Washington Heights Mourns Vin Scully, Local Kid Who Made It Big

WASHINGTON HEIGHTS, NY — A famous Dodgers announcer with Washington Heights roots died this week.

Vin Scully passed away Tuesday evening at the age of 94 in his home in California. He was the voice of the Dodgers from 1950 until 2016.

Scully was born in The Bronx and grew up in a fifth-story walk-up apartment in Washington Heights. He was the son of Vincent Aloysius Scully, a silk salesman, and his mother, Bridget. His father died of pneumonia when Scully was four. After his father died, money was tighter so his mother rented out two spare bedrooms in their Washington Heights apartment, usually to merchant sailors.

One of those sailors was Allan Reeve, who his mom later married.

Scully graduated from Fordham Prep High School in 1944 and Fordham University in 1949. While at Fordham, he worked as a student sportscaster at WFUV, the Fordham University radio station. Scully also spent some time on the field as an outfielder for Fordham, but only hit one home run in his career against City College.

While Scully lent his voice to Los Angeles Dodgers for 67 summers, he started his career in New York City with the Brooklyn Dodgers at Ebbets Field from 1950 to 1957. He spent his first summer with the Dodgers commuting on the subway to Ebbets Field from West 180th Street.

He was 22 when he first got behind a mic and stuck with it until he was 89. In an interview in 2006 he told the New York Times he could not think of retirement, except by illness.

“After 57 years, this is my life,” Scully told the New York Times, “a man really determines himself by what he does. I wonder how a man feels when he isn’t defined.”

Washington Heights resident Mike Veve remembers Scully as the greatest announcer in the history of baseball.

“I listened to him call the Game of the Week with Joe Garagiola when I was a kid, heard him call countless World Series and playoff games, and regularly tuned into the Dodgers games on MLB radio to have Scully on in the background as I graded papers and did my grad school work at night. There will never be another like him. Vin Scully, when asked about who his audience was, said ‘I’ve always felt that I was talking to one person. But I’ve never envisioned who that one person is.’ It was me, Vin, and I can't thank you enough,” Veve said.

Scully’s last broadcast came in October of 2016 during the final Sunday of the regular season when the Dodgers played the Giants in San Francisco. A month after his retirement, President Barack Obama presented him with the Presidential Medal of Freedom.