Gohisca, 1952 and the Generosity of a Friend, Part III

As detailed earlier, my Mayberry friend Jimmy Phillips gifted me with the 1952 high school yearbook from the last year Andy Griffith worked as a high school teacher. Jimmy has also been a vocal supporter of my Mayberry Day-by-Day Calendar. I hope my use of his generous gift to write these recent blog posts helps him know how much I appreciate his thoughtfulness.

In the past two blog posts, I discussed how Andy Griffith came to be a teacher at Goldsboro High School and the inside reference to his friend from the school that he used in “The Clubmen” episode. There is another, interesting connection with a man who may not have been connected to The Andy Griffith Show but was a widely respected newsman for decades before his death this past April.

Many people know Carl Kassel as the voice of National Public Radio’s news show Morning Edition from its first broadcast in 1979 until he retired 30 years later. Many more know him as the official judge and scorekeeper of the NPR comedy program Wait, Wait… Don’t Tell Me, a role he filled from the beginning of that program in 1998 and continued to do even after his retirement from news until he retired from that show in 2014. (Winners of one of the games on the show won Carl’s voice on their answering machine or voicemail system as a prize.) Still others know Carl as the announcer for many years for the Kennedy Center Honors on CBS.

Carl’s illustrious news career actually had its roots many years earlier in Goldsboro, North Carolina where he attended the school where Andy Griffith taught. Andy’s last year to teach there was also Carl’s senior year. Carl was the president of the Goldmasquers, the dramatic arts group that was directed by Cliff Britton

Under Britton, the high school had complete radio broadcasting facilities which Carl used to train. He also participated in radio workshops staged by Britton and landed his first on-air radio job when only 16.

 

Carl was also the male student named “Most Likely to Succeed” by his high school class in 1952.

After high school, Carl went to Andy’s alma mater the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill where he and fellow classmate and future broadcaster Charles Kuralt helped launch the local campus radio station WUNC. He left college before graduation when he was drafted into the Army. After serving, he first worked on-air in Goldsboro then became the news director of a radio station in Virginia where he hired a young intern who also went on to a career in broadcasting, Katie Couric. Carl became a nationally-known newscaster in 1975.

While Cliff Britton was clearly a mentor to Carl, so was Andy Griffith, the music teacher who also worked with the Goldmasquers during three of Carl’s four years in high school. Carl won the lead role in numerous high school stage productions and Andy encouraged him to pursue a theater career. Carl said he told Andy, “No, I’m going to be a radio star,” though he did follow Andy’s advice briefly.

Carl acted professionally for one summer in The Lost Colony in 1952, the summer after he graduated and Andy resigned from Goldsboro High School. Carl played the Indian chief Wanchese in the production which starred Andy.

In Carl’s first dress rehearsal, Andy told him he had been a bit heavy handed with the makeup.  Carl recalled that Andy then taught him how to appropriately apply the face paint, and added that Andy was “a big, big help” during the season.

What a treasure trove the Gohisca yearbook has been.