PROFILE
From Babysitter
Wayne native Alice Gainer lands her dream job in New York
T
PHOTOGRAPHY BY ANNE-MARIE CARUSO
he first time I met Wayne
native Alice Gainer was
when I was in elementary
school. She was a teenager,
working as a lifeguard
during summers at Wayne
Township’s James W. Roe Memorial
Pool, where my sister and I took swimming lessons. Eventually, she became
our babysitter while she was attending
Wayne Valley High School. As
my sister and I got older, and our
beloved caretaker went off to
attend Fordham University, we
saw her less and less, until we
saw her one day on the news.
Back in 1999, Gainer was tall
(at least from my 7-year-old
perspective) and blonde, with a
bright smile. Her blonde hair and
bright smile remain, but I notice now
she looks the part of a news anchor:
well-dressed and poised.
Gainer is a news anchor and reporter
for WCBS-TV and WLNY-TV, the result
of more than a decade of chasing the
dream job she wanted since college. She
entered Fordham as a fine arts major
with a vague sense of what she would
do with an art degree, but left as a communications graduate with a steadfast
determination to become a successful
reporter. Her interest in news began in
George Washington Middle School
where she wrote for the school paper
and continued as she took television
production classes at Wayne Valley.
Gainer’s future career truly came into
focus, however, when she worked as a
reporter on Fordham’s professional
radio station, WFUV. Her work there
led her to a string of radio jobs after
graduation, including one at NPR
affiliate WBGO, which was followed
by a job as a writer for News 12 New
Jersey. It was there that Gainer’s mantra,
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WAYNE MAGAZINE
“Good things come to those who make
them happen,” kicked into high gear.
“On my own time, when I was not tagging along with some of the reporters,
I put together my own news tape. They
were short somebody in the news room
on Christmas Day,” she remembers.
“Someone stole donations from a
church donations box. That was my
very first story. It’s saved on my parents
DVR, which is where it’ll stay
forever, I think 8