ESPN Classic - Jim Murray biography

Thursday, April 5, 2001
Jim Murray biography

Sports Columnist

EXPERIENCE

LOS ANGELES TIMES, sports columnist, 1961- 1998.

SPORTS ILLUSTRATED, West Coast editor, 1959-61.

TIME MAGAZINE, Los Angeles correspondent, 1948-55. (from 1953, also served as West Coast editor for SPORTS ILLUSTRATED, which he helped found).

LOS ANGELES EXAMINER, general assignment and rewrite man 1944-48.

NEW HAVEN (Conn.) REGISTER, general assignment, police and federal beat reporter, 1943-44.

HARTFORD (Conn.) TIMES, campus correspondent while in college.

EDUCATION

Trinity College, Hartford, CT, 1943.

PERSONAL

Born: December 29, 1919. Hartford, CT
Deceased: August 16, 1998, Los Angeles, CA
Wife: Linda McCoy-Murray

AWARDS

Named "America's Best Sportswriter" by the National Association of Sportscasters and Sportswriters 14 times.

National Headliner Award, 1965 and 1977.

Honored by the Television Academy Awards 1966-1967 for writing contribution for the Andy Williams Show, Outstanding Variety Series.

Alumni Medal from Trinity College, 1972.

Installed in the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Hall of Fame, 1977.

National Headliner Award, citation for outstanding sports writing, 1980.

Red Smith Award for extended meritorious labor in sports writing, 1982.

First sportswriter to win the Victor Award, conferred annually on outstanding athletes based on selections by sportswriters, editors and broadcasters across the country, 1982.

Associated Press Sports Editors Association award for best column writing, 1984.

Pepperdine University, Doctor of Laws degree, honoris causa, 1987 J.G. Taylor Spink Award for "meritorious contributions to baseball writing, 1987. Award included induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame, Cooperstown, NY, July, 1988.

Victor Award XXVIII Hall of Fame Award "in recognition for his remarkable contribution to sports journalism as a literary art form." 1994.

PULITZER PRIZE for Commentary, 1990. Columbia University. Best Sportswriter Award, 1991 from the Washington (DC) Journalism Review.

Lincoln Werden Memorial Award for excellence in golf journalism, 1997. Presented by the New York Metropolitan Golf Writers Association.

Times Mirror 1998 Life Time Achievement Award (for 37 years with the Los Angeles Times).

BOOKS

BEST OF JIM MURRAY, Doubleday
SPORTING WORLD OF JIM MURRAY, Doubleday
THE JIM MURRAY COLLECTION, Taylor, 1988
JIM MURRAY, AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY, Macmillan, 1992
JIM MURRAY: THE LAST OF THE BEST, Los Angeles Times, 1998
JIM MURRAY: THE GREAT ONES, Los Angeles Times, 1999