It was announced this morning that Today‘s Willard Scott, who is, shockingly, only 81 years old, will retire next Tuesday. Scott, who had worked at NBC for more than 60 years, has for the past few years made only sporadic appearances on the program, sometimes filling his old role with brief weather reports but mostly doing his classic bit of honoring centenarians around the country.
Scott’s career may have been capped by this role as a supporting player — and, indeed, many here at Flavorwire saw him as already on the verge of retirement when we first started watching him a decade or two ago — but his legacy extends beyond that, reaching into weird corners of the entertainment world in a way that is indicative of his part in establishing the foundation of what broadcast television has become. He invented the character of Ronald McDonald, for instance, and was also the host of several kids’ shows. He was even Bozo the Clown, once.
Scott began his job as Today‘s traveling weatherman in the ’80s, and it’s the one he would keep for the next three decades, throughout the innumerable redesigns of the set and changes in the newscasters. It’ll certainly be the end of an era once Scott finally stops appearing on the show, so hopefully the network’s send-off is more sentimental than the one they provided to longtime peacock employee Ann Curry.