Update Jan. 31, 2025: Steve Horstmeyer says he’s signed an extension to work through May 21, the last day of the May ratings’ “sweeps,” instead of retiring when his contract expires March 16. The two additional months will “help get things organized for after my departure,” he tells me.
Hortmeyer, 71, has been WXIX-TV’s chief meteorologist since August 2008.
Original post Nov. 20, 2024: Steve Horstmeyer, Cincinnati’s longest-tenured meteorologist, says he will retire in March after 48 years in television.
“It’s time. You know when it’s time,” says Horstmeyer, 71.
“I wanted to retire two years ago, but the station wanted me to stay, so I did,” he says. That was after suffering a stroke while on the air doing the 10 p.m. news four years ago, he revealed. A coworker noticed something was wrong, so he saw a doctor several days later.
“I didn’t know it (was a stroke) for four days. I had some issues with my right leg and right arm. The doctor said I had a major stroke. It came as a complete surprise to me. He said, ‘Do you have much stress?’ “
The WXIX-TV weather team forecasts for the 13-1/2 hours of weekday newscasts, plus does seven hour a week of weather streaming programs, he says. Fox 19 also has provided weather information to the Reds for 11 years, he says.
“I’m in fairly good shape today,” says Hortsmeyer, who still bikes from his Madisonville home to WXIX-TV’s Queensgate studios twice a week.
The Cincinnati native started his career in April 1977 as a part-time employee for WLWT-TV’s legendary forecaster Tony Sands. He later worked at WKRC-TV with Tim Hedrick before hired as Channel 19’s chief meteorologist in 2008. His arrival made Channel 19 a major player in local TV because Horstmeyer’s experience spanning into six decades made him one of the most authoritative and trusted meteorologists in Cincinnati’s TV history.
Although he was fascinated by the weather as a kid, and a loyal Sands’ viewer, Horstmeyer always figured he’d be a teacher. He earned a degree in earth science and mathematics education at Miami University in 1975, and a master’s degree in geography with an emphasis in meteorology from the University of Nebraska in 1976.
“I was going to be a college professor. Never for one minute did I think I’d end up on TV,” he says.
Horstmeyer was teaching math and earth science at Dater Junior High School in April 1977 when he saw Sands promoting Channel 5’s new color radar, a Cincinnati TV first. He called Sands, and was hired as a part-time meteorologist mostly for Channel 5’s Weatherscene service, which provided forecasts to Kings Island, the Reds and CG&E (now Duke Energy). He went full-time a year later.
“What are the chances you make a phone call to the guy you grew up watching doing TV weather, and he hires you and changes your life?” he told me in 2008 as he was transitioning from Channel 12 to Channel 19.’s primetime news.
The 1971 Moeller High School graduate did two stints at Channel 5. He was fired with Sands in December 1984 after the station hired WKRQ-FM DJ Pat Barry to replace the droll Sands and add some entertainment sizzle to the Jerry-Springer-Norma Rashid evening news. (He trained Barry how to do weathercasts.)
Channel 5 hired him back a few months later, and he stayed until going to WKRC-TV in 1989 after forecaster Glenn “Skipper” Ryle retired from Good Morning Cincinnati.
Horstmeyer jumped to WXIX-TV in 2008 for the opportunity to be a TV station chief meteorologist for the first time, at age 55.
Horstmeyer has worked with a "who’s who" of local TV personalities: Hedrick, Springer, Sands, Rashid, Bob and Rob Braun, John Lomax, Cammy Dierking, Bill Myers, Bob Herzog, Pat Barry, Tricia Macke, George Vogel, Mike Buresh, Ken Broo and Jack Atherton.
When his contract expires Sunday, March 16, Horstmeyer may not vanish completely. He has volunteered to stay around until Fox 19 hires a new chief meteorologist. After that, he’s willing fill in occasionally, as meteorologist Jeff Creighton has done.
He’s looking forward to traveling with his wife, Annie, a paralegal for a downtown Cincinnati law firm. And “just having a normal life” after nearly five decades working weekends, mornings or nights.
“It will be nice to have dinner with my wife,” he says. “She and I never have had the same schedule.”
