Where has the time gone?
It was Election Day of 1984.
I put the last of my belongings in the back of my little Plymouth Arrow and headed east from Brookings, South Dakota.
Destination?
Crawfordsville, Indiana.
It will be 40 years on Monday that I officially left South Dakota and moved to Indiana.
Where has the time gone?
Seems like yesterday, sometimes.
Seems like a lifetime ago other times.
It is the understatement of the month to say it has been interesting.
And now, I get on a plane, or in a car, and leave Crawfordsville lots and lots of weekends, and then come home, to write about my trials and tribulations.
OK, maybe an occasional success, like working a Super Bowl or some such event.
But here we are, 40 years down the road.
A lot of miles, a lot of events, a lot of softball games in the summer, later.
I was working as a supervisor with the Coast to Coast Company, and they offered me a promotion if I moved to Crawfordsville.
It was not an easy decision to leave so many friends and family and move 700 miles away. I was doing high school sports in Brookings for the radio and newspaper, and was helping with some radio and a little TV covering South Dakota State. I had to give all that up.
But, my old boss at SDSU, and the guy in the same spot at the University of South Dakota knew one of the sports guys at Purdue, and they made a call.
Mark (at Purdue) told them I should come up and say hello and they would try and fit me in.
So I did after I got here, and that worked out pretty well. The Purdue guys put me in touch with the Pacers, Colts, and more, and you read about those adventures every other week.
I also walked into the Journal Review offices and introduced myself.
Barry Lewis was either the first or second guy I encountered, and that was the start of a 40-year friendship.
Barry was the assistant sport editor, having just graduated from college, and was working for Tim Timmons. There was also John Pea, with his red correction pen, and Gail Hamilton, who just liked everyone.
I said I could cover sports, and I’m sure they all were positive this unknown guy from South Dakota was out of his mind.
I also contacted the radio station, and met Mike Haynes, who was the sports director then. I said I had lots of radio experience back in South Dakota, which I’m sure he cared nothing about, and that I was a decent stats guy.
He liked that.
Remember this was early November.
My first weekend, I just went for a walk on Saturday afternoon (I was living with another company guy just north of the old high school), and there was lots of noise to the west.
I walked toward the noise and stumbled into the Monon Bell game.
Good first impression.
Mike called and said the first basketball broadcast was the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, and I could go along and keep stats. No promises of getting on the air, but if my stats were OK …
Well, another good first impression was coming, because my first Indiana high school basketball game was the five-overtime thriller between Southmont and North Putnam! Ron Hendricks was the coach at South; he and I talk about that game every time we cross paths.
The JR guys liked my stats work too, and they used me a little for some writing, and always for game stats. It wasn’t too long before I wore them down and they just let me start covering more games.
Now I’m the senior writer (in more ways than I care to think about).
Mike moved on as well, and I started doing play by play. That meant recruiting spotters and stats helpers/color analysts to help out, because I still needed stats for my JR stories.
I apologize to the many who are not mentioned, but Bob Jones, Tom Perkins, Tom Coyle, John Roche, Brent Harris pop to mind first. Barry and I have also done a few games together, although he and many other sports editors of the Journal let me write huge county or conference stories because I was there with the radio station.
But I need to circle back around or this column will stretch to Tuesday.
There have been so, so, so many wonderful people in this community that have either helped or put up with me for all or parts of 40 years.
Among those wonderful people are the people reading these notes today. A truly heartfelt thanks to each of you. There has never been a week when someone, a coach, a parent, or especially a member of the community, hasn’t reached out to comment on the weekly adventure. Some were truly sympathetic thoughts about some travel disaster, and many more have just been a positive comment, that there is enjoyment in what was written.
There was also an amazing outpouring when each of my parents passed away. The strength it provided was incredible.
There has also been 40 years of friends, and the adventures that friends go through. I have been incredibly blessed with some of the most amazing friends. They are owed a huge debt of gratitude.
So, it was 40 years ago, and here we are.
Still trying to make sense of life, still trying to better appreciate the goodness that surrounds me.
I have told all my national sports friends that I grew up on a small dairy farm in eastern South Dakota, and look where I am now. I’m going to cover another Super Bowl in a couple months.
What I also tell them is that I am living in Crawfordsville, Indiana, and I’m incredibly proud of that.
It’s off to Green Bay this weekend. Yes, I know it is November, and we are going back in early December, but that’s where the bosses tell us to go.
Thanks to everyone for the opportunity to share the stories of these 40 years. Let’s hope there are many more.
Safe travels.
Jeff Nelson is a frequent contributor to the Journal Review and works professionally for Fox Sports working with the Indiana Pacers, Indianapolis Colts and many more professional teams.
