“He actually got remarried to a song leader.”įreeze, whose primary residence is in New York City, owns a home in Alpine. After nearly two decades of marriage, they divorced. “But it was not a fairy-tale ending,” she said. While cheering for BYU in 1993, she met and married the guy inside the Cosmo the Cougar mascot suit, who later became a yell leader. She made the squad and transferred to BYU. I really enjoyed it there.”Īt that point, her parents moved back to Provo with her four younger sisters, and her mother encouraged her to try out for the BYU cheer squad.
“It was a fantastic experience,” she said. But, at the time, BYU didn’t allow freshman on the cheer squad, so she got a cheerleading scholarship at Weber State and headed to Ogden. And every once in a while, when I get a little tired, that starts to come back.”įreeze was a high school cheerleader, and she wanted to go west and keep cheering in college. It was such a great place to grow up,” she said.
“And when I was 6 weeks old, they bundled me up and took me to Indiana.” She grew up in southern Indiana - in Jeffersonville, across the Ohio River from Louisville, Kentucky. Her parents met, married and became parents while they were at BYU. “The family joke is my grandmother wouldn’t let him go to Kent State because she thought he’d get shot, so he went to BYU and shot himself.” “And my dad shot himself in the leg,” Freeze said. He hadn’t been there long when he and a group of othrr young men went “up in the mountains” where they were doing “quick draw” with handguns. So her father went to BYU to play freshman football. They don’t let the Mormon kids do anything out there,’” Freeze said. “And my grandmother’s friends said, ‘You know what? You should send him to Utah. He was thinking about Kent State, but his mother didn’t want him to go there after four students were shot and killed during anti-war protests earlier that year. Her father, Bill, was raised in Indiana, and in 1970 was looking for a college where he could play football. Her mother, Linda, is from Provo, and is the descendant of pioneers who crossed the plains. “I am a BYU baby!” Freeze said with a laugh.
Then it was on to New York, where she was a meteorologist at ABC-owned WABC - and sometimes filled in on “Good Morning America.” Utah-born, Indiana-raised
Then it was on to NBC-owned WCAU in Philadelphia, where she was both a meteorologist and co-host of a weekday entertainment show - and sometimes filled in on “The Today Show.” In Chicago, she was the first female chief meteorologist at WFLD. She earned a bachelor’s degree in geosciences from Mississippi State University in severe weather and forecasting, and a master’s degree in environmental sciences from the University of Pennsylvania.Īfter Portland, she moved to Denver, where she worked at both KWGN and KMGH. You’re going to get the opportunity.’ But I didn’t listen. You don’t need to keep taking the classes. “I really enjoyed it.” When she asked one of the KPTV executive producers if she could have some time off for midterms, “he said, ‘Amy, you have a nice smile. And a couple of months later, the station’s main meteorologist had to have heart surgery “and they said, ‘Amy Freeze, you should be doing the weather!’” Because of her name, and despite the fact that she “knew nothing about the weather.”įreeze quickly enrolled in an introduction to meteorology class at Portland State, and kept taking classes in the field. She was hired to be the entertainment reporter. One day, she was “goofing off” on stage, helping the tech staff check the lighting, when a consultant saw her and told the news director she should be on air. When her husband started grad school in Oregon, Freeze, then 21, got a part-time job at KPTV in Portland as a newswriter. Simpson trial,” she said, “and it was really a great experience. Her then-husband took a job in Los Angeles, and she got an internship at KTLA’s morning news show.