Frank Glieber, a longtime voice of the Dallas Cowboys football team and a prominent CBS-TV and KRLD-Radio sports broadcaster, died Wednesday after suffering an apparent heart attack at a North Dallas athletic club.

Glieber, 51, was jogging at the Aerobics Center when he collapsed, a witness said.

For the last 22 years, Glieber had worked for CBS, where he was known for his calm, detached style -- and his versatility. He broadcast professional and college football, professional and college basketball, professional golf -- he covered the 17th hole at the Masters for the last 18 years -- and he was a contributing broadcaster to CBS's Sports Saturday and Sports Sunday.

Also, he had been sports director for KRLD, Dallas' all-news radio station, since 1970, and was involved in numerous sports programs for that station.

Glieber was hired in 1960, the Cowboys' inaugural season, to be the team's color commentator for KBOX radio. He worked play-by-play the next year, and in 1962 he went to CBS, where he usually worked Cowboys games.

Ever since, his voice has been closely associated with the Cowboys. He has been named Texas Sportscaster of the Year seven times.

"This is very difficult for me,' said Cowboys President Tex Schramm, one of Glieber's closest friends and the man who hired him to broadcast for the Cowboys in 1960. "Frank was here when I came, and we kind of started together. He's just always been so close to the Cowboys and so close to myself. It's hard to accept and believe. He was a total professional, and also a very, very sweet man. I loved him. It's just a tremendous loss.

"There's been no one like him in his business,' Schramm said, "because he was a person who was able to put his personality second to the event that he was covering. It's very difficult for people to do that nowadays, but he had that ability.'

"The greatest compliment I can give to Frank is that he was so professional that, more than anything else, he got out of the way of the event,' CBS Sports President Peter Lund said. "He never tried to be bigger than the event. Because of his quiet professionalism, it's only in the past couple of years that people in the industry and country have recognized Frank's abilities. We really viewed him as a guy who could do anything for us. No matter what the sport was, Frank was always there.

"And Frank was not only one of the most professional announcers I ever encountered, he was one of the nicest people I've ever known. Just a sweetheart. A gentle man.'

Glieber's last assignment for CBS was Saturday, when he broadcast the Los Angeles Lakers-Portland Trail Blazers NBA playoff game in Inglewood, Calif. He had been scheduled to broadcast another game in the Lakers-Blazers series Sunday in Portland. On Tuesday, the day before his death, he reported on the NFL draft from the Cowboys' offices for KRLD.

Glieber, who lived in Richardson, is survived by his wife, Kathy, and five children: John, Lynn, Robin, Craig and Mitchell.

The body was taken to the Sparkman-Hillcrest Funeral Home on Northwest Highway. The funeral is set for 10 a.m. Friday at Lovers Lane United Methodist Church.

Glieber had played high school football and basketball in his native Milwaukee, and in 1952 he received an academic scholarship to Northwestern University, where he briefly played varsity basketball.

Published in the Dallas Morning News on 5-02-1985.

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GLIEBER, FRANK (1934–1985). Frank Glieber, sports announcer, was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on April 5, 1934. After graduating in 1956 with a bachelor's degree from Northwestern University, he moved to Dallas, Texas, and became one of the most famous voices in Texas sports. Except for two years in Cleveland, he spent his entire career in the Dallas area working in both television and radio. He began as an announcer for the Highland Park High School football team and the Dallas Eagles, a minor-league baseball team, and eventually became the sports director for KRLD radio, where he did the play-by-play announcing for Southwest Conference basketball games. He worked for local news shows and served as the telecast announcer for the Texas Rangers. In 1960 he was the original radio color commentator for the Dallas Cowboys and became the voice associated with the team. He also hosted four weekly television shows that dealt with either the Cowboys or the National Football League. He worked his way up by 1963 to a position with CBS, where he worked for twenty-two years. As a CBS commentator he covered the seventeenth hole of the Masters' Golf Tournament for eighteen years, as well as National Basketball Association games, professional tennis, and NFL football. While with the network, Glieber, with no prior experience announcing these sports, covered professional tennis, bowling, and golf. He would accept assignments for sports he had never covered because he thought there was always enough time to prepare adequately. Before announcing his first tennis match he had to consult colleagues on the system of scoring.

Glieber was well respected by his colleagues, who admired his versatility and detachment. He was named the Texas Sportscaster of the Year seven times. He was often used by CBS to break in new announcers, such as Dick Vermeil and John Madden. At the height of his career Glieber worked sixteen-hour days and established his own corporation, based in his home. He refused to sign a major network contract because he enjoyed being involved with sports on the local level; in his own words, he liked living "on the fringe" of the network rat race. He was also a committed family man who, despite his intense schedule, always found time to attend his sons' football games. Glieber was nicknamed "the Round Mound of Sound" because of his portliness. On May 1, 1985, he collapsed and died of an apparent heart attack. He was survived by his fourth wife, Kathleen, and his five children. He is buried at Hillcrest Memorial Park in Dallas.

Credit: Published by the TSHA (Texas State Historical Association)

KRLD Reporter Who Covered the JFK Assassination

Frank was said to be a spectacularly gifted sports reporter, and was later the KRLD Sports Director, but was pressed into service by KRLD (CBS-Dallas), along with young cub reporter, Wes Wise (later, the Mayor of Dallas), to cover the Kennedy Motorcade at Love Field, and along the Motorcade Route.

In the 2013 book, "Reporting the Kennedy Assassination: Journalist Who Were There Recall Their Experiences" by Laura Hlavach & Darwin Payne (Editor), KRLD reporter, Bob Huffaker, recounts:

"We at KRLD had planned our coverage to begin at Love Field. There Frank Glieber and Wes Wise began. Frank described the arrival of Air Force One, and Wes then took up the broadcast at Lemmon and Inwood. He described the motorcade at that location."

Glieber is captured in color footage by an unknown cameraman, with a still camera in hand, atop the KRLD Mobile Unit at Love Field. He was not called to testify before the Warren Commission, but is mentioned once in the Warren Report, where his name is mispelled "Gleiber" (so if you are searching for him you have to search under both spellings). According to the Warren Commission Testimony of a Dallas KLIF Radio reporter, Russell Lee Moore, Glieber was a KRLD reporter who did double duty as "both a Sports and News reporter". This was typical of news offices across Dallas and Fort Worth, for the Kennedy visit - every available reporter, photographer and cameraman was pressed into service some being used for coverage they wouldn't normally be assigned. Another example is the Women's/Society Page photographer, Doris Jacoby (memorial#: 106756903) , who was sent to Love Field to cover Mrs. Kennedy, but after the assassination was sent to Parkland, with her camera where she's seen photographing the grieving spectators. Her main coverage was to have been the genteel Luncheon at the Trade Mart, which would have had a staring place on the Women's page.

Rest in Peace...

~Linda (48291572)