Ed Harris, Roland Julian, Bob Wilson and Larry Rea will be inducted into the Tennessee Sports Writers Association Hall of Fame, it was announced Tuesday.
Induction ceremonies will take place Thursday, July 9, at Cumberland University in Lebanon.
Harris, Julian and Rea were elected by the more than 75 members that make up TSWA. Wilson is the first member to be elected by a TSWA panel that will add a veteran inductee every year.
The TSWA Hall of Fame, which was started in 2006 to recognize Tennessee's sports journalism history, will have 27 members with the addition of Harris, Julian, Rea and Wilson.
Harris, a native of Knoxville, was sports editor of the Knoxville Journal for 30 years before Ben Byrd took over in 1969.
Harris wrote his “Top of the Morning” column daily during his time as sports editor. He covered the University of Tennessee football in the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s and the Knoxville Smokies professional baseball team for more than 30 years.
He died in 1978.
Julian worked at the Knoxville News-Sentinel for more than 50 years until his forced retirement in November 2008. That does not include his time as a newspaper carrier in his youth or working in the mailroom in high school.
Julian started covering high school sports and working on the desk. Later he helped cover the University of Tennessee basketball team, football and track and field. He was also the beat writer for Tennessee’s first pro hockey team, the Knoxville Knights, during the 1960s.
However, Julian was best known for his coverage of swimming. He was known throughout the Southeastern Conference as the most reliable and avid media member covering the sport, including the annual SEC swim meet.
Roland, on behalf of the News-Sentinel, initiated the annual All-SEC swim teams in 1970, way before the league acknowledged the honor.
Rea was the long-time high school sports editor of The Commercial Appeal and helped perfect a system that allowed the Memphis daily to collect and publish reports on scores of high school competitions in West Tennessee, North Mississippi and Eastern Arkansas.
His reporting was a daily fixture, and it culminated each year in the Best of Preps, a major banquet for top athletes; his friend, John Guinozzo, was with him all the way on this.
Rea closed out his career at The Commercial Appeal at the outdoors editor.
Wilson was sports editor of the News Sentinel for 35 years, stepping down in 1957 when he was terminally ill with cancer. He died in 1958.
Wilson began covering Tennessee football during the early days of coach Bob Neyland. He covered all of UT’s bowl games, from the New York Charity Game in 1931 until the 1952 Sugar Bowl.
Wilson covered the Knoxville Smokies in the Southern Association, the Tri-State League, and Appalachian League.
Gen. Bob Neyland said of Wilson: "No writer knew Tennessee football better than Bob Wilson."
Previous inductees
2006: Edgar Allen, The Nashville Banner and TSSAA; Russ Bebb, The Knoxville Journal; John Bibb, The Tennessean; Ben Byrd, The Knoxville Journal; Al Dunning, The Commercial Appeal; Will Grimsley, Associated Press; Haywood Harris, University of Tennessee; Elmore (Scoop) Hudgens, Vanderbilt University; Buck Johnson, The Chattanooga Times; Gary Lundy, The Knoxville Journal and The News-Sentinel; Gus Manning, University of Tennessee; Grantland Rice, Murfreesboro native; Fred Russell, The Nashville Banner; Tom Siler, The News-Sentinel; Gene (Pappy) Thompson, Bristol Herald Courier; Marvin West, The News-Sentinel.
2007: Jimmy Davy, The Tennessean; Wirt Gammon Sr., The Chattanooga Times; Dudley (Waxo) Green, The Nashville Banner; Raymond Johnson, The Tennessean; Bill Luther, The (Knoxville) News-Sentinel; Jay Searcy, The Philadelphia Inquirer/Oak Ridge native; Jimmy Smyth, Johnson City Press; June Stewart, Vanderbilt University; and F.M. Williams, The Tennessean.
2008: Bobby Hall, The Commercial Appeal; Claude (Blinky) Horn, The Tennessean; Ted Riggs, The News-Sentinel.
(E-mail Stan Crawley at wscrawley@earthlink.net)