It only takes one heart to change the world. That’s something Jerre Gowdy, wife of famous sports announcer Curt Gowdy, truly believed, and it was the force behind all of her charity work, whether in Boston, Palm Beach, Florida, or Wyoming.
Born Geraldine Ophelia Dawkins, Gowdy died on Jan. 27, surrounded by her family at her home in Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts. She was 101.
Throughout her life, Jerre strove to be that one heart for her corner of the world, contributing her time and talents to multiple medical charities with a particular focus on researching children’s diseases, as well as contributions to the arts and culture.
She was chairwoman of the American Heart Ball for the American Heart Association and held positions with the New England Baptist Hospital League, the Lahey Clinic, the Jimmy Fund, Schepens Eye Research Institute of Massachusetts, the Boston Repertory Theatre Company, and the Boston Ballet.
She also chaired a gala as tribute to famous conductor Arthur Fiedler of the Boston Pops Orchestra.
In Wyoming, her efforts focused on additions to Curt Gowdy State Park, her husband’s namesake park, a stunning 3,500-acre sportsman’s paradise that lies exactly halfway between Cheyenne and Laramie.
Her efforts included helping create a new multimillion dollar visitor’s center that opened at the park in 2013, thanks to money she helped raise alongside family friend Johnny Morris, who is founder of Bass Pro Shops.
The family also started its Curt Gowdy State Park Family Fund about that time, with Cheryl serving as senior advisor and her brothers, Curt Jr. and Trevor serving as co-advisors, to focus on more additions to the park.
More recently in 2023, Jerre traveled to Wyoming in person, at the age of 99, to help celebrate the grand opening of a children’s center at the park, Little House on the Park, in person with her daughter Cheryl Gowdy.
On The Edges Of A Dream
Little House seeks to teach children about love and kindness, and spread those lessons statewide, as a Curt Gowdy family legacy.
The morning of Little House’s grand opening, Jerre told Cowboy State Daily she’d had a dream about the log cabin with its beautiful, reclaimed beetle wood and fossilized stone fireplace.
What struck Jerre about the cabin in this dream was just how solidly constructed this cabin she had traveled all the way to Wyoming to see really was.
Architects had told her many times as Little House was being built that it would last forever.
Waking from her dream that morning, ahead of a daylong event to gift the cabin to Wyoming, there was just one wish in her heart, she said. It was that Little House would welcome all people for a long time to come, and that it would always bring them great joy.
Jerre herself shared her own great joy that day. She raised her hands up high to wave a Wyoming flag across the sky, a signal for all the children to gather behind her for a kindness parade.
Bluebirds — Curt Gowdy’s favorite bird — flew around the edges of all this commotion, not quite chased away by crowds or the gathering of rain clouds in the sky.
Inside Little House, the children knew just what to do, and neither Jerre nor Cheryl could hide their smiles as the children busied themselves coloring up kindness pages and gathering up as many large spinning top toys as their arms could carry to try out on a hearth of fossilized stone.
About Curt Gowdy State Park
Curt tells the story of how his sportscasting career began in a humble, unmarked parking lot in his autobiography, “Cowboy at the Mike,” where he called a six-man game of football for a team that had no roster or jerseys.
Curt rose to the occasion, improvising with names he made up on the spot for them, doing well enough he was offered a job of $30 weekly at a Cheyenne radio station to call more games.
This was 1943, and he was recovering from a spinal operation that had ended his dreams of becoming a fighter pilot, so he took the job.
After Wyoming, he landed in Oklahoma City, calling football games for University of Oklahoma, where the world would ultimately discover his considerable talent.
Curt would go on to work for ABC, NBC, and CBS and would win 13 Emmys and a Peabody award.
He has been inducted to 25 halls of fame as well, and he was also host of ABC’s award-winning "The American Sportsman" for more than 20 years, a show in which the Cody native frequently mentioned Wyoming.
Granite State Park, meanwhile, was the boyhood stomping ground when he was growing up in Cheyenne, something he also talks about in his autobiography.
When Curt Gowdy decided to return home for a visit in 1972, state officials decided to rename Granite State Park to Curt Gowdy State Park.
With 3,500 acres, an average of 7,500 feet in elevation, three reservoirs, and 35 miles of stunning, beautiful trails, it’s easy to see why he so loved the area as a boy.
He counted it among the highest honors in his life to have his state rename his favorite, boyhood stomping ground after him.
Blind Dates Can Be Beautiful After All
Jerre met Curt on a blind date during a college media night when he was just starting out in Oklahoma City as a sports broadcaster. She was attending the University of Oklahoma, where she was a talented violinist, tap dancer and honor student.
She would ultimately complete a master’s degree in communications.
It was love at first sight for the couple, who married June 24, 1949, at the Presbyterian Church in New York City on Park Avenue. There, her television communications skills paid off, as she prepped the Kraft Food national commercials. She was also an actress on the weekly Kraft Television Theatre.
They would have three children together. The first, in 1951, was Cheryl, who is the oldest. She was born in New York City. The other two, both born in Boston, were Trevor and Curt Jr., also in the early 1950s.
“Through 56 years of marriage, he repeatedly said Jerre was the most beautiful girl in Oklahoma,” Cheryl said.
That’s the same thing he would tell anyone who asked.
“I married the most beautiful girl in Oklahoma,” he told the Palm Beach Post in 2000. “Three wonderful kids, Yankees, Red Sox, presidents, Olympics, champs and championships, movie stars, Bing Crosby, fishing the Florida Keys, New Zealand, back home in Wyoming. What a time. Can’t beat it.”
Curt died on Feb. 20, 2006 at the age of 86.
Proud To Be Curt’s Wife
Among Jerre’s other many accomplishment, she served as president of the Curt Gowdy Broadcasting corporation from 1963 to 1980, moving to Palm Beach, Florida, with her husband in 1974. Their radio network included six stations, including KCGY FM in Laramie.
In Palm Beach, Jerre continued her philanthropic efforts, sharing those duties with her daughter Cheryl. These included Children’s Home Society, the oldest adoption service in Florida, the Gulf Stream Boy Scouts, and Do the Zoo (West Palm Beach.)
During the Little House celebration at Curt Gowdy State Park in 2023, Jerre took a few moments to speak. One of the first things she told the crowd was simply, “I’m so proud to be the wife of Curt Gowdy.”
Cheers went up around the room and Jerre smiled back, her eyes glistening as she was overcome with emotion.
When the noise died down enough, she thanked everyone for coming to share a moment of joy with her, before handing the mic back to her daughter, Cheryl.
A gracious and kind lady, to the end.
Funeral Details
Relatives and friends have been invited to attend Jerre’s funeral services at 10 a.m. Feb. 7 at St. John’s Episcopal Church, 705 Hale Street in Beverly Farms, Massachusetts.
Burial will follow at Mount Auburn Cemetery, Cambridge, with arrangements by Campbell Funeral Home, 525 Cabot Street in Beverly Farms.
In lieu of flowers, the family has asked for donations to Curt Gowdy State Park Family Fund, Donor Advisory fund/Wyoming Community Foundation, 1472 N. 5th St., Suite 201, Laramie, Wyoming, 82072, which is a nonprofit.
Gowdy is survived by her daughter Cheryl of Palm Beach and Boston; son Curt Jr. and his wife Karen of New Canaan, Conn.; son Trevor and his wife GG of Beverly Farms, Mass.; five grandchildren and four great grandchildren.
Renée Jean can be reached at renee@cowboystatedaily.com.
