Yes, his real name is Charlevoix
Yes, his name is REALLY Joe Charlevoix.
“My last name was never an issue when I was growing up in the Upper Peninsula because my dad is the sheriff of Dickinson County,” said Joe, a well-known meteorologist with TV 7&4 and a Cherryland Electric Cooperative member.
“But once I started working in Traverse City and people saw my last name of Charlevoix, they assumed I got it from the northern Michigan town of the same name,” he said. “In fact, I heard early on that some people in Charlevoix weren’t real happy with me because they thought that was my TV name.”
It isn’t.
The irony is that there is no pretense at all about the 29-year-old Charlevoix. He is down-to-earth and friendly, always ready with a smile.
“I guess that just ties back to my growing up in the U.P.,” he said. “That’s the way my parents raised me.”
At an early age, Joe was fascinated with the weather.
“I think the turning point for me was age four,” he said with a smile. “My mom and I were caught in a bad thunderstorm. Tree branches were flying everywhere. From that point on, I was mesmerized by the weather.”
So much so that he brought his weather drawings into kindergarten. Beginning in sixth grade, he was the weather watcher for the Norway area for the local TV station. When his favorite weatherman for a TV station in Marquette announced he was leaving, Joe cried.
When he got to high school, he played basketball, ran cross country, played saxophone in the band and was his senior class president at Norway High School. But he remained fascinated by the weather.
“At lunch during high school we’d go over to a friend’s house to eat and watch Sports Center,” he said. “But even though I’m a huge sports fan, my buddies watched that and I went into another room and watched the Weather Channel.”
After high school, Joe attended college at Valparaiso University in Indiana. He majored in broadcast meteorology and interned in Chicago with WGN-TV chief meteorologist Tom Skilling, who became his mentor.
His first job out of college was for a small TV station in Calumet.
“But after 9-11, the station closed and I was out of work,” Joe said. “Luckily, I got a call after that from (news director) Doug DeYoung here at 7&4. I’ve been here five years and I love it.”
Charlevoix’s day is not typical of your everyday Joe.
His alarm wakes him up at 2:30 a.m. and he’s in to work at 3:30 putting together graphics and forecasts for the 7&4 morning show that runs from 5:30 to 7 a.m.. He does “cut in” forecasts when the Today Show is on breaks and then he has a forecast on the 11 a.m. local show. He walks out the door around noon.
“We cover a huge geographic area, one of the largest for a TV station east of the Mississippi River,” he said. “So while there might be a storm in one part of our coverage area, the sun might be shining in the other part. It’s a real challenge.”
Joe is part of a three-person team at TV 7&4 that includes chief meteorologist Greg MacMaster and Jayne Smith. In a sense, they are his extended family.
His real family, however, is tight-knit and still lives in Norway. His father Don is the longest serving sheriff in Dickinson County history. His mother Teresa is a third grade teacher at Kingsford. His 21-year-old sister Holly is in U.S. Army military intelligence.
“My parents are great people,” said Joe. “Our family is real close.”
They had to be to get through what he calls his toughest stretch of life.
That’s when his 20-year-old sister Crystal, who had Downs Syndrome, died in 2003. A few months later, Joe’s residence burned down in Traverse City. The day after the fire, as his father was coming from the U.P. to help, he got into a traffic accident near Kalkaska that totaled the car.
“Luckily Dad was all right,” said Joe. “But I lived out of my suitcase for 11 months after that. The people I work with and my bosses at 7&4 were absolutely wonderful. They helped get me through that time.”
Now, he says, his biggest challenge is providing an accurate forecast every day.
“I try to keep my opinion out of it when I report the weather,” he said. “I state the facts. I realize you can’t please everyone. But I get a lot of e-mails about the weather and I really love inter-acting with our viewers.”
Even the ones who want to know more about the Charlevoix name then the Charlevoix weather.
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