That's two

In the mid-1980s, I was covering a raucous basketball night at Whiteville (N.C.) High School. I was there for the girls game, and the place was so packed that they were turning fans away.

For some reason, I had to call the newspaper office (no cell phones then) before the game, so a state trooper escorted me to another building. As we left the gym, some guy said, "That's two. Two of us should go in."

I made my call, and the trooper escorted me back into the gym, much to the chagrin of the stranded fans.

The only thing I remember about the games is that it was so full that I had to SIT ON THE FLOOR UNDER THE SCORER'S TABLE! During the girls game, one of the girls touched the halfcourt line with her toe (over and back). I pointed to her foot, but the refs missed it.

In the boys game, a tiny guard for one team was caught in the air against the taller Whiteville front line. He brought the ball from his hip and shot a sort of hook shot that banked in over outstretched hands.

I wrote a short story that would have done the Associated Press proud. When I got back to the paper, I rewrote it, and one of my co-workers said it was the best 9.2-inch story he ever saw. That's counting the headline.

><

EMAIL: tgilli52@gmail.com  BLUESKY: PROFILE

MORE BLOG ENTRIES BY TOM GILLISPIE

• Resume for a writer and editor

• An editor's views on powerful writing

• Advice for be and would-be novelists

• Links to TG's stories online

• Favorite quotes

• What I do when I'm editing

ANECDOTES BY TOM GILLISPIE

• Wipeout at Death Valley

• Days with rainbows

• A desperate writer working in the dark

• Yer OUTTA there!

EDITOR@WORK BLOG ENTRIES

• You really DO need an editor

• Reminders for would-be novelists

• What I do when I'm editing

• What I charge (it's a deal) and what I edit

• Slogging through the Internet

• J-school: More eyes on your stories

• J-school: Go out and learn

• Rookie mistakes for magazine writers

ENTRIES FROM THE DOG BLOG

• Katie cried

• Growl and pull

• 13-plus years with my dog Lady

• ... said the spider to ...

• The Dog Diary (2014)

• YIP! YIP! The stereo-sound huskies

• What Lady and Michael Jackson had in common

BLOG ENTRIES FROM THE AUTO RACING JOURNAL

• Angel in Black: Remembering Dale Earnhardt Sr.

(a book of great stories about the Intimidator)

• Then Junior Said to Jeff...

(the book of great NASCAR stories)

• My best day as a sports writer

• Jeff Gordon's milk toast to Dale Earnhardt

• Wayne Auton: A life in racing

No way (I would write that story)

The year was 1980 or '81, and I was in my second (and last) year as sports editor for a small newspaper in South Carolina.

I'd heard of a kid who'd played basketball a couple of years earlier at the local high school, and that year he was playing basketball for a college elsewhere in the state. I asked the local high-school coach if that was worth a feature story, and he said no; he thought no one would be interested in a full-blown feature.

So I kept track of the kid and wrote a short update periodically. I probably wrote something short about the kid four or five times over a year and a half.

One day I was talking to a guy who had played football and basketball at the high school the previous year, so we knew each other. While we were talking at halftime, the basketball player's mother caught me in the hallway beside the open gym door. And with the former high-school star (now a starter for the University of Georgia football team) and a bunch of other folks watching (and listening) in shock, she yelled for at least five minutes.

It caused a disturbance, as everyone in the gym and hallway could hear her.

A few days later, she came to the newspaper office and yelled at my boss with me in attendance. He patiently listened, then told the woman that I was the best sports editor he'd ever had. If I didn't want to do a feature story on her son, he said, it was OK with him.

She was appalled, of course, since her yelling got her nowhere. She stomped out in a huff, and, thankfully, I never saw (or heard) her again.

I never did a feature on her son. I might have done one if she'd been quiet (or if she'd asked nicely), but I wasn't going to do it after the way she acted.

No way.

><

EMAIL: tgilli52@gmail.com  BLUESKY: PROFILE

MORE BLOG ENTRIES BY TOM GILLISPIE

• Resume for a writer and editor

• An editor's views on powerful writing

• Advice for be and would-be novelists

• Links to TG's stories online

• Favorite quotes

• What I do when I'm editing

ANECDOTES BY TOM GILLISPIE

• Wipeout at Death Valley

• Days with rainbows

• A desperate writer working in the dark

• Yer OUTTA there!

EDITOR@WORK BLOG ENTRIES

• You really DO need an editor

• Reminders for would-be novelists

• What I do when I'm editing

• What I charge (it's a deal) and what I edit

• Slogging through the Internet

• J-school: More eyes on your stories

• J-school: Go out and learn

• Rookie mistakes for magazine writers

ENTRIES FROM THE DOG BLOG

• Katie cried

• Growl and pull

• 13-plus years with my dog Lady

• ... said the spider to ...

• The Dog Diary (2014)

• YIP! YIP! The stereo-sound huskies

• What Lady and Michael Jackson had in common

BLOG ENTRIES FROM THE AUTO RACING JOURNAL

• Angel in Black: Remembering Dale Earnhardt Sr.

(a book of great stories about the Intimidator)

• Then Junior Said to Jeff...

(the book of great NASCAR stories)

• My best day as a sports writer

• Jeff Gordon's milk toast to Dale Earnhardt

• Wayne Auton: A life in racing