The Voice of Los Angeles

Abstract

This chapter pays homage to Los Angeles Dodgers broadcaster Vin Scully, who has provided the team's play-by-play for more than six decades years, with “elegance and ease and seeming effortlessness.” Born in 1927, Vincent Edward Scully grew up in the Bronx listening to sportscasters on the radio. He took up broadcasting while a student at Fordham University. Scully joined the Dodgers at spring training in Vero Beach, Florida, in March 1950. More than sixty years later, he is still with the team, the longest tenured announcer in American sports history. With a strong sense of perspective—of history—Scully emphasizes to listeners that baseball is a special little world, fascinating to be sure, but not to be overvalued. This chapter first provides a background on Scully's career in radio broadcasting before considering him from different generational perspectives. It argues that Scully “is more than just a well-loved sportscaster. He is the voice of L.A.” Angelenos' sense of civic identity resonates with that voice.