Some people may refer to Ken Squier as a Vermont broadcasting legend, up there with Marselis Parsons and the family of Charles P. Hasbrook-who has owned WCAX-TV since it’s inception in 1954, had purchased WCAX-AM from (now WVMT-AM) from the Burlington Daily News in 1939 and had later sold WCAX-AM to Simon Goldman and his James Broadcasting company in 1963, who had changed the call letters to WVMT-AM that year.

But I view Ken Squier as another man doing his job admirably as a race announcer and a radio and television racecaster at local and regional racetracks throughout New England, briefly for ABC; and notably for CBS for the longest time. Who happens to be from Vermont and owns his family’s own radio station in Waterbury. I wouldn’t necessarily call Ken Squier a ‘broadcasting legend’ in the normal sense. I wouldn’t put him in the class of people such as Walter Cronkite, Ed Murrow, Eric Severeid, Mike Wallace, Barbara Walters, Curt Gowdy, Jim McKay; and Chris Schenkel. I’d put him more so in the class of Keith Jackson and Dick Enberg.

Ken Squier had inherited his radio station from his father Lloyd when his father had passed away in 1979. I’d love to find out which manufacturer of transmitter Ken’s station WDEV-AM currently operates on, and which transmitters it had operated on ever since his father Lloyd had put it on the air on July 15, 1931.

Ken Squier had begun announcing races on television 1970 or 1971 with Chris Economaki and Jim McKay, a couple of them being the 1971 Greenville 200, and another race from Asheville-Weaverville, North Carolina that had aired on ABC. Ken Squier had also covered many different sporting events for CBS Eye On Sports/CBS Sports Saturday-Sunday, among them were (icky, yucky) boxing, track; and more pleasant skiing and skating. A lot of them were features like how Charles Kuralt would cover them-such as the North Carolina hollering contest and the Calaveras County Frog Jump.

In the years 1973-1974, CBS at the time wanted to try some racing, and they knew of Ken Squier’s background so it changed his value at CBS. They did several Indy car races like Milwaukee, Phoenix, Texas and at Brands Hatch in Britain. By 1976, Ken Squier was spending the majority of the summer in Europe with the Formula One on CBS, the year that Mario Andretti won the Formula One title. Mario Andretti had made the switch from NASCAR to Formula 1 in 1969. And CBS Sports had also covered Formula One for several more years utilizing Ken Squier. Ironically, also in 1976; Ken did the French Grand Prix on a Sunday and on the following Monday, CBS had sent him to Puerto Rico to announce the Pan American Games where he covered all kinds of events including (icky, yucky) weight lifting, roller skate hockey, (icky, yucky) basketball, track and field and some other things he vaguely remembers doing

By the late 1970’s, CBS had him also doing a lot of ski racing and ski jumping. It was actually in 1977 and 1978 that Ken Squier and Neal Pilson (then the head of Business Affairs for CBS) started working to get a Daytona 500 on the air as a “flag to flag” event.

The Golf events that Ken Squier did for CBS were the Colonial, the Heritage and the Masters in the year 1980.

How could yours truly not like a man who was a pioneer in television coverage of NASCAR in the sport’s good old days, had worked for my favorite network-CBS; and owns a radio station that he had inherited from his father?

Photo of Ken Squier:

Video about the life and career of Ken Squier:

Video about the history of Ken’s radio station in Waterbury, Vermont; WDEV-AM: