George Retzlaff has never won a bowling tournament, has never been involved as an executive of a bowlers’ or a proprietors’ organization, but his name is recognized across the country by people involved in bowling. George Retzlaff is the man who first thrust the image of 5 pin bowlibg on the screens of Canadian television. In his position as Executive Producer of CBC-TV Sports, he recognized that a bowling show would have a wide audience and would provide excitement and entertainment to Canadians everywhere.
Retzlaff arrived in Canada from Europe at the age of 4, when the family emigrated to Canada and bought a farm in Saskatchewan. The Retzlaff family soon moved to Winnipeg, where George went to Daniel McIntyre High School. He had a part time job as a truck driver after school hours and at night attended a drama course and soon was receiving parts on radio. Later, he transferred into the technical end and became chief operator of CJRC in Winnipeg. After the war, George moved to Toronto to CFRB, but then moved back to Winnipeg where he joined the CBC in 1948.
He returned to Toronto in 1951 with the CBC and got a job as a camera man. As television progressed, Retzlaff was assigned to look after the British Empire Games in Vancouver in 1954.
Around this time, he became interested in bowling as a continuing program with the national network. He helped develop a format that created bowling stars and the sport of bowling received its greatest exposure during the early 1960’s. Retzlaff’s keen sense of nuances and intricacies of bowling made the program constantly entertaining.
Even though 5 pin bowling is not currently appearing on the CBC, George Retzlaff has retained a keen interest in the game and has maintained friendships developed over the years with bowlers and proprietors.
His two daughters, Judy and Janet are now adults. He enjoys semi-classical and classical music and likes to read, preferring historical books to fiction. An energetic and enthusiastic man, George’s interest in bowling has been most encouraging to the Industry. He is putting forth great effort to bring bowling back th CBC television and everyone honouring George tonight hopes his efforts will be crowned with success.