Doug Wilson

Doug Wilson, a 17-time Emmy winner and an inductee in the Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame, spanned the globe with ABC Sports for half a century. A 1957 graduate of Colgate University, he began his career in television as an NBC page in New York. He moved to ABC the following year. Starting at ABC’s Wide World of Sports as an associate director in 1963, Wilson covered 51 different sports across five continents at events ranging from figure skating in Beijing, to wrist-wrestling in Petaluma, to auto racing on the streets of Monaco, to Ping-Pong Diplomacy in Detroit.

Wilson also participated in the production of ten Olympic Games telecasts, beginning with Innsbruck, Austria in 1964. At the Calgary Games in 1988, he directed the world feed for the figure skating competition and the Closing Ceremony. In 1996, Canadian Television invited Wilson to direct the television coverage of the World Figure Skating Championships in Edmonton, Alberta. He became recognized world-wide as the premier director in figure skating.

Wilson won 17 Emmys and was honored by the Directors Guild of America in 1994 with its Lifetime Achievement Award in Sports. He was also honored by the Joseph P. Kennedy Foundation for his production of the 1979 International Special Olympics. In 1995, the United States Figure Skating Association presented Wilson with its Spirit of Giving Award, and he was inducted into the United States Figure Skating Hall of Fame in 2003. In 2019, Doug was inducted into the Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame.

Over the past decade, Wilson has performed “An Evening with Doug Wilson,” a one-man show about his 50-year odyssey with ABC Sports, at various venues around the county. Wilson has also guest lectured at Colgate University, Ithaca College, the University of Southern California, the U.S. Naval War College, William and Mary, and American University.

Wilson has three sons and three step-children, and lives in Irvington and Saugerties, New York with his wife, Betsy. They have eight grandchildren.

www.DougWilsonABCSports.com