For old-timers....the true star of Orlando weather....
Charles Stump
Meteorologist Charles Stump was arguably Orlando’s first TV news star. He spent nine years at WESH and six at WFTV before he died of a heart attack in 1975. In the late ’60s and early ’70s, when no one watched Channel 9, the station used to lead its 6 p.m. newscast with 10 minutes (including two commercial breaks) of Stump’s weather. He had this three-sided map that would rotate for local, state and national maps. All the numbers and little sunshines were magnetic. Eventually the magnetism wore off, and if you tapped the board “just so”… everything would fall off. It was great sports to do this to Charlie at 5:59 and listen to him squall. In addition to being an AMS approved meteorologist, he was also WFTV’s business manager after serving as personnel and public relations director.
TV Trivia: Stump was the first meteorologist to appear on TV in Florida, starting out at WSUN in Tampa in 1953 after leaving the Air Force. He jumped to WTVT-Channel 13 in Tampa in 1955 to help start that’s station’s weather service. He then moved to WESH in 1960.
When my family moved from south Florida to Cocoa Beach in late 1963, we began to watch perhaps Central Florida's leading television news star, Charlie Stump. Charlie delivered the weather in a continuous monotone. No, he was not **** to anybody, perhaps but for his wife. But he was the first weatherman (there were no women) who was a true meteorologist. In the mid-1960's, when I would go to visit friends at UF in Gainesville, I found out that the Orlando stations were picked up in Gainesville, and that Charlie was a popular television pastime even among UF students. Every night at 11 pm students would gather in the dorm TV rooms and fraternity houses to watch Charles Stump do the weather.
He would drone on in this monotone, no, he was
not ****, but he was authoritative. Most in Florida during that era had never seen a real meteorologist doing the weather report. And yet backwater central Florida had first rate expert weather predictions that far surpassed the forgettable weather readers in Miami.
We never saw his butt, we have no idea if he had thick thighs, but we knew we could trust him.
We salute your memory, Charlie Stump!
Meteorologist Charles Stump was arguably Orlando’s first TV news star. He spent nine years at WESH and six at WFTV before he died of a heart attack in 1975. In the late ’60s and early ’70s, when no one watched Channel 9, the station used to lead its 6 p.m. newscast with 10 minutes (including two commercial breaks) of Stump’s weather. He had this three-sided map that would rotate for local, state and national maps. All the numbers and little sunshines were magnetic. Eventually the magnetism wore off, and if you tapped the board “just so”… everything would fall off. It was great sports to do this to Charlie at 5:59 and listen to him squall. In addition to being an AMS approved meteorologist, he was also WFTV’s business manager after serving as personnel and public relations director.
