“He was a true citizen of the wide world of sports, but his heart was always in Tennessee.” So said sportswriter “Buck” Johnson of the legendary sportscaster, Lindsey Nelson. If you grew up any time between the 1950s and the 1980s, you had to have heard the smooth voice of Lindsey Nelson. Whatever the sport, be it baseball, football, basketball, or golf, Nelson was there to honor the game. After graduating from high school in Columbia, Nelson entered the University of Tennessee in the fall of 1936. On September 25, 1948, he called his first Tennessee game and quickly became “The Voice of the Tennessee Vols,” broadcasting their football, basketball, and baseball games. From there, Nelson rose to fame, first as part of the Liberty Network, and soon thereafter at NBC, where he was generally recognized as the top man in the field. For many years, he was the voice of the New York Mets. Among numerous honors and awards, the National Sportswriters and Sportscasters Association named Lindsey Nelson “Sportscaster of the Year” for four consecutive years. Then, having no further honors, the group elected Nelson its president. Once asked to sum up the high points of his career, Nelson responded; “That’s easy; the high points are the personalities… For me, persons like Bob Neyland, Leo Durocher, Casey Stengel, and George Halas are the high points in the career of anyone privileged to be associated with them.” Without a doubt, those “personalities” felt the same way about Lindsey Nelson.
