Longtime Reds fans will recognize the name Lou Rainone, producer-director of Reds games when WLWT-TV (Channel 5) was the Reds flagship station until the mid 1990s.
Rainone died last week in Colorado at age 78, after a five-year battle with Alzheimer' disease.
Services will be Aug. 13 at Epiphany United Methodist Church in Loveland.
Channel 5's Rainone, Bill Spiegel and Ken Fouts trained a generation of TV directors and producers from the late 1960s, through the Big Red Machine era (when NBC used Channel 5 staffers for the baseball "Game of the Week"), until the mid 1990s.
A Canadian citizen, Rainone came to Cincinnati in 1966 from CKLW-TV in Windsor, Ontario, to direct WLWT-TV's 6 and 11 p.m. newscasts. Later that year, Fouts was hired from Detroit to direct Reds games and other Channel 5 sports. They became lifelong friends.
When Fouts joined NBC Sports full-time in 1974, Rainone stepped down from being Channel 5 production manager to take Fouts' place in the Reds TV truck as producer-director.
Rainone also freelanced for NBC Sports as a director, and eventually went full-time freelance to direct sports for different networks and companies until retiring about 15 years ago.
Visitation will be 9:30 a.m. before the 10 a.m. services on Saturday, Aug. 13, at Epiphany United Methodist Church, 6635 Loveland-Miamiville Road, Loveland. The family suggests that memorials be made to the Alzheimer's Association.
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