CLEVELAND, Ohio -- In a television market like Cleveland where the faces always seem to change every few years, Dick Goddard was a constant.
The legendary weatherman, who passed away Tuesday at the age of 89, spent 55 years at WJW Channel 8, letting viewers know to expect sunshine, rain or snow -- sometimes all three in one day -- and reminding them to spay or neuter their pets.
But to many of his colleagues in television news, Goddard was more than that. He was a colleague, role model and friend.
“Dick and I became acquaintances in the early 1980s when I was on the launch team of The Weather Channel. Dick was a huge fan of an all-weather network,” remembered WJW meteorologist André Bernier. “The Weather Channel had so many people in its Atlanta HQ that it had its own bowling league. I asked Dick if he would mind if we called our four-man team, the Woollybear Watchers. Why, he was thrilled and sent a ton of Woollybear paraphernalia to decorate the lanes we bowled on.”
In 1987, Bernier learned of an opening at WJW and called Goddard and asked him if he would personally deliver his resume and tape to Virgil Dominic, the station’s news director at the time. Goddard was happy to do it, Bernier recalled. A few weeks later, he got the job.
“Dick Goddard had a hand in getting me my dream job at the best local station anywhere,” Bernier said. “Even after over 32 years here in Cleveland, I still think of how blessed I am to have been given God’s favor back in the 1980s.”
When he arrived to do sports on Newscenter 8 in 1980, John Telich sat on the opposite end of Goddard on the news desk. They were closer off the air.
“I will never forget how he made me feel so welcome when I joined the station 40 years ago,” Telich said of Goddard, who had already been at WJW for 14 years by the time he got there. “He was an icon but he was the guy who would make the runs to pick up food for us, and we would good-naturedly tear into him if anything was wrong on the order.”
WJW anchor Stefani Schaefer said she fought back tears delivering the news of Goddard’s passing to viewers Tuesday morning.
“My heart is so sad. I first met Dick when I was a child - my cousin Tana Carli anchored the news alongside him. I was star struck ...He was THE Dick Goddard!” she wrote on Facebook.
Scott Sabol, WJW’s morning meteorologist, also grew up watching Goddard as a native of Hudson before joining the station in 2003.
“Mr. Goddard’s on-air weathercasts had the perfect blend of self-deprecation, intelligence and humility with a down-home, folksy vibe that gave him an endearing quality which viewers gravitated toward,” Sabol tweeted. “You felt like you were listening to your uncle or grandfather each day at 6 p.m. All of this over time created a sense of trust. Once cemented it was unbreakable. There aren’t many broadcasters like him.”
Before she became a White House correspondent for NBC News, Kelly O’Donnell worked with Goddard at WJW in the 1990s.
“My early local news days in Cleveland, Dick was a generous colleague and simply the brightest star any of us knew,” she wrote on Twitter. “On the air over the decades meant that Dick had been in our lives forever and his memory will as well. God bless.”
“Such a lovely, funny, genuine human being. May the angels welcome you Dick! Heaven has gained a great one,” tweeted former WJW and WOIO Ch. 19 anchor Denise Dufala.
Tributes to Goddard also poured in from former colleagues at competing stations.
“I grew up watching Dick Goddard. Most of us did,” said WEWS Ch. 5 weatherman and Northeast Ohio native Mark Johnson. “He fueled my passion for weather. He made the forecast important part of everyone’s daily routine. Dick’s word was absolute trust. He was must-see TV everyday.”
A decade before he joined WEWS, meteorologist Bryan Shaw worked under Goddard as an intern.
“You inspired so many of us,” he tweeted. “A truly wonderful person. We will miss you.”
“A very tough day in Cleveland TV,” WOIO meteorologist Jason Nicholas posted. “We’ve lost a legend. It’s hard to put into words what Dick Goddard truly meant to Cleveland. Thank you for everything, Dick. You will be missed - but your memory and impact will live on for generations.”
Added WKYC Ch. 3 meteorologist Holly Strano, “The SWEETEST man ever. Rest In peace. You will be missed friend.”
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August 05, 2020 at 02:01AM
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Dick Goddard remembered by colleagues in local TV news - cleveland.com
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