Transcontinental memories of ’so many fun’ mark the end
Editor’s note: This is Furman Bisher’s final column for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Read more:
–Past columns. His last one is below. Read his first one including his moving tribute to his late son and several others.
–Photos of his career. Even one where he’s playing football.
–Video: Bisher reflects on his very first column for the paper
It was April 15, income tax day, in 1950 that this all began. Usually, such a run as this rarely ever carries on this long. Perhaps my act has worn thin. Perhaps I have over-stayed my time. But to an old warrior such as I, it isn’t easy finding an appropriate ending place.
My mind wanders back to the Falcons’ first flirtation with glory. They led the Dallas Cowboys into the shadows of a Sunday afternoon in Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium, 60,222 fans in a state of exhilaration, a division championship a breath away when the defense broke down. It was over and a city was left heartbroken.
It had been such a colossal event that even Red Smith, the scholarly columnist of the New York Times, had flown in to write of it. After the game, I gave him a lift back to his hotel, and as he collected his tools of trade, and opened the car door, he put a hand on my shoulder and said: “One more day in a cold, dreary press box — God, I love it.”
That said it for a lot of us.
Many a time that memory flashes across my mind, though the number of Sundays has dwindled down, as has the number of columns. Once I wrote six columns a week. I thought I was supposed to. Then five, then four, then three, then down to one. That means I have one day in seven in which to write something that stirs the blood, or something that misses the plate. A stinker. I don’t know that there is a graceful way to take leave. It doesn’t require a lot of space, I know that. (Cheers from the layout editor.)
I do know, as well, that it tugs at the heart. Ye gods, how many of these have I written? So many that many of the keys on this old Royal typing machine are worn thin. (And this column was first given a test run on the machine on which I wrote my first column in 1950.)
How many continents has it been, how many nations, how many flights, how many airports, how many sagging beds in bawdy rooming houses, and how many languages, with or without translation? Oh, and yes, and how many fellow travelers, wonderful friends on all those continents, and on the streets in this town and in my own land?
Then the Olympics, winter and summer, arousing memory of the most excruciating trip of them all, following the Winter Games in France. Catching a train in Notre Dame de Briancon to Chambery, to Geneva, to Frankfurt, to Atlanta, thence to Richmond, then Charlottesville to preside at a dinner. So much for that. I wouldn’t mind doing it again, but my body would disagree.
The Italian heavyweight of some six decades ago, Primo Carnera, known to some as “The Ambling Alp,” returned to the United States for some personal appearances long after he held the title — whose legitimacy was strongly questioned. Nevertheless, he had been the champ. He was a source of much interviewing, of course, during which he was asked what he remembered most pleasantly of his fighting days in this country. “Oh, much good time,” he said, in his fractured English, “so many fun.”
That says it for me in any language. “So many fun.”
Perhaps we shall see each other again at Thanksgiving, or the Masters, but I take my leave today with deep regret. Selah.
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444 comments Add your comment
Old Gator
October 11th, 2009
6:15 am
Didn’t always agree with you but then I’m not always right either. You saids it best ” So many fun”. Thanks
"Chef" Tim Dix
October 11th, 2009
7:37 am
The age of the newspaper man has officially ended. May the wind fill your sail and always be at your back.
ATL Blue Devil
October 11th, 2009
8:07 am
Mr. Bisher,
Thank you for your tremendous service to this paper and the city of Atlanta. You will be truly and sincerely missed.
Not bad for a Tarheel . . .
garcia
October 11th, 2009
8:12 am
Selah, Mr Bisher, selah.
Lew Hege
October 11th, 2009
8:21 am
Furman: You are the best. The boy from Denton did okay! But why are you quitting? You’re too young!
(Lew Hege, Southeast Sports)
Tom Jennings
October 11th, 2009
8:37 am
Dear Mr. Bisher,
My dad taught me the values of his day (and yours). Included was the value of you and Jessie Outler opining all things sports. Reading the Constitution in the morning, the Journal in the evening, brought the headlines of the day all the way to Winder, GA, located so far from Atlanta.
Of course, today is different in so many respects, and I won’t digress into those differences. But your columns were a consistent reminder of the way sports holds my interest – with words that blossomed in my mind into a portrait of whatever subject you pontificated.
Thank you for getting into the inner reaches of my mind, and helping, with my dad, putting sports in its proper place.
Selah, yourself.
Michael Scharff
October 11th, 2009
8:56 am
Mr. Bisher, your words have been a sourcce of joy to me for many years. As a life-long Augusta resident, I particularly appreciate your love for the Masters. I wish you all the best in your retirement.
dave
October 11th, 2009
9:11 am
Damn . . . just, damn. I’ll miss you, bet your bottom dollar, I’ll miss you . . .
Tom Conn
October 11th, 2009
9:14 am
Always enjoyed your Masters stories, and how Ivan Allen Jr., the “dandy little mayor”, made my hometown “big league”. But your Thanksgiving columns were always enjoyable, I agreed with so much of what you listed. You’ll be missed!
Navigator
October 11th, 2009
9:26 am
Furman, I was a kid when you had your local sports reporter show on Sunday, and really looked forward to hear real experts talk about SEC football (back then all our teams were SEC). You gave us so many Masters reports before there was ESPN, and your coverage of major events was excellent. I’ll miss reading your columns, but thanks for the memories.
Dawgdad
October 11th, 2009
9:27 am
Furman, thanks for the professionalism over the years, no petty grudges, no biased reporting, just honest opinion. We will miss you terribly.
TODD SENTELL
October 11th, 2009
9:45 am
Furman … you’ve been called the Red Smith of the South. I’d like to say you’ve always been, to me, the Mark Twain of American sportswriting. Go raise some hell. You deserve it.
Todd Sentell
Author of Toonamint of Champions
Uncle Tom
October 11th, 2009
9:45 am
Furman,
My dog is still upset about what you said about him on a fairly recent Thanksgiving column (something like, “I’m thankful that my best friend isn’t a dog.”), but other than that, we will all you very much. We’re thankful we had you for so long.
Ed Lorenz
October 11th, 2009
9:52 am
Mr. B — My father, a stringer for you when he was at Tech, introduced me to your columns and guided me through some early trial and error journalism. As my abilities improved and passions grew, I often used you as a model in style and substance. I will dearly miss your Thanksgiving offering – as well as your general reflections, insight and overview of the games and the true merit of how they play in life. Good fortune to you in your next career – enjoy, and know you were/are appreciated. You painted some wonderful pictures. As the Roman poet Ovid wrote, “The purpose of good writing is not so much to be understood, as to make it impossible to be misunderstood.”
I understand. Thank you. #
willdave
October 11th, 2009
9:52 am
Mr. Bisher, thank you so much for sharing your remarkable insight with us over these past several decades. We treasure you and will always remember you fondly. Please enjoy your retirement to the fullest.
Native Atlantan
October 11th, 2009
10:30 am
Furman, please excuse me for using your first name but as I’m sure you’ve been told before I feel as if we are on a first name basis with your words being in my living room for my entire life. I was born in Piedmont Hospital in 1956 and my mother had me reading before I attended first grade. The ultimate villain of my early youth wasn’t a fictional one from the Hardy Boys or Zane Grey, he was one Darwin Holt, a subject of many of your columns and justifiably so. In a way you challenged me to read at a higher level just so I could understand the height of his dastardly deed against Chick Granning. I must have asked my father for help with dozens of the more complex words in your columns because I was so fascinated that the bad guy didn’t always lose as he did in fiction. Regardless of his success later in life I never could get past Bear Bryant’s win-at-all-cost attitude, which is fine for the pros but is so much more pervasive in the college game today because of his “success”. There are not enough Bobby Dodds or Joe Paternos preparing boys to win at life and not just win on the field.
At one time I took both papers to read Outlar and Grizzard in the Constitution and Bisher and Hudspeth in the Journal. I’ve attended many a Derby and Masters in absentia with you as my guide. I will go ahead and start my Thanksgiving list now. I’m thankful to have had your prose to read my entire life to this point. Selah.
Dan
October 11th, 2009
10:41 am
Thank you, Mr. Bisher. Well done.
SecondGenJacket
October 11th, 2009
10:49 am
A true class act.
MightyQuinn
October 11th, 2009
11:09 am
On a cold saturday morning in northeast Iowa a few years back, my wife and I saw the sign for the Field of Dreams movie site. We pulled off to visit, and on the gift shop wall was a copy of the interview with Shoeless Joe Jackson conducted by our own Furman Bisher. Your reach far exceded the Atlanta environs, Mr. Bisher. Godspeed and happy retirement.
Mark
October 11th, 2009
11:22 am
Jesse and Furman…those were the days…Have a nice retirement Furman.
SCTechfan
October 11th, 2009
11:27 am
Please tell me it’s not so. I’ve been a fan of yours since I could read the Sports Column in the AJC. I had the pleasure of meeting you one day as you played in a celebrity golf tourment at the Harbor Club at Lake Oconee. We chatted for a few minutes but not long enough. You were an influence on so many sports writers, especially Lewis Grizzard and Jesse Outlar. I can still remember you and the old coach and Outlar on your weekly TV program on Sundays recapping the previous day’s college football rivalries. Your columns are what made me enjoy the poetry of your writings and your openions on life as well as sports. I felt the experience of the first day at college in one of your columns two years ago, I could feel the exhilaration you protrayed. Very few writers today have that ability and it’s a shame. You have it, Grantland Rice, Lewis Grizzard, Jesse Outlar had it. Furman, you’re in a class of your own.
Selah
tixholdersince66
October 11th, 2009
11:36 am
Mr. Bisher, The saying goes “A picture is worth a thousand words”. I so enjoyed in your columns your “Words that are worth a thousand pictures”. I don’t know how you painted those stories, but I am glad you did. An era ends, Selah and best personal regards in retirement.
Sarah
October 11th, 2009
11:47 am
You always managed to convey that the story was more than just the final score which is why I would always read your columns even in Virginia! You will be missed more than you know. Now is the time to enjoy your beautiful family, but we all know we have not heard the last word from you….thankfully!
MidGaBuzz
October 11th, 2009
11:53 am
Mr. Bisher, I want to thank you for all your insight and intelligence to the sporting community. You shall be missed!! Take care and God Bless you.
1276jacket
October 11th, 2009
11:57 am
Say it ain’t so. This can’t be your last one.
Ocala Jack
October 11th, 2009
11:59 am
Thanks for the memories, Mr. Bisher.
62jacket
October 11th, 2009
11:59 am
Dear Mr. Bisher, I was first introduced to your wonderful writing in 1975, when my family moved to Atlanta. I had grown up in Dallas, reading Blackie Sherrod, whom I have heard you speak of many times. I was 12 years old at the time, and over the years, your words have taken me to places and events I could never have experienced first-hand. Also, up until that night in the fall of 1995, it seemed that most of the time your articles were mostly helping to ease the excruciating pain of being an Atlanta sports fan. I have to admit that once your articles came online, I cancelled my subscription to the AJC. For years you had been the only reason I took the paper, anyway.
I’ve been dreading this for a long time, but I wish you the best of luck in anything you do, and I don’t know what else to add except, “I’m thankful for Furman Bisher”.
zgoldatl
October 11th, 2009
12:05 pm
I am 23, and have lived and breathed Atlanta, Georgia my entire life. Im from inside the perimeter and proud of it. There is nothing in the world that makes me happy like Atlanta sports. I would like to thank you Mr. Bisher for so many memories. I grew up reading your columns and I still do to this sad day. I have goose bumps as I write this, but I want to simply say Thanks, and God Bless You Sir.
Jimmy H.
October 11th, 2009
12:06 pm
I grew up in Georgia reading your columns and after moving to Texas had to either get the AJC at one of the local libraries or online via the Internet. Even then I made it a point to read your columns because I knew I would find interesting points or information in them. When I clicked on the link for your column and realized that it was your last one I thought to myself that another of the good ones was leaving the Atlanta sports world. In my mind your leaving the AJC is along the same lines as some of the other what I call Atlanta sports institutions leaving (Pete Van Wieren retiring from the Braves, Skip Caray passing away, Larry Munson retiring). Enjoy your retirement and keep giving us your unique take on Atlanta sports when you can.
jim hardeman
October 11th, 2009
12:07 pm
Enter your comments here
jim hardeman
October 11th, 2009
12:10 pm
Furman,
First names are appropriate when writing to an old friend.
Many of my most wonderful memories of my dad started with his words “Did you read Furman today?”
Thanks for being that conduit that allows us to talk during those years that I knew everything.
Bill Miller
October 11th, 2009
12:14 pm
Furman – You have been a class act these many years (and I go back to 1967 in enjoying your columns), with some very perceptive columns. We will miss you greatly. Enjoy the memories.
Tim Blinkhorn
October 11th, 2009
12:34 pm
Mr. Bisher, it has been my pleasure to enjoy your insight for most of my life. I, like you, recall the collapse of Rick Bias in the secondary and it is a fitting metaphor for your last column. It is a collapse for the paper and it’s readers. Jesse Outlar, Lewis Grizzard and you MADE the sports section for the Journal-Constitution. I have read your columns from far and wide thanks to day old american papers in Italy and now in real time on the internet. I think it’s time I probably move on and leave my roots behind also.
Some Sense
October 11th, 2009
12:49 pm
Yet another element of Atlant’s innocence passes before us. Oh, for the days again of Furman Bisher, Jesse Outlar, Bobby Dodd, and Frank DiPrima.
Good God…look at our city now…infested with crime…GT students being robbed at gunpoint.
Thanks, Furman, for standing for what Atlanta once was.
atlanta loses another institution « ATLmalcontent
October 11th, 2009
1:00 pm
[...] by atlmalcontent The great Furman Bisher wrote his final column today, marking the end of a 59-year run at the Atlanta Journal and AJC. A gifted wordsmith and Southern [...]
Curt
October 11th, 2009
1:00 pm
Mr. Bisher, you are a true legend, and there will NEVER be another journalist that can fill your shoes.
moboman
October 11th, 2009
1:01 pm
Mr. Bisher,
I hope those classless jerks in last weeks blog had no hand in hastening this decision. They are a prime example of what is wrong with the electronic newspaper edition, if not more.
In the sixties, as a 9 or 10 year old I took a train trip by myself to visit a cousin in Montgomery. (can you imagine that now!) My mom bought me a Sport Magazine, with an article about Hank Aaron being the most likely to pass the Babe, to read during the ride. Not only do I still have that issue, but from that moment I became a sports reader. Each day after school I ran to the bottom of the drive to get the paper. I would check the Braves box score to see what Hank did, and read what you had to say. I have been hooked ever since. Your rare ability to deliver not just information, but sentiment, is what makes you special. I am certain that at least some of what we loved about Grizzard, was thanks to the example you set. With both of your comlumns now missing from the AJC, reading it will seem much less important, and far less meaningful. Dont stop writing. Best wishes to a giant and a true GENTLEMAN. Selah!
Walter
October 11th, 2009
1:46 pm
One of the best columns anybody ever wrote was Mr. Bisher’s “I Saw Him Take His First Breath in Life and I Saw Him Take His Last.” Essentially a eulogy for his beloved son, Roger. I enjoyed Furman’s articles on sports, but this one, on being a father, touched the soul. Thank you, Mr. Bisher.
74 Dawg
October 11th, 2009
1:52 pm
An era has passed. Many of us, including myself, grew up reading your columns. Now I have grandkids playing football. Ouch. You will be missed. Hope you do write an occasional observation on Thanksgiving or the Masters. Thanks…
Larry
October 11th, 2009
2:02 pm
Mr. Bisher,
Born a stone’s throw from Grant Park on Ormond Street, as a little boy I recall just few blocks down the street the building of Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium. I also recall so many of your articles and you have truly been a blessing for me. And even though my life and career has since taken me to many countries and continents also, I have taken with me all these years and shared your Thanksgiving gratefulness with so so many, many people around the world.
I thank you, and I will miss you, but I will never forget you, sir. Age gracefully and know that one day when your family and friends are sitting on the first pew that they will so so with incredible pride an honor.
Larry
NorCal
October 11th, 2009
2:27 pm
Vaya con Dios amiga!
NorCal
October 11th, 2009
2:33 pm
I mean amigo!
Tom Ryan
October 11th, 2009
2:55 pm
Well, this is a sad day for me, as it is for many others. I have enjoyed our occasional correspondence over the years and although I don’t believe I read your first column in 1950 since that was a year before I started to elementary school, I know that I began reading your columns not long afterward. I have enjoyed your forthright, tell-it-like-it-is style and shall greatly miss your columns. You are a true legend who has had a long, exemplary writing career and I wish you the best in your retirement. As others have stated, I hope that you will still pop up occasionally. Now if we could just nudge the people in Athens to elect you to the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame.
MWT
October 11th, 2009
2:57 pm
The Atlanta I grew up with is now gone. Godspeed Mr. Bisher.
Gayle Barron
October 11th, 2009
3:08 pm
We will miss your wonderful articles Furman. I can honestly say that you always wrote the kindest words about many athletes and I was one of them. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.
God bless you,Gayle
David
October 11th, 2009
3:39 pm
Mr. Bisher -
With your retirement goes the last lion of an era in Atlanta Constitution history. While the paper may still have good columnists, no one can spin a yarn on Atlanta and the South like you and your dearly departed collegues Celestine Sibley and Lewis Grizzard. I hope you get to enjoy a much longer retirement than Ms. Sibley, whose was cut short, and glad you’ve lived to see yours, which Lewis did not.
Further, you are truly an inspiration with you longevity as you could have easily retired ten, twenty years ago. As with both of your deceased collegues, you will be sorely missed. Hopefully, you can come around for a visit for each of the big events.
Marc McPherson
October 11th, 2009
3:45 pm
Selah Mr. Furman Bisher. Many words you have written. Many of those I have read. You wrote in a style so grand that we will never again see, without pretension or scathing personal opinion. You wrote without pomp or personal vitriol. You took care of me as I flipped open each day’s newspaper. Your work has slowed over the last years and I was so afraid one day I would open the sports page and you wouldn’t be there at all. Thank you for the gift of your 59 years. Thank you for your last words in print. Thank you for sharing your full life.Through you I found, vicariously, a friend and a window into happenings you clearly helped me to imagine. Selah Dear Journalist.
Bo in North Carolina
October 11th, 2009
4:04 pm
Furman, best of luck and God speed in your retirement. Come back and visit with us on Thanksgiving.
Selah
Turning The Page
October 11th, 2009
4:21 pm
Furman you have many fans and almost a whole page worth’s of bye’s.
Never have I looked so forward to one of your columns, but this is the one I’ve wished for for so long and the Happy Day is upon us!I for one am not one of your fans. I hope the AJC will hire someone that can appeal to a wider sports audience, one that is in touch with the 21st Century, not the 20th. Hopefully one that can also appeal to most of the state’s citizens circa 2009, not 1950.
Best of luck to you. I wish you well in whatever you decide to do.
Richard Hyatt
October 11th, 2009
4:22 pm
You are the hero and unspoken mentor a generation of newspaper writers. I know. I’m one of them.