. The Swame often appears on SportsCenter at night hosting brief segments called “Chris Berman’s two-minute drill”. From 1988-1989, he hosted ESPN’s first game show, Boardwalk and Baseball’s Super Bowl of Sports Trivia.
This video clip featuring SportsCenter with Chris Berman and Gayle Gardner covering the weekend’s golf afound the country is really rare footage….and we at ImaSportsphile are overjoyed to have this…..along with so many other vintage video in our librarry featuring these two “pathfinders” of sports news broadcasting multiple times a day….as this is just another “nugget of gold” in our treasure chest of vintage memories.
