Al Eschbach is an American radio personality [1] [2] who has had a radio program on WWLS radio since 1985, with the exception of a brief stint on Kansas City's KCMO-AM in the early 1990s. [3]
Raised in Jersey City, New Jersey, he went to Seton Hall Preparatory School for high school and then University of Oklahoma. [4]
In 1976, he started his career as the sports director at KTOK in Oklahoma City. [5]
He was inducted into the Oklahoma Journalism Hall of Fame in 2020. [6] [7]
Curtis Edward Gowdy was an American sportscaster. He called Boston Red Sox games on radio and TV for 15 years, and then covered many nationally televised sporting events, primarily for NBC Sports and ABC Sports in the 1960s and 1970s. He coined the nickname "The Granddaddy of Them All" for the Rose Bowl Game, taking the moniker from the Cheyenne Frontier Days in his native Wyoming.
Alvan Leigh Adams is an American former professional basketball player. He spent his entire 13-year career with the Phoenix Suns of the National Basketball Association (NBA). Adams was named as the NBA Rookie of the Year in 1975 and selected as an NBA All-Star in 1976. He retired in 1988 and holds Suns records for games played (988), minutes played (27,203), rebounds (6,937) and steals (1,289). Raised in Oklahoma City, Adams was nicknamed the "Oklahoma Kid".
Harold Verne Keith was a Newbery Medal-winning American writer. Keith was born and raised in Oklahoma, where he also lived and died. The state was his abiding passion and he used Oklahoma as the setting for most of his sixteen published books.
Gary Phillip Reasons is an American former professional football player who was a linebacker in the National Football League (NFL). He played college football for the Northwestern State Demons from 1980 to 1983 and was the first player chosen as a first-team Division I-AA All-America team in three consecutive years. He also played professional football in the NFL for the New York Giants (1984–1991) and Cincinnati Bengals (1992). He played on the Giants teams that won Super Bowl XXI and Super Bowl XXV. Reasons later worked as a college football television analyst and sideline reporter for ABC/ESPN and Fox Sports Southwest. He has been inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame and the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame.
The Gaylord College of Journalism and Mass Communication is the journalism unit of the University of Oklahoma in Norman. The college is named for the former longtime publishers of The Oklahoman.
Dwight Vreeland Swain, born in Rochester, Michigan, was an American author, screenwriter and teacher. Swain was a member of the Oklahoma Professional Writers Hall of Fame.
Michael Ray Gundy is an American college football coach and former player. He is the head football coach at Oklahoma State University. Gundy played college football at Oklahoma State, where he played quarterback from 1986 to 1989. He became Oklahoma State's coach on January 3, 2005. Gundy and the University of Utah's Kyle Whittingham are currently the second-longest tenured FBS coaches with one school, trailing only Kirk Ferentz. Gundy and Whittingham are the longest-tenured in the Big 12 Conference.
Michael Vincent Curran is a retired American ice hockey goaltender. He led the United States to a surprising silver medal at the 1972 Winter Olympics after representing the USA at the 1970 and 1971 Ice Hockey World Championship. He turned professional with the Minnesota Fighting Saints of the upstart World Hockey Association in 1972–73 and quickly became one of the early star goaltenders of the new league, playing in the 1973 WHA All-Star Game. Curran lost his job in 1976 when the Fighting Saints folded, but he returned to international hockey with Team USA at the 1976 and 1977 Ice Hockey World Championship as well as the 1976 Canada Cup. He retired following the 1977 season after a second stint with the revived Fighting Saints WHA franchise. Currently, Curran works as the headmaster at a prestigious private school.
Northwest Classen High School is a public high school serving students in grades 9–12 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
James Clark "Jim" Nance was a leader for 40 years in the Oklahoma Legislature in the U.S. state of Oklahoma and was community newspaper chain publisher 66 years. Nance served as Speaker of the Oklahoma House of Representatives and President pro tempore of the Oklahoma Senate. During his legislative career, Nance wrote the "Honest Mistake" law which became a model for other states. Nance then became a key sponsor and Legislative Chairman of the U.S. Uniform Law Commission (ULC), sponsored by the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws, a non-partisan advisory panel which drafted uniform acts and uniform state commerce laws. Nance became known as a legislative expert in a 40-year legislative career as one of two Oklahomans to hold the top posts in both chambers of the Oklahoma Legislature. The state's largest newspaper, The Daily Oklahoman wrote he was the "longest serving Oklahoma Legislator" and "A Legislator's Legislator." Nance, a Democrat, is the only Oklahoma House Speaker elected through a bipartisan coalition of Democrats and Republicans. Fiercely independent, Nance considered public policy work to be a service and did not ever accept a salary or pension for any of his 40 years in the legislature and 24 years on the Uniform Law Commission. Nance refused to work as a lobbyist, although he had many offers after leaving office.
Yojiro Uetake is a Japanese wrestler and two-time Olympic champion in freestyle wrestling. He went undefeated for the entirety of his college career, winning three consecutive NCAA Championships. Uetake was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame in Stillwater, Oklahoma as a Distinguished Member in 1980. In 2005, he was inducted into the FILA Hall of Fame. He was inducted into the Oklahoma Sports Hall of Fame in 2015.
Wayne Turner Wells is an American wrestler and Olympic champion in freestyle wrestling at the 1972 Olympic Games. Wells was born in Abilene, Texas and grew up in Oklahoma. In 1982, Wells was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame as a Distinguished Member.
Edith Kinney Gaylord, also referred to as Edith Gaylord Harper, was an American journalist and philanthropist.
Robert Guyton Barry Sr. was an American television and radio sportscaster, and was formerly the weeknight sports anchor during the 5:00 and 6:00 p.m. newscasts on Oklahoma City, Oklahoma NBC affiliate KFOR-TV, until his retirement in 2008. He also previously served as the station's sports director. Barry graduated from Classen High School in 1946, and studied journalism at the University of Oklahoma before joining the U.S. Air Force in 1951. Barry is known for being the longtime voice of both the University of Oklahoma Sooners and Oklahoma State University Cowboys sports teams.
Mary Jane Alexander is an American writer and photographer, playwright, poet, and lyricist who documents people and places of the American West, with an emphasis on centenarians and American Indian culture. She was inducted into the Oklahoma Journalism Hall of Fame in 2019. During the pandemic, her work expanded into site-specific public art installations focusing on text and soundscapes that “amplify and illuminate facets of our collective shadowed history.”
Betty Ann Price was an American music teacher, art director, and ambassador. She served as the executive director of the Oklahoma Arts Council from 1983 to 2007. During her time as executive director, Price worked with eight different Oklahoma governors. She also served as an arts advisor to states, non-profit organizations, and a number of boards. She was inducted into the Oklahoma Women's Hall of Fame in 1985, among many other awards and recognitions.
Oscar Brousse Jacobson was a Swedish-born American painter and museum curator. From 1915 to 1945, he was the director of the University of Oklahoma's School of Art, later known as the Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art. He curated exhibitions and wrote books about Native American art.
Helen Freudenberger Holmes was an American journalist, historian, teacher, politician, and Women's Army Corps officer.
Joan Elizabeth Gilmore was an American journalist based in Oklahoma City, where she was an editor and columnist at The Daily Oklahoman beginning in 1952. She was inducted into the Oklahoma Journalism Hall of Fame and the Oklahoma Women's Hall of Fame.
Edith Cherry Johnson was an American journalist who was the society editor for The Daily Oklahoman between 1908 and 1958. For her journalism she was inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame in 1935 and posthumously inducted into the Oklahoma Journalism Hall of Fame in 1997.