James "Jim" Lampley is an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 sportscaster

Sportscaster

In sports broadcasting, a commentator gives a running commentary of a game or event in real time, usually during a live broadcast. The comments are normally a voiceover, with the sounds of the action and spectators also heard in the background. In the case of television commentary, the commentator...

, news anchor, movie producer

Film producer

A film producer oversees and delivers a film project to all relevant parties while preserving the integrity, voice and vision of the film. They will also often take on some financial risk by using their own money, especially during the pre-production period, before a film is fully financed.The...

, and restaurant owner. Lampley has anchored a record 14 Olympic Games U.S. television broadcasts, most recently the 2008 Summer Olympics

2008 Summer Olympics

The 2008 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XXIX Olympiad, was a major international multi-sport event that took place in Beijing, China, from August 8 to August 24, 2008. A total of 11,028 athletes from 204 National Olympic Committees competed in 28 sports and 302 events...

 in Beijing, China.
Lampley was born in Hendersonville, North Carolina

Hendersonville, North Carolina

Hendersonville is a city in Henderson County, North Carolina, USA, southeast of Asheville. In 1900, 1,917 persons lived in Hendersonville; in 1910, 2,818; and in 1940, 5,381 people lived here. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 12,223, up fivefold in one century. It is the county...

. His father died when he was five. His mother immersed him in sports to make up for what she felt his father would have done. He was raised in Hendersonville and Miami, Florida

Miami, Florida

Miami is a city located on the Atlantic coast in southeastern Florida and the county seat of Miami-Dade County, the most populous county in Florida and the eighth-most populous county in the United States with a population of 2,500,625...

.

He graduated from the University of North Carolina

University of North Carolina

Chartered in 1789, the University of North Carolina was one of the first public universities in the United States and the only one to graduate students in the eighteenth century...

 in 1971 with a degree in English and finished coursework in 1974 for a Master in Mass Communications also at UNC but never wrote his thesis because his career took off.
In 1974, while in graduate school, he was chosen along with Don Tollefson in what ABC called a talent hunt.