Ken Squier
Kenley Dean "Ken" Squier (born April 10, 1935) is an American sportscaster and motorsports editor from Waterbury, Vermont. From 1979-1997, he served as the lap-by-lap commentator for NASCAR on CBS, and was also a lap-by-lap commentator for TBS from the time they had rights to NASCAR until 2000. Squier was the first announcer to give lap-by-lap commentary for the Daytona 500 in 1979. He coined the term "The Great American Race" for the Daytona 500 and developed the in-car camera for the 1982 running of the event. He lives in Stowe, Vermont.
Sports announcing career
Early career
Squier's father, Lloyd, owned and operated WDEV in Waterbury, Vermont, and Ken began his on-air work at age 12 (when Lloyd Squier died in 1979, Ken Squier inherited the station and remains its principal owner and CEO). Squier's racing announcing career began when he announced a stockcar race from the back of an old logging truck at a tiny dirt track in Vermont at age 14. He was the announcer at Mallets Bay and the Northeastern Speedway as well as the Monadnock Speedway in the 1950s. In 1960 he opened Thunder Road International SpeedBowl, the Barre, Vermont, quarter-mile oval that he still owns.