Thankful to be part of ‘Redden Era’

There are several broadcasters and sports directors in the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame, but few print journalists.₁ That was remedied a bit on May 21 with the induction of Joplin Globe sportswriters Wendell Redden, Jim Fryar, Jim Henry, and Anvil Welch.

Combined, the four spent 157 years anchoring the Globe sports department. The “Redden Era” spanned 70 years, from 1951 to 2021. Dan Nelson, chairman of the board for the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame, described them as “a sports media mainstay” in Missouri.

Redden, who died in 2011, started at the Globe a few months before graduating from Joplin High School in 1951. He became sports editor in 1952, a position he would hold until his retirement in 1996. The Missouri Press Association inducted him into the Newspaper Hall of Fame in 2018.

More importantly (at least to me), Redden hired me as a Globe sportswriter while I was a student at Missouri Southern State University. I was amazed at how many different high schools the Globe managed to cover in Missouri, Kansas, and Oklahoma. The phones rang incessantly on Tuesday and Friday nights with coaches calling in their basketball results. We tried to write a short story on every game played – as many as 40 in the Globe’s coverage area on some nights.

Wendell assigned me to cover the Commerce High School football team throughout their playoff run in 1981. I never fully comprehended the fact the Globe had hundreds of subscribers in northeast Oklahoma who were anxiously awaiting the results.

I also worked with Jim Fryar and Jim Henry during my 15 months at the paper. Fryar was there from 1975 to 2017; Henry was there for 39 years (1978-2003 and 2007-2021). Welch was “only” at the Globe for 31 years (1984-2015), but he also worked for the Springfield News-Leader for several years beforehand.

So, 157 years between four guys in one sports department is really quite remarkable.

“Wendell was one of the nicest people anyone could ever meet,” Henry told the crowd of 500 on May 21. “He was our leader and mentored many sportswriters during his 45 years. When Wendell died in 2011, I thought writing a column worthy of him would be the most difficult thing I would ever do the rest of my career.”₂

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I was pleased to learn that Roger and Carol Dillon sold the Shannon County Current Wave in Eminence to a local couple, Kenny and Valerie Schulz, on April 1. The paper had been for sale for seven or eight years.

Gayla Phipps, who has been on the staff for five years, will remain to assist Valerie, who is her sister. Gayla is Roger and Carol’s daughter-in-law.

Roger, who bought the Current Wave in 1984, was MPA president in 2022. He’s one of the nicest guys you’ll ever meet.

Roger's claim to fame is that he was the last private resident and caretaker for Ha Ha Tonka before it became a state park in 1978.

Although the Current Wave struggled financially at times, Roger didn’t let that deter him from always fighting the good fight. He helped wage a six-year battle against the National Park Service, which sought to remove the wild horses from the Ozark National Scenic Riverways in Shannon County. Roger was an original member of the Missouri Wild Horse League, and they were instrumental in getting Congressman Bill Emerson involved. Emerson sponsored a bill to make the horses a permanent part of the Ozark National Scenic Riverways. It was signed into law by President Clinton in 1996.

When asked about his plans for retirement, Roger listed playing golf, getting a haircut, weed-eating, cleaning gutters, and doing some traveling.

After 41 years in the business, he’s earned the right to do whatever he pleases.

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1The few print journalists in the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame include J.G. Taylor Spink, who took over The Sporting News in 1914 upon his father’s death; Bill Corum, who covered the Brooklyn Dodgers, the New York Giants, and the Kentucky Derby for the New York Evening Journal in the 1920s; and Mike DeArmond, who had a 40-year career as a sportswriter with The Kansas City Star, retiring in 2012.

2Quotes provided by Laurie Sisk of the Joplin Globe.