100 Year Run: RIP Sid Hartman
Star Tribune sports columnist Sid Hartman dies at age 100Sid Hartman, who started selling newspapers in 1928 and wrote about sports for the Star Tribune for the ensuing decades, died Sunday. He was 100.
"My father's extraordinary and resilient life has come to a peaceful conclusion surrounded by his family," his son, Chad Hartman, tweeted early Sunday afternoon.
Sid Hartman also was for decades a radio voice on WCCO.
Hartman was born on the north side of Minneapolis on March 15, 1920, and he worked for newspapers in his hometown for nearly his entire life. At the time of his death he was still writing three or four columns a week.
He gained a stature very few journalists have achieved, becoming one of this state's legendary public figures. He was for years a power broker in the local sports scene, playing an integral role in the early success of the Minneapolis Lakers pro basketball team while serving as the team's de facto general manager and working behind the scenes to help bring major league baseball to Minnesota.
He created a rags-to-riches story unlike any his hometown has seen, working his way from the very bottom of the newspaper industry to one of the most influential and popular figures ever to use a typewriter, and later computer, for his livelihood. He also became a popular radio personality for WCCO and for 20 years was a panelist on a Sunday night TV show. If Minnesotans referred to "Sid,'' there was no doubt who they were talking about, much the same as the greatest of those he covered, men like "Kirby'' and "Harmon'' and "Bud.''
According to a count by Star Tribune staffer Joel Rippel, Hartman produced 21,235 bylined stories in his career, from 1944 until the one that ran on C2 of Sunday's Sports section. That column was his 119th of 2020.
Much of Hartman's success can be traced to his relentless reporting style. He developed and nurtured contacts, and his vocation was a labor of love. Hartman had no false illusions about his writing ability, one of the few newspaper journalists who required another reporter to write his "autobiography."
Many of those he encountered in his job became his closest friends. Sports were Hartman's life, around the clock, although in his later years he showed his softer side by becoming a doting grandfather.
https://www.startribune.com/legendary-columnist-sid-hartman-dies-at-100/572788662/
Hurry-up Vikings, we ain't getting any younger!
The guy is a legend in this town, seriously.
Too bad he passed during a pandemic. He'll get his recognition from the pro teams and Gophers as much as they can right now.
I posted in the other thread but Sid is such a legend that he deserves 2 threads. RIP Sid Hartman.
Sid Hartman died today at the age of 100 after decades of covering Minnesota sports.
— FanDuel Sports Network North (@FanDuelSN_NOR) October 18, 2020
Here's a feature from 2018 about his extraordinary life. pic.twitter.com/Dqvino57hi
A legend and a true inspiration. As I get older, I think of Sid and how you can always continue to go after your dreams. Thank you Sid! Will be so dearly missed!
Statement from Mark and Zygi Wilf and the #Vikings on the passing of legendary sports figure Sid Hartman pic.twitter.com/Fh82LKUcEQ
— Minnesota Vikings (@Vikings) October 18, 2020
Can you spot Sid Hartman in this Kevin Garnett photo from game 7 vs. the Sacramento Kings? pic.twitter.com/OHRt6M8M9B
— Carlos Gonzalez (@CarlosGphoto) October 18, 2020
Sid Hartman has died at 100.https://t.co/uPuTFyOvvY
— Vintage Minnesota (@VintageMinn) October 18, 2020
Star Tribune sports columnist Sid Hartman welcomed Kevin Garnett back to the Twins Cities at Target Center on Tuesday February 24, 2015 in Minneapolis. (@jerry_holt/@StribSports) pic.twitter.com/gdYYSmtHGF
@"Kentis" said: Sure hope he missed todays debacle... RIP Sid!I doubt he missed it, not for a second...
Only Sid could find something positive to write tomorrow about today's game.
@"purplefaithful" said:@"Kentis" said: Sure hope he missed todays debacle... RIP Sid! I doubt he missed it, not for a second...Only Sid could find something positive to write tomorrow about today's game.
Paul Allen will take over the positive mantel. everything will be rainbows and lollipops tomorrow morning.
I grew up reading him and Don Riley, really gave me a pleasure and I always looked forward to the inside scoop of my teams. RIP Sid, a true Icon of MN sports, thank you sir.
In honor of Sid Hartman: One-of-a-kind media giant and yes, a close, personal friend — @RussoHockey pays tribute to the legend of sports journalism.
— The Athletic Minnesota (@TheAthleticMIN) October 19, 2020
Unlocked for all:https://t.co/5F6JAj63Sa
Lived a hundred years and still didn't see a Vikings championship. Might have needed to live a hundred more the way they are playing lately.
Resting was not an option for Sid Hartman, and that's what made him greatRest in Peace for Sid Hartman? That's not a message of compassion for Sid. That's an insult. Sid lived by hurrying up and not waiting.Sid Hartman was halfway home to reaching 101 years old when he died Sunday. The information first came in a tweet from his son, Chad, and instantly, social media was set aflame.
Many of those went with the traditional RIP. I have a question for all those going that route:
Are you nuts? Rest in Peace for Sid Hartman?
That’s not a message of compassion for Sid. That’s an insult.
OK, I’m sure Sid had a few peaceful moments in his century as a Minnesotan. He did fall on the ice and break a hip in 2016, and there had to be sedation involved, so there might have been a couple of hours when the then-96-year-old was put into neutral.
That didn’t last, of course. Less than three weeks after the fall and the surgery, the Gophers held a news conference to introduce football coach P.J. Fleck, and Hartman was there — to hear Fleck’s sales pitch, although more importantly to guilt the new coach into a sacred vow to make weekly appearances on Sid’s Sunday radio show.
Here’s my synopsis on RIP and Sid:
I first met him in August 1963 when hired as a sports copy boy for the Minneapolis Morning Tribune. Sid was both the morning sports editor and the provider of Hartman’s Roundup five or six days per week. Staples of the Roundup were a half-dozen small mug shots — called half-column cuts — of people mentioned.
Sid would give one of the copy boys (aka, the victim) a list of six names. You would head for the library and go through the alphabetized drawers of half-column cuts. If a person on the list didn’t surface, you would find a photo in the files to make a fresh engraving.
Early on, after a search as the rookie copy boy, I informed Sid that neither a half-column nor a photo of one of those parties existed.
Mr. Hartman did not take that information by resting in peace. In fact, if he wasn’t so worried about the Gophers’ upcoming season opener with Nebraska, he might have taken a moment to end my newspaper career right there.
Fifty-seven years later, with 20 as a competitor in St. Paul, and then 32 back in Minneapolis, I’ve been in Sid’s company a couple of thousand times, and I’ve never seen a man at peace.
For decades, Sid and I also supported the same grocery store — the original Byerly’s in Golden Valley. Back when the staff was more permanent, at least twice a month I’d be in line and the clerk would say, “Your friend was just in here.”
Meaning Sid, to which I would usually offer a Sign of the Cross, but one day, I asked: “Did he offer congratulations on your fine service?”
“No,” the capable woman at the checkout said, “he told me to ‘hurry up,’ as always.”
You’ve heard of hurry up and wait? Sid lived by hurrying up and not waiting. That’s what made him a great newspaper reporter. Demanding of sources, major and minor, “Tell me. Don’t tell anyone else. Tell me … now.” And, usually, he was so persistent, so forceful, that the source would crack.
One part of life lost to modern communications has been our former reliance on telephone operators. There can be no estimate as to the number of people providing operator assistance that Sid drove from the occupation with his belligerent demands.
On the night of Nov. 20, 1965 (I looked it up), Sid returned to the Tribune office around 11 p.m., handed me a phone number for a hotel in New Jersey, and said:
“Call the front desk and get put through to Paul Klungness. He’s a Dartmouth running back from Thief River Falls. I want to have a note in the Saturday column.”
I was no longer the rookie and said: “Sid … it’s midnight in the East. Dartmouth is playing Princeton tomorrow. I can’t wake up a player.”
Sid said, “Call.” The hotel operator refused to ring Klungness’ room. Sid grabbed the phone. He didn’t get Klungness, but she did let him wake up Dartmouth coach Bob Blackman and Sid got his quote on Klungness.
Sid would say, “You can get anybody on the phone,” and he made that come 95% true — with persistence, impatience, drive to be not only first but also all alone with information.
I watched you in action for 57 years, Sid, and have full confidence in this: Rest in peace is the exact opposite of what made you a great newspaperman.
I’m also confident that, underneath all the distractions, decades on the radio, decisionmaking for the Lakers, pursuit of major league sports and new stadiums, baiting of officials conspiring against our teams, beat the strong heart of a great newspaperman.
And as now the senior sportswriter in the Twin Cities, I can add the reason Sid achieved that greatness:
For most of his career, he wanted it more than the rest of us, and he always needed it more — still needed it, in fact, seven months past age 100, and being there in print on the morning of his death.
https://www.startribune.com/reusse-resting-was-not-an-option-for-sid-and-that-s-what-made-him-great/572790342/
“We had very little in common. But we became the best of friends. Sid had integrity, which is why he was successful. He didn’t embellish what you told him, which is why you could trust him. I’ve said it before: As one man can love another, I loved Sid.”Bud Grant
Sid Hartman and Bud Grant made the unlikeliest of best friendsSid and Bud — the persistent reporter and the outdoorsy athlete/coach — bonded for life
“It’s hard to describe why we hit it off, because we were totally opposite of one another,” Grant said. “He was just a good person who as a columnist had integrity. He was involved in my life longer than anyone else, longer than my parents, my wife, my kids — longer than anyone. He was my best friend.”
From his early reporting days, Sid made a habit of coming to the Gophers locker room after practices. Other reporters had gone home by then or back to their offices, Grant said.
“I often was slow to dress and leave the locker room when I was playing at the U,” Grant said. “I had no place to go necessarily, and was in no hurry, so Sid and I often walked out of practice together. We’d end up having dinner together, and after I got married, my wife, Pat, would get off work at 6 and the three of us would eat together.”
Grant invited Sid to go duck hunting once, and the two of them, along with the late Otis Dypwick, the U communications director, and Gophers fullback, linebacker and captain Dave Skrien, left for Morris, Minn., after a Saturday Gophers football game.
“Otis was speeding through Litchfield, I think it was, and we got pulled over by a cop,” Grant said. “Sid of course got out and started talking to the officer, asking him if he was a football fan and telling him that right there, in the back seat, he had two Gopher football players. Sid told him we had just finished playing a game, and that we were going duck hunting.
“Then Sid said, ‘Would you like to see a game yourself?’ and the officer said, ‘Sure.’ So Sid pulled out a couple of tickets and handed them to the cop, who put them in his pocket. Then the officer handed a piece of paper to Sid and said, ‘And here’s a ticket for you, Mr. Hartman.’ ”
Sid and Grant’s relationship grew so tight that some 60 years later, on the night before Pat Grant died of Parkinson’s disease in 2009, she made her much-heralded goulash for her husband, their son, Peter — and Sid.
https://www.startribune.com/sid-hartman-and-bud-grant-made-the-unlikeliest-of-best-friends/572790732/
Edit Post (mod action — author will see a notice)
Warn Poster
Suspend User (3 days)
The user will be suspended for 3 days and will receive an email with the reason and information about how to appeal.