Greg Kerr’s retirement from Texas TV lasted less than three months. The veteran anchor, who signed off in Amarillo in July after announcing the end of his 43-year broadcasting career, is already back on the air.
KCEN announced Wednesday that Kerr has joined the Tegna-owned NBC affiliate in Temple as its newest morning anchor.
Morning anchor Lindsay Liepman introduced Kerr to Central Texas viewers Wednesday. Kerr said the move brings him closer to familiar territory: He grew up in Dallas, spending his youth in the Oak Cliff and South Dallas neighborhoods, and previously worked in Austin.
A few years ago, Kerr said, he and his wife, Sheryl, began considering where they wanted to settle eventually and landed on Central Texas.
“5 am comes quickly, but I’m back at it!” Kerr wrote on social media. “I’ve joined Lindsay Liepman and the KCEN morning team in the Waco/Temple market.”
Kerr thanked his wife for her “love, encouragement and support,” calling his return to the newsroom a “‘major’ life decision.”
The quick comeback immediately caught the attention of followers who remembered his retirement announcement.
“What happened to retirement?” one person commented.
“That was a short retirement,” another wrote.
Kerr announced in June that he was leaving NewsChannel 10 in Amarillo after more than four decades in TV news and sports. He had spent four and a half years anchoring the station’s evening newscasts and said at the time that he and Sheryl planned to move to the Austin area. His final day was July 2.
Before leaving, Kerr helped introduce his successor, Dan Joseph, who took over NewsChannel 10’s 5, 6 and 10 p.m. newscasts.
Kerr’s television career began in 1983 as a sports anchor at KLST in San Angelo. His stops over the following decades included stations in Texas, Illinois, Oklahoma and North Carolina, as well as FOX Sports Southwest. In 2012, he returned to Austin’s KTBC as a morning news anchor, beginning his transition from sports into full-time news.
At KCEN, Kerr joins a morning team that recently lost longtime anchor Jasmin Caldwell. Caldwell left the station in August after nine years, then resurfaced weeks later at competing Central Texas station KWTX-TV as an anchor and reporter.
Chron has reached out to Kerr for comment.
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This article originally published at Veteran Texas anchor makes surprise comeback after brief retirement.