Brickhouse, Jack

Jack Brickhouse, byname of John Beasley Brickhouse, (born Jan. 24, 1916, Peoria, Ill., U.S.—died Aug. 6, 1998, Chicago, Ill., U.S.), American sportscaster best known for his announcing of Chicago Cubs and Chicago White Sox baseball games.

Brickhouse began his career broadcasting basketball games for Bradley University in Peoria, Ill., during the 1930s. In 1940 he moved to Chicago and started his 41-year association with WGN radio and WGN-TV, where he broadcast more than 5,000 baseball games. In addition to covering both the Cubs and the White Sox between 1948 and 1967—a feat made possible by the two teams rarely playing home games on the same day—Brickhouse broadcast the football games of the Chicago Bears for 24 years. He also announced professional wrestling, basketball, boxing, golf, and college football bowl games. Brickhouse stopped announcing for both Chicago baseball teams after the 1967 season, but he continued to broadcast Cubs games until his retirement in 1981. Brickhouse was inducted into the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association Hall of Fame in 1983. That same year he was presented with the Ford C. Frick Award, which is given each year to a broadcaster who has made a major contribution to baseball and results in enshrinement in a special exhibit in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y. His trademark celebratory phrase “Hey, hey” adorns the foul poles in Wrigley Field.