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Potempa: TV weather gods Tom Skilling and Roger Triemstra in Munster Sunday

Chicagoland and Northwest Indiana audiences love their weather and media personalities from the arenas of TV and radio.

Among the “Kings of the Clouds” are Roger Triemstra and Tom Skilling, both the longtime channel fixtures and weather soothsayers of WGN.

Triemstra, 91, started at WGN in 1967 forecasting and predicting while sharing the same news desk as anchor John Drury. The now-slim and trim Skilling, who is still a broadcasting “weather or not” noted name for WGN TV and radio, he just celebrated his 70th birthday in February.

Skilling will be in Munster this weekend to fete his pal and mentor Triemstra at a book signing party event open to the public to celebrate the release of Triemstra’s just-published 204-page colorful autobiography “Cooler By the Lake: A Memoir” (2022 Bantry Bay Media $25). The event is from 1:30-3:30 p.m. Sunday in the Great Room, just off the main lobby of Hartsfield Village, 10000 Columbia Ave in Munster.

For more information or to call RSVP for the free event, which will include light refreshments and other great guests, call 219-836-3477. The books will only be available as a cash purchase. For anyone who is unable to attend, I’m told books are also available with a credit card option at www.rogertheweatherman.com or by calling 312-912-8639 for $33.95, which includes the shipping and handling.

“My longtime WGN colleague, the inimitable Rog Triemstra has written a terrific book which is an autobiographical look at his fascinating career,” Skilling said.

“It’s quite a book, beautifully done, with a treasure trove of photos, and I can tell you it’s a fun read. Rog shares fascinating insights into his work with legendary WGN radio personalities, including Wally Phillips, Bob Collins, Max Armstrong and Orion Samuelson, among so many others, and also the account of the love of his wife Gerrie and the Triemstra family.”

Skilling praises Triemstra’s career as both “fascinating and multi-faceted, extending well beyond the broadcast weather work, including years as a chemical engineer and as a military meteorologist, as well has his humble roots raised in a Dutch community in the Chicago suburbs.

“I can tell you I learned things about Rog Triemstra I didn’t know from his book, including his fascinating family background and how the Triemstra family came to settle in South Holland, Illinois,” Skilling said.

Sunday’s book event includes Triemstra’s daughter Cherie, as well as Skilling, and also Eddie Volkman, Chicago area radio personality and the son of late weather great Harry Volkman. Of course, Ed Volkman formerly hosted a long-running morning radio show in Chicago, “Eddie & JoBo,” on WBBM-FM B96. Accordion Maestro Frank Rossi will provide entertainment for Sunday’s book soiree.

Harry Volkman, who died at age 89 in August 2015, wrote and published his own 220-page paperback autobiography in April 2011 titled “Whatever the Weather: My Life & Times as a TV Weatherman” ($19.95), co-written with author Peter Schroeder.

At one time during his 55 years of forecasting weather on TV, Volkman carried the distinction of being affiliated with all of the major TV stations in Chicago, with the exception of ABC Channel 7. But he was most widely associated with his many years on CBS WBBM Channel 2. He joined WBBM in 1978, after two stints each at WMAQ, and yep, also WGN. Volkman is also credited in meteorology history as the first TV weatherman to issue a “tornado alert” during a broadcast in 1952 when he was doing the weather for a TV station in Tulsa, Okla.

Philip Potempa is a journalist, published author and the director of marketing at Theatre at the Center. He can be reached at pmpotempa@comhs.org.