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<\/p>\nFormer WINK News Chief Meteorologist Matt Devitt has been in the headlines a lot lately after his separation from the station. In addition to his time on TV, Devitt\u2019s huge social media following helped with his local celebrity status.<\/p>\n
While Devitt\u2019s future remains unknown, a lot of television personalities left quite an impression in the Southwest Florida TV market and went on to bigger and better things.<\/p>\n
Here are just a few.<\/p>\n
SHEPHERD SMITH VS. HODA KOTB<\/p>\n
According to a Sept 30, 2020, article in ADWEEK, Shepherd Smith (NNBC and Fox News) and former \u201cToday\u201d show host Hoda Kotb went \u201ctoe-to-toe\u201d in the Fort Myers market. <\/p>\n
It was the late 1980s, Smith worked for NBC affiliate WBBH and Kotb worked for CBS affiliate WINK. Both primarily covered crime.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe two were competitors back then, but respected one another\u2019s reporting, and knew exactly when the other was on a big story,\u201d the article reads. \u201cIn fact, their respective news directors called them out if one failed to beat the other.\u201d<\/p>\n
KERRY SANDERS<\/p>\n
Kerry Sanders is most famously known as a broadcast journalist for NBC (from 1991 until his retirement in 2023). <\/p>\n
A 1982 graduate of the\u00a0University of South Florida, Sanders worked at a number of Florida stations \u2013 including Jacksonville, Tampa and Miami. Most notably for us, he worked at WINK starting in 1983.<\/p>\n
Sanders later made a name for himself covering the ValuJet Flight 592\u00a0crash into the Everglades (May 11, 1996).<\/p>\n
CRAIG SAGER<\/p>\n
Craig Sager was a well-known sportscaster for\u00a0CNN\u00a0and its sister stations\u00a0TBS\u00a0and\u00a0TNT, from 1981 until his death in late 2016.<\/p>\n
Sager was a 2016 inductee of the Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame.\u00a0During the\u00a02017 NBA All-Star Game, he was named the \u00a0recipient of the\u00a0Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame\u00a0Curt Gowdy Media Award.<\/p>\n
Sager began his career in the mid-1970s as the\u00a0sports director for WINK. He is remembered for his \u201cenergetic\u201d broadcasting style.<\/p>\n
WILLARD SCOTT AND SANIBEL<\/p>\n
NBC weatherman Willard Scott\u00a0(1934\u20132021) was a\u00a0longtime winter resident of Sanibel, frequently visiting from 1988 until 2021. He was a regular at the\u00a0Lighthouse Caf\u00e9 and had a home on Captiva Island.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s best known for wishing viewers a happy birthday when they were 100 or more years old.<\/p>\n
FRANK NODINE, THE \u2018VOICE OF FORT MYERS\u2019<\/p>\n
Frank Nodine was perhaps the first local television celebrity. For 30 years, Nodine was the voice of Fort Myers. He was also the topic of a July 15, 2017, article in the News-Press by Cynthia A. Williams<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen WINK-TV went on air for the first time in 1954, the face that appeared on the small screens of the few television sets in Fort Myers was that of WINK\u2019s first announcer, Frank Nodine,\u201d Williams writes.<\/p>\n
Nodine remained at WINK for nearly two decades as a sports announcer, live-show host, program director, administrative assistant and finally as station manager and vice president.<\/p>\n
\u201cThen, after an absence of four years, he would return, first as an evening, weekend sports announcer on WINK-TV and then as the early morning deejay for WINK-AM. In other words, there is little, if anything, that Frank Nodine did not do over the roughly 30 years of his career in radio and television in Fort Myers.<\/p>\n
\u201cA frequent speaker at local clubs and the master of ceremonies at local events, Nodine became something of a celebrity in the small town he had made so thoroughly his home. He retired in 1984 and died 12 years later at the age of 71.\u201d<\/p>\n
Read all about his impressive life at the link on this page.<\/p>\n
Sources: \u00a0Wikipedia, ADWEEK, The News-Press and the Naples Daily News.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Journalist and author Hoda Kotb<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
Kerry Sanders is most famously known as a broadcast journalist for NBC (from 1991 until his retirement in 2023).<\/p>\n