Carl Kasell has died

Cafe Society
1

I’m bummed.

2

Aww man… There goes my chance to get his voice on my answering machine. :frowning:

3

I wondered if that was why they changed the prize on WWDTM to “anyone on this show’s voice”. :frowning:

4

Oh no!!

5

this list various honors he received. Andy Griffith was a high school teacher for Carl.

http://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/article209144054.html

6

Sad news. I hope he didn’t feel miffed by the aforementioned ‘any voice’ change on Wait Wait. (Possibly he’d been in poor health for a while and that’s why the change was made.)

7

I’ll have to listen to Wait Wait this weekend for the tribute…

8

I heard that the other day. :frowning:

9

Bummer. We went to a WWDTM taping when he was still on the show, and he was amazing. What a voice!

10

By the way, at the end of the article Bayard linked to, there are a handful of actual voice mail greetings he recorded for WWDTM winners. The guy really had quite a sense of humor.

11

Damn. :frowning:

12

And before that, he was the voice of “Morning Edition”.

RIP, Carl.

13

What really surprised me was the statement in the article that he died from “complications from Alzheimer’s disease.”

I have been around a few Alzheimer’s patients (including my Mother) and they could not have maintained a broadcast routine like Carl had within a week or two of his death. It doesn’t make sense to me, but I guess every Alzheimer’s patient’s experience is unique.

He was a real asset to WWDTM and he will be missed. I hope the show does an appropriate send-off.

14

I’m not sure what you mean. Carl retired from newscasting in 2009 and from WWDTM in 2014. I don’t believe he was working in the last week or two. :confused:

15

Carl Kassel left Wait, Wait in 2014. He continued to do the “voice prize” for a while longer.

16

I apologise. I thought he was still on WWDTM.

My mistake.

17

Unfortunately, no. Bill Kurtis has been the scorekeeper since 2014.

18

And, as mentioned above, they recently changed the prize from “Carl Kassel’s voice on your voicemail” to “the voice of anyone on the show on your voicemail.” I wondered at the time if that change happened because Carl’s health was going downhill. Sorry to see that I was right.