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A 49-year career in television literally had Doug Wilson ’57 spanning the globe to bring viewers “the constant variety of sports."

Wilson covered more than 40 different sports for ABC's Wide World of Sports and helped produce 10 Olympic Games, rubbing elbows along the way with legends such as Muhammad Ali while working with Roone Arledge and others who changed the way Americans tune in to television.

Doug Wilson '57 won 17 Emmy Awards as a producer and director at ABC Sports.

Wilson earned 17 Emmy Awards during his career, and was honored in 1994 by the Directors Guild of America with its Lifetime Achievement Award in Sports.

He shares amazing stories and talks about his career in the latest episode (mp3) of Colgate Conversations, a series of podcast interviews with members of the Colgate community.

Wilson often worked with Ali, who appeared on Wide World of Sports more than 70 times. He was a close observer as the boxing legend began to transcend sports and become “a part of American history.”

Wilson joked that a person often associated with Ali’s early career, the brash sports announcer Howard Cosell, was the same off-camera as the “soft-spoken, modest, self-effacing guy you knew on the air.”

Wilson is credited with transforming how figure skating is televised, and he talks about covering Peggy Fleming at the 1968 Olympics, and how the gold medal she won vaulted her into America’s consciousness.

Wilson also was on hand for the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, at which Israeli athletes were killed after being taken hostage by Palestinian terrorists.

He talks about the incredible job sports announcer Jim McKay did in covering those harrowing events, and how he helped prepare McKay for a memorial service that was beamed around the world.

Wilson, an English major at Colgate, started his career as a page at NBC. He talks in the podcast about how cable television has dramatically changed the way sports are now covered.

Colgate alumni have played key roles in that evolution, including Ken Schanzer ‘66, president of NBC Sports; Drew Esocoff ‘79, who directs NBC Sunday Night Football; and Howard Katz ‘71, a top executive at NFL Films and former president of ABC Sports.

For more from Wilson’s discussion, go here (mp3).or see the Colgate Conversations page or iTunes page for download options.