Irwin "Irv" Weinstein (born April 29, 1930) is a retired local television news anchor. He hosted
WKBW-TVWKBW-TV, Channel 7, is a television station in Buffalo, New York. It is the ABC affiliate for the Buffalo television market, and is one of many local Buffalo TV stations seen over-the-air and on cable in Canada. Its transmitter is located at 8909 Center Street in Colden, New York...
's
Eyewitness NewsEyewitness News is a name used by local television newscasts, widely used in different markets across the United States. It is also the name of a very popular music package offered by Gari Communications.-Origins:...
in
Buffalo, New YorkBuffalo is the second most populous city in the state of New York, second only to New York City. Located in Western New York on the eastern shores of Lake Erie and at the head of the Niagara River, Buffalo is the principal city of the Buffalo-Niagara Falls metropolitan area and the seat of Erie...
for 34 years from 1964 to 1998 and became an iconic broadcaster, well-known in both the Buffalo area and in
Southern OntarioSouthern Ontario is the portion of the Canadian province of Ontario lying south of the French River and Algonquin Park. Depending on the inclusion of the Parry Sound and Muskoka districts, its surface area would cover between 14-15% of the province. It is the southernmost region of Canada.Southern...
, which was within WKBW's broadcast area. Weinstein was known for his powerful delivery and sense of humor. Weinstein, weatherman
Tom JollsTom Jolls is a retired television weatherman at WKBW-TV in Buffalo, New York, where he worked for 34 years. He was also the star of the Commander Tom Show which had a 26-year run on WKBW....
and sports anchor
Rick AzarRick Azar is an American broadcaster who spent 31 years at WKBW-TV in Buffalo, New York.- WKBW-TV Career :Rick Azar was the first voice heard on WKBW-TV on November 30, 1958...
are the longest running anchor team in television history, fronting the broadcast from 1965 until Azar's retirement in 1989.
Irwin "Irv" Weinstein (born April 29, 1930) is a retired local television news anchor. He hosted
WKBW-TVWKBW-TV, Channel 7, is a television station in Buffalo, New York. It is the ABC affiliate for the Buffalo television market, and is one of many local Buffalo TV stations seen over-the-air and on cable in Canada. Its transmitter is located at 8909 Center Street in Colden, New York...
's
Eyewitness NewsEyewitness News is a name used by local television newscasts, widely used in different markets across the United States. It is also the name of a very popular music package offered by Gari Communications.-Origins:...
in
Buffalo, New YorkBuffalo is the second most populous city in the state of New York, second only to New York City. Located in Western New York on the eastern shores of Lake Erie and at the head of the Niagara River, Buffalo is the principal city of the Buffalo-Niagara Falls metropolitan area and the seat of Erie...
for 34 years from 1964 to 1998 and became an iconic broadcaster, well-known in both the Buffalo area and in
Southern OntarioSouthern Ontario is the portion of the Canadian province of Ontario lying south of the French River and Algonquin Park. Depending on the inclusion of the Parry Sound and Muskoka districts, its surface area would cover between 14-15% of the province. It is the southernmost region of Canada.Southern...
, which was within WKBW's broadcast area. Weinstein was known for his powerful delivery and sense of humor. Weinstein, weatherman
Tom JollsTom Jolls is a retired television weatherman at WKBW-TV in Buffalo, New York, where he worked for 34 years. He was also the star of the Commander Tom Show which had a 26-year run on WKBW....
and sports anchor
Rick AzarRick Azar is an American broadcaster who spent 31 years at WKBW-TV in Buffalo, New York.- WKBW-TV Career :Rick Azar was the first voice heard on WKBW-TV on November 30, 1958...
are the longest running anchor team in television history, fronting the broadcast from 1965 until Azar's retirement in 1989. Weinstein was inducted into the Buffalo Broadcasters Hall Of Fame in 1998 and the N.Y. State Broadcasters Association in 2006.
Born in
Rochester, New YorkRochester is a city in Monroe County, New York, south of Lake Ontario in the United States. The Rochester metropolitan area is the second largest economy in New York State, behind the New York City metropolitan area. Known as The World's Image Centre, it was also once known as The Flour City, and...
, Weinstein's broadcast career began while he was still in high school. He worked at WHAM Radio as an actor on several locally produced programs. After professional stops in Iowa and West Virginia, he was hired as a newscaster and news director at WKBW Radio in Buffalo in 1958, and soon forged a fast-paced newscast featuring strong writing and alliterative language ("pistol-packing punks" referring to petty criminals, or "Buffalo blaze busters" in place of firefighters) that helped take the newscast ratings to #1 in the Western New York market.
In 1964, Weinstein was hired as news director/anchorman at sister station WKBW-TV, an ABC Network affiliate. At the time, the station's news programs were rated #3 in a three-station market but by the mid-1970s, WKBW-TV's Eyewitness News program had ratings higher than the combined audience of the two competing Buffalo stations and remained the top-rated newscast until Weinstein's retirement in 1998 and beyond.
In 1968, Weinstein briefly returned to his broadcast beginnings as an actor in WKBW radio's
HalloweenHalloween is an annual holiday celebrated on October 31. It has roots in the Gaelic pagan festival of Samhain and the Christian holy day of All Saints. It is largely a secular celebration but some have expressed strong feelings about perceived religious overtones...
adaptation of
Orson WellesGeorge Orson Welles was an American film director, writer, actor and producer, who worked extensively in film, theatre, television, and radio. Welles was also an accomplished magician, starring in troop variety spectacles in the war years...
'
War of the WorldsThe War of the Worlds was an episode of the American radio drama anthology series Mercury Theatre on the Air. It was performed as a Halloween episode of the series on October 30, 1938 and aired over the Columbia Broadcasting System radio network. Directed and narrated by Orson Welles, the episode...
Weinstein also appeared in a remake of the broadcast in 1971 (rerun in 1998). During his 40 year career in Buffalo, Weinstein appeared in numerous theater productions and operated The Playhouse, a theater in downtown Buffalo in the early 1980s.
A WKBW-TV promo for Eyewitness News included a jingle with the lyrics:
- "Irv Weinstein, you're really a pro!
- Ya got all the news that we wanna know.
- You tell it like it is and never throw us a curve,
- Nobody says it like Ir-r-r-r-v !
- Eye-wit-ness News (Yes-sah!)"
The day of his retirement, December 31, 1998, was proclaimed "Irv Weinstein Day in Erie County" by the then Erie County Executive Dennis Gorski in recognition of Irv's contributions to the life of the community. Five days later, Toronto columnist
David FrumDavid J. Frum is a Canadian-born conservative journalist active in both the United States and Canadian political arenas. A former economic speechwriter for President George W. Bush, he is also the author of the first "insider" book about the Bush presidency...
wrote a tribute titled "He came from Buffalo" in Canada's
National PostThe National Post is a Canadian English-language national newspaper based in Don Mills, Ontario, a district of Toronto. The paper is owned by CanWest Global Communications and is published every Monday through Saturday...
newspaper. "The way the French feel about Jerry Lewis, that's how we feel about Irv Weinstein," Frum wrote. In October 2004, Weinstein's status as "an icon of television journalism in Buffalo" was discussed on the floor of the Ontario Legislature by MPP
Tim HudakTimothy "Tim" Hudak is a politician in Ontario, Canada, and is currently the Leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario. He also serves as member of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario for the riding of Niagara West—Glanbrook for the Progressive Conservative Party.-Background:Hudak...
.
http://hansardindex.ontla.on.ca/hansardeissue/38-1/l078b.htm
Weinstein and his wife, Elaine, currently reside in
Irvine, CaliforniaIrvine is an incorporated city in Orange County, California, United States. It is a planned city, mainly developed by the Irvine Company since the 1960s. Formally incorporated on December 28, 1971, the 69.7 square mile city has a population of about 212,793...
, where their daughter,
Beth KromBeth Krom is an Irvine, CA councilmember and former two-time mayor of Irvine. In March 2009, she announced her candidacy for congress for California's 48th congressional district against incumbent John B. T. Campbell III.-Family:...
, served two terms as mayor and now serves on the City Council. The Weinstein's son, Marc, is co-owner of the
Amoeba MusicAmoeba Music is an independent music chain with stores in Berkeley, San Francisco, and Hollywood, Los Angeles, California. Founded by former employees of nearby Rasputin Records, it opened on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley in 1990. The stores are unusually large given their independent status...
stores in Berkeley, San Francisco, and Hollywood, and younger daughter, Rachel, is an artist and theater administrator in the Pittsburgh area. Irv Weinstein also owns a part-time residence in
Ellicottville, New YorkEllicottville, New York is the name of two places in Cattaraugus County, New York:*Ellicottville , New York*Ellicottville , New YorkBoth locations are named after Joseph Ellicott, an agent for the Holland Land Company....
.
- Canadian-born actors Eugene Levy, Martin Short, John Candy, Mike Myers, and Jim Carrey grew up watching Eyewitness News with Irv Weinstein.
- Eugene Levy
Eugene Levy is a Canadian actor, television director, producer, musician and writer. He is known for his work in Canadian television series, American movies and television movies...
's "Earl CamembertEarl Camembert is a fictional news reporter and anchorman portrayed by Eugene Levy on the Canadian sketch comedy show SCTV, which aired in the 1970s and 1980s....
" character on SCTV is often compared to Weinstein (as well as Canadian broadcaster Earl CameronEarl Cameron was a Canadian broadcaster and was anchor of CBC's The National from 1959 to 1966.Cameron was born in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan and, as a student, found a summer job at a local radio station, CHAB...
), particularly in appearance.
- Actor Jim Carrey
James Eugene "Jim" Carrey is a Canadian-American actor and stand-up comedian. Carrey is best known for his performances as multiple characters in the sketch comedy show In Living Color, as the title character in Ace Ventura: Pet Detective and Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls, as the unlucky TV...
's character in Bruce AlmightyBruce Almighty is a American comedy film, directed by Tom Shadyac and written by Steve Koren, Mark O'Keefe and Steve Oedekerk. It stars Jim Carrey as Bruce Nolan, a down on his luck TV reporter who seeks a promotion and a better life overall. After a series of bad incidents, such as being beaten...
, Bruce Nolan, is reported to be partially based on a reporter at WKBW-TV who wanted to replace the retiring Irv Weinstein in 1999 and didn't get the job...and partly on real-life feature reporter Don Polec, who handled lighter and humorous features on WKBW during the 1970s but moved on to a 27-year career as feature reporter at ABC-owned WPVI in Philadelphia.
Irv Weinstein catchphrases
Weinstein was famous for his frequent use of
alliterationAlliteration is a literary or rhetorical stylistic device that consists in repeating the same consonant sound at the beginning of several words in close succession...
in his news stories. For instance:
- "Buffalo's boys in blue"
- "Pistol-packing punks"
- "Buffalo blaze-busters"
- "Sky-Scorcher"
The catch phrase "Topping tonight's Eyewitness News" was coined by Weinstein, and is in current use as part of a revived
Eyewitness Newsformat.
External links