Meet Jim Murray . . .

So . . . just who was Jim Murray? Well, the late, great sports columnist would have turned 90 on Dec. 29. He was born Dec. 29, 1919, in Hartford, Conn. . . . Here is who he was in the words of a few who knew him (and you may recognize a few of the names!) . . .

"For reasons forever a mystery, Murray practically adopted me when I met him at my first World Series, between Los Angeles and Minnesota in 1965. He took me everywhere, introduced me to everyone. I felt like an art student perched on Michelangelo's palette." — Edwin Pope, Miami Herald
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"I'd say within the business, Jim was a legend to everybody except himself. I have known him for 35 years, I guess, and he was a wonderful friend. Also, the toughest SOB I've ever known." — Blackie Sherrod, Dallas Morning News (ret’d)
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"Jim was more than a sportswriter. He produced literature. No one in sports journalism was more revered, or more shabbily imitated.” — Furman Bisher, Atlanta Journal-Constitution (ret’d)
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"Jim Murray is not merely a great sportswriter. He is a great American writer who deserves to be thought of with Mark Twain, Ernest Hemingway and John Updike, as well as Red Smith and Jimmy Cannon." — Dave Anderson (Pulitzer Prize winner), The New York Times
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"It's been said that Grantland Rice launched a thousand bad sportswriters. Well, Jim Murray launched 10,000 bad sportswriters. He was the only one who could do what he tried to do." — Bill Millsaps, Richmond Times Dispatch (ret’d)
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"Only Jim, of all the great sportswriters, always got it right and always got it funny.” — Dave Kindred, The Sporting News
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"He never did complain. He never had the time, what with asking how you were doing. It didn't matter if you were the third-string tennis writer for the Modesto News, when you left Murray you were never quite sure which one of you was the legend." — Rick Reilly, ESPN
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"Ten days into my summer internship here at The Washington Post — July 1, 1979 — I got to read a Jim Murray column for the first time. As an aspiring writer, I knew enough about Murray to know he was a Funny Guy, a stylist who brought the metaphor to the sports page like nobody before or since. We — The Post — used to run some of Murray's columns. And that day, I was in no way prepared for what was under his signature." — Michael Wilbon, The Washington Post (Sports, 8-18-98)
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"Your grace, your wit and your great range of perspective brought by wide experience are necessary for the Los Angeles Times — now, more than ever.” — Shelby Coffey III, (former editor, Los Angeles Times, 2/21/95), now a trustee on the Newseum board, Washington, DC.
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"He made his readers laugh and cry, all the while peppering them with enough one-liners to land you a week at the Palace. He leveled cities with tongue-in-cheek descriptions, humanized by hyperbole and punctured the pompous with his literary lance. Every day he faced the same challenge, the same blank piece of paper tauntingly unfurled and hanging out of the typewriter like a mocking tongue, daring him to be different, fresh, funny and incisive. And every day for more than 35 years, Jim Murray not only accepted that challenge but triumphed." — Vin Scully, Los Angeles Dodgers Hall of Fame broadcaster (8.18.98)
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As a friend and fan, what better way to celebrate and perpetuate Jim Murray's legacy? Your donation to the Jim Murray Memorial Foundation will enrich the lives of students who are pursuing degrees in journalism. As of 2009, 68 Murray Scholars have each received a $5,000 scholarship from the Jim Murray Memorial Foundation.