There is perhaps no person more singularly responsible for the Rose Bowl’s place in the lore of American culture than Keith Jackson. It was Jackson, after all, who dubbed the Granddaddy of Them All as, well, the Grandaddy of Them All.
Now, Jackson will get his own statue outside of the most historic venue in our nation’s favorite sport.
According to the NBC affiliate in Los Angeles, the Rose Bowl Legacy Foundation and the Pasadena City Council on Monday approved plans to place a statue of Jackson outside the Rose Plaza near the stadium’s south entrance. His will join statues of Jackie Robinson and Brandi Chastain.
Jackson died on Jan. 12, 2018, at the age of 89. Fundraising for the statue began shortly after his passing.
The Jackson statue could be in place as early as December, in time for the 106th edition of the Rose Bowl Game.
Jackson holds the records for most Rose Bowls called with 15, ahead of Mel Allen, Curt Gowdy and Brent Musburger, who all called the game 12 times. (Kirk Herbstreit, who turned 50 earlier this month, has already served as color commentator for 11 Rose Bowls.)
The 1952 Rose Bowl, a 40-7 Illinois win over Stanford, was the first college football game broadcast to a national audience, and has remained a network television event ever since. Jackson called his first Rose Bowl in 1989, when ABC took over rights from NBC, and remained the game’s voice almost continuously through 2006. Among his most memorable Rose Bowls were Ohio State’s denial of an Arizona State national championship in 1997, Michigan clinching a share of the national title in 1998 and Vince Young‘s epic performances in 2005 and ’06.
Jackson was inducted into the Rose Bowl Hall of Fame in 1999, and he’s also a member of the the Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame, the National Sportscasters Association Hall of Fame, the NSSA Hall of Fame and the Southern California Sports Broadcasters Hall of Fame. The Rose Bowl’s broadcasting center was named in his honor in 2015.
