Namesakes related to Penn State scandal face numerous challenges
The play-by-play announcer of the Baltimore Ravens strolled the sidelines prior to a pivotal National Football League game against the Steelers on a chilly Sunday evening in Pittsburgh on Nov. 6, 2011.
As he stood at Heinz Field, the sports broadcaster chatted amicably with the executive producer of NBC’s “Sunday Night Football.” Standing nearby was the former chairman of NBC Sports and Olympics, Dick Ebersol.
The announcer held out his hand to the esteemed television executive who was, according to The Sporting News, “The Most Powerful Person in Sports” in 1996. For any professional in this field, meeting Ebersol would be a great honor.
“Dick, pleasure to meet you. I’m Gerry Sandusky,” said the radio announcer.
At the mention of the name, Ebersol flinched.
For Gerry Sandusky, a broadcaster for 27 years and the sports director of WBAL-TV in Baltimore, this was just the beginning of a bizarre twist of fate that has tied him to a reviled criminal: The former Penn State defensive coordinator and now convicted child predator, Jerry Sandusky.
For Gerry Sandusky and several other people across the country, the events of November 2011 have changed the perception of their names. As a result of the child sex abuse scandal and allegations of a coverup by officials at Penn State, people who lived ordinary lives now carry a burden every day: They have the same names as those involved in the case.
Of course, this isn’t the first time a name has been made infamous by heinous criminals. American killer Jeffrey Dahmer tainted the name “Dahmer;” his younger brother David changed his last name and lives in anonymity. The name “Hitler” is known around the world to be synonymous with evil.
Adolf Hitler’s last blood relative, William Patrick Hitler, changed his name and disappeared after his uncle’s death at the end of World War II. British author David Gardner discovered William Patrick after he had died but revealed the story of his three sons in his 2001 book, “The Last of the Hitlers.” According to Gardner, William Patrick’s three sons, who were born in the United States, agreed to never marry or father children in order to ensure the end of the Hitler bloodline. The Hitler brothers, like the characters to follow, realized the impact of a name—it can carry an undesirable stigma.
‘Gerry with a G, still proud to be Sandusky’
Two letters separate the letters G and J in the modern English alphabet. But the difference between Gerry and Jerry, when spoken, is indistinguishable.
The English Spelling Society says a heterograph is a set of words that have the same sound, yet are spelled differently and have different meanings.
Gerry Sandusky’s name, right now, could well be the most unfortunate heterograph in the English language.
On Nov. 4, 2011, a 23-page grand jury presentment in Harrisburg described in graphic detail the allegations of child sexual abuse by former Penn State defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky.
On Nov. 4, 2011, Gerry Sandusky was on the road to Pittsburgh, in advance of Sunday’s Ravens-Steelers game. That night, he flicked on the local news in his hotel room. Like the rest of the country, he was appalled at what he saw. But he was stunned more than most.
“For a solid half-hour, I saw story after story about alleged heinous crimes with somebody whose name sounded exactly like mine,” Sandusky said. “By the end of that newscast, I wanted to throw up. And I realized, this is not going to go away for a long, long time.”
On June 22 of this year, Jerry Sandusky was found guilty on 45 of 48 charges of sexual molestation. The publicity surrounding the case ensured that the mere mention of the Sandusky name would evoke disgust from coast to coast.
Gerry Sandusky began his career at Miami’s WSVN-TV after graduating from Towson University near Baltimore in 1984. After four years as a sportscaster there, he returned to his native Baltimore and began anchoring sports for WBAL-TV 11, the city’s NBC affiliate. As the lead member of the Ravens broadcast team, he does play-by-play for WBAL 1090 AM and 98 Rock, and anchors the pre- and post-game coverage.
His profile page on WBALTV.com notes that he has won two Emmys and two Edward R. Murrow awards. But it doesn’t mention that he has the same name as a convicted child rapist.
Unable to escape the question, Sandusky pre-empts it. “Anywhere I go, I pretty much introduce myself as: ‘Gerry Sandusky, Gerry with a ‘G,’ still proud to be Sandusky, not related to the former Penn State coach.’ ”
He speaks without pausing, as if he’s repeated the phrase thousands of times. “I just get it out of the way right away, because I know as soon as people hear my name, they’re immediately going to wonder, ‘Wow, is this guy related to that guy?’ So I just try to answer the question before they can even ask it.”
People who have known Gerry Sandusky for years understand there’s no relation between him and the former Penn State coach. But search his name on Twitter, and you’ll find a population of misinformed people (or just bad spellers) who lash out against the wrong Sandusky.
“Every day I get tweets from people who invite me to rot in hell and hope bad things happen to me and presume that I’m related to him, or if not that guy,” Sandusky said.
Coincidentally, Gerry and Jerry’s paths have crossed. In 1986, while Gerry was working for WSVN in Miami, Penn State was preparing to play the University of Miami in the Fiesta Bowl for the national championship. Gerry flew to State College to interview Jerry.
The interview focused “on the crazy coincidence that we both had the same name, and football roots, and football backgrounds, and football families, but weren’t related,” Sandusky stressed.
But despite the problems that the name similarity has caused him in the last year, Gerry Sandusky realizes it’s not the end of the world.
“You get the choice,” he said. “You can either let it drive you crazy, you can feel like you’re being unfairly attacked, you can be a victim. Or you can just try to use it as a way to show people that the only thing in life you really get to control is how you react to things.”
Sandusky is the president of his own media consulting business, the Sandusky Group. On his website, he keeps a blog appropriately titled, “Gerry with a G.” In a post from Aug. 31, “The Best Reasons for Keeping the Worst Name in America,” Sandusky wrote that his children and wife have had to endure the jokes, the heckling and the stares that come with the name.
He said that changing his name would solve a lot of problems in the short term.
“But in the long term, each of us would know we had caved in to external pressure,” he said. “We had failed to stand up to the legacy that made us proud of the Sandusky name in the first place. We would know we took the easy way out.”
In the days following the news of the allegations, Gerry had to set the record straight to the online community. He tweeted, “A great big thank you to my late mom for choosing to spell my first name with a ‘G’.”
‘My doctor said I’m going to see Joe Paterno!’
It’s 4:09 on Friday afternoon when a physical therapist answers his phone. “Hi, is Mr. Paterno there?” a stranger asks on the other end.
“Yes, this is he,” says Joe Paterno, of Portland, Ore. “I’m still alive!”
The therapist isn’t bothered that he shares a name with the late Penn State coach. In fact, Joe Paterno is eager to talk about it.
This Paterno graduated from the University of Iowa in 1981 with a degree in physical therapy. Before the Sandusky child abuse scandal, Paterno benefited from the coach’s stellar reputation.
“I got all kinds of people coming in and saying, ‘Oh God, my doctor said I’m going to see Joe Paterno! And I was really excited,’ ” said Paterno.
After Jerry Sandusky was indicted on 40 charges of child molestation, Penn State’s Paterno faced criticism for not reporting to police what a graduate assistant had told him about Sandusky. The day before the university’s board of trustees fired him, Paterno said, “With the benefit of hindsight, I wish I had done more.”
The physical therapist Joe Paterno said that after everything happened, the perception of his name changed drastically.
“It went from this great connotation of ‘Gosh, I’m going to go see Joe Paterno, and isn’t he a great person, a great coach, so well respected,’ to all of a sudden, it’s not such a great association,” he said.
In July, former FBI director Louis Freeh’s report detailed scathing findings that accused Paterno – along with the athletic director, Tim Curley, and the university vice president of business and finance, Gary Schultz – of concealing allegations of child abuse in order to avoid bad publicity. The physical therapist Paterno doesn’t shy away from giving his opinion.
“I just want that name to be respected, because it’s my name,” said Paterno. “I have respect for Joe. Look at all the good things he’s done. A thousand good acts shouldn’t be overshadowed by one act with anybody’s life.
“People ask me the question, ‘How does it feel to have the name Joe Paterno after all that’s happened?’ I say it’s great. It’s still great. I still have a lot of respect for him. My usual response is, ‘Do you know anyone who hasn’t made any mistakes in their life? I’d like to meet them.’ ”
Over the years, Joe Paterno of Portland has heard comments everywhere he goes, whether he’s buying a suit (“Well, gosh, Joe Paterno shops at JC Penney’s, that’s really reassuring!”), or getting preferential treatment at the airport or when renting a car. Years ago, when his future wife’s grandmother heard the name Joe Paterno on television, she got a little concerned, having never met her soon-to-be grandson-in-law.
“She said, ‘Oh my goodness, my grand- daughter is marrying this man? He’s a little bit too old for her.’ ”
People ask him if he gets tired of being associated with the late football coach.
“Not at all,” Paterno said. “My grandfather’s name was Joe Paterno. I come from a line of Joe Paternos. The Latin translation of it is ‘our father.’ I mean, my kids even call me ‘JoePa.’ So, no, I don’t get tired of it. And it’s still a good thing.”
‘No, I’m not that guy’
Tim Curley was just about to take the steaks off the grill, when he answered the telephone on a Saturday evening—and politely said he would be glad to talk after dinner about a familiar topic.
A half-hour later, he talked about his last name.
“No, I’m not that guy,” Curley, a hospital worker from Ballston Spa, N.Y., told the caller.
Former athletic director Tim Curley is awaiting a January trial for perjury and failure to report allegations of child sexual abuse. But Tim Curley from Ballston Spa has never stepped foot on Penn State’s campus.
“It’s funny because I was in the Air Force with a Penn State grad, and he and I used
to kid around a little bit about me being the athletic director,” Curley said.
The kidding around ended in November. Before the scandal led every newscast across the country, Penn State’s Curley wasn’t widely known outside of State College and in the college sports community. In the days after the grand jury report, Curley’s name appeared on broadcasts and newspapers nationwide. In July, the Freeh Report alleged that Curley was one of the university administrators who showed disregard for the safety of children on Penn State’s campus.
Though it would be hard to be in two places at once, Tim Curley from Ballston Spa thought he should make it plainly obvious that he wasn’t the same guy.
“When the scandal came out, I went on Facebook right away and said, ‘I am not now and have never been the athletic director at Penn State.’ ”
Sandusky, Mich.: ‘Small town U.S.A.’
Not just people but whole towns can have heterograph problems when it comes to names.
When you meet someone, one of the first questions you ask is, “Where are you from?” For the 2,745 residents of Sandusky, Mich., the answer may come with a bit of uncomfortable discussion.
“There’s been jokes and everything else at other people’s expense and there’s no way to stop people from doing that,” said Sandy Miller, president of the Sandusky Chamber of Commerce. “Small town U.S.A., it’s really hard to get over that kind of stuff.”
Miller said the city is family-friendly and its mental health agency has won an award for excellence in its work with children.
“There are a lot of community sports events,” she said. “The Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts are very prevalent. It’s a kids-first community.”
The only thing Sandusky natives can do to restore their hometown’s good name is to promote the positives, said Miller. That can be hard to do, though, considering the stigma evoked by the town’s name.
“You know how people perceive things,” said Miller. “Just because your name is the same as someone else’s, you know that you automatically have one strike against you.”
