Tuesday evening, just 32 days after ending a 38-year stint with WLKY, Louisville’s longest-running sportscaster, Fred Cowgill, received board approval to start teaching TV and radio at Jeffersonville (Ind.) High School. When F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, “There are no second acts in American lives,” he must have had someone else in mind.
“I’ve been looking for a while,” Cowgill said. “I wanted somebody, frankly, to want me. I wanted the choice to be obvious or else I wasn’t going to do it. There have been some suitors out there; some locally, some across the country, But it didn’t feel right. It didn’t check all the boxes. As I’ve learned more about this (Jeffersonville) job, I see an enormous commitment from a high school . . .I taught at (the University of) Louisville last spring and Louisville doesn’t have this kind of equipment. Almost no high school does. And I would make the case that a lot of colleges don’t. It’s jaw-dropping.”
Cowgill, 66, is plainly energized by his new gig and determined to put a pleasant spin on his departure from WLKY. When asked if he had left the station voluntarily, however, he paused for a moment before conceding, “That’s a good question.”
Older media types who get to leave a job entirely on their own terms are rapidly approaching unicorn status anymore, but Cowgill succeeded in negotiating an unusually graceful exit. Though the handwriting on the wall had been legible since Kent Taylor left WAVE in November, 2022 to serve out a non-compete clause before resurfacing at WLKY six months later, Cowgill was able to remain the station’s sports director through the 150 th Kentucky Derby and the PGA Championship at Valhalla last month. He signed off for the last time on May 24 with a sizable sigh and his signature wave, calling the occasion “deeply personal and very bittersweet,” a description he repeated, verbatim, on Monday.
There had been cake and applause in the studio that night, and an opportunity to say goodbye on the air and at a farewell function with his colleagues. It was as much of the “happy ending” Cowgill had been seeking as a man of his age and salary could reasonably expect.
“I will always love WLKY and for 38 years we had a blast,” he said. “I got to be part of something that very few people are able to enjoy. To have a 38-year run. . .that is beyond priceless to me. But I think there comes a point, if you’re listening, where that little guy whispers in your ear, ‘Maybe it’s time.’ At the end, as hard as it was, it felt right.
“The station was trying to figure out the big picture and I’m not a kid anymore. I’m not using the ‘O’ word yet (but) they could have gotten rid of me a long time ago and they chose not to. I think in fairness to them, they gave me a lot.”
It could have been intensely awkward. Taylor had been one of Cowgill’s interns and later a junior member of his sports staff prior to his 22 years at WAVE, and his return to WLKY as Cowgill’s anointed successor waa potentially fraught with friction. Formerly the station’s sports anchor at both 6 and 11 p.m., Cowgill lost the later slot after Taylor was hired.
“That situation, for most people, would have been virtually impossible,” Cowgill said. “There were a couple of small moments. But we’re friends. I have enormous affection for him. I think he feels the same way about me. He’s one of the best people I know.”
Taylor’s take: “We knew each other so well that I didn’t find it awkward at all. I thought it was pretty smooth. . . I thought we worked great together.”
WLKY news director Andrea Stahlman, another former Cowgill intern, said he had been talking about retirement for some time when she first broached the possibility of a Taylor succession plan.
“And he was like, ‘Wow, that would be incredible,’ ” she said. “I think it was probably bittersweet and fun and also difficult. Kent really wanted to dive full-speed into his new job but also wanted to make sure that Fred went out in a great way and in the way Fred wanted to go out. But I think it was difficult for Fred. It was a long year of knowing the end was coming.”
That said, the preceding two years had likely been longer. Cowgill suffered a severe knee injury while working the sideline at a 2021 Trinity High School football game. This required a lengthy rehabilitation and prompted a strong social media backlash after he subsequently sued the school. Cowgill ultimately agreed to dismiss his lawsuit – “Getting a glimpse of the future, I didn’t like where it was going.” -- but some of the damage endures, particularly when he is confronted by uneven lies on the golf course.
“That incident at Trinity was extremely painful,” he said. “It took me two years to recover. I couldn’t walk for a long time and I couldn’t take pain-killers because I’m allergic to pain-killers. I almost lost the lower part of my left leg. There were some dark nights. But it prepared me for the rest of my life and how I approach it. I think it’s really important to choose to be happy. Those are words I use a lot. I’m going to fight for that because the world will drag you down.”
That fight gained fuel when Jeffersonville High’s athletic director, Larry Owens, called to say the school had an opening for a TV/radio teacher. Owens’ first call had been to Taylor, who told him he wasn’t interested in the job but knew someone who might be. Owens remembers calling Cowgill on a Monday, four days before his last appearance on WLKY.
“Dumb luck, but great timing,” Owens said.
Jeffersonville High principal Pam Hall followed up, aware of the audacity implicit in asking a tenured television broadcaster to take a significant cut in compensation to teach teen-agers.
“You have to be crazy, I guess, or have pretty high self-esteem to make that initial phone call to say, ‘Hey, are you interested in this?” Hall said. “But I just believe he’s the best. I don’t think there’s any question about that. And I feel like our kids here at Jeff high deserve the best. I try to swing for the fence with every hire I have. . .I felt like going after Fred was really going to catapult us to the next level.”
With a $3.5 million studio Hall says makes Jeffersonville “the flagship, I think, in the country,” Cowgill was quickly convinced of the school’s commitment and potential. Come fall, he will be teaching six 45-minute classes per day with a total audience of about 150 students.
“It’s exciting,” he said. “They have two radio stations and a TV station, a live YouTube channel. They’re also on Spectrum (cable) in Jeffersonville. They have remote-control cameras for their football games. You name it, they’ve got it. It’s as good as anything in town, if not the best. I’ve already got a basic game plan that I’ve talked to a number of administrators about. I’m going to try to get a newscast running as soon as possible, daily.”
This time, Fred Cowgill plans to work behind the cameras. Perhaps permanently.
“If I’m never on the air again, that’s fine,” he said. “If I am, that would be really cool. I will always love it, but I want it to be under the right circumstances. Those circumstances never quite worked out in all of this.”
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