Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, August 9, 1995 TAG: 9508090040
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: M.J. DOUGHERTY
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
If not yet from the area, then certainly from the pages of The Roanoke Times.
After 50 minor league baseball games, 60 auto races, 100 football games, and too many government meetings and basketball games to count, I am leaving for a permanent job.
When I got here eight years ago, the New River District had seven teams, neither New River Valley Speedway nor New River Valley Mall had been built and South Main Street leaving Blacksburg was a two-lane goat path.
In that time, I have seen the bureau expanded, the New River Current started, the afternoon edition stopped and the "World-News" chopped off the newspaper's name.
After eight years of goofing off as a part-time sports writer, I figured it was time to start my career as an college professor.
Until the item appeared in "Names on Campus" earlier this month announcing my graduation and my new job, most people didn't know about my other life.
With my picture in the Current twice a week and by appearances at sporting events throughout the New River Valley, most people thought the newspaper was my only job. And when I told people I was in graduate school, just about everyone thought I was studying journalism.
For the record, my doctorate is in planning. And I will be an assistant professor with the West Virginia University Extension Service.
That means my days of being a sportswriter have come to an end. And while I am looking forward to the challenges of my new position (and of unpacking and sorting the contents of a 24-foot truck), I will miss all of the people I have worked with over the years.
No matter where I have been, it seems like there has been someone there to watch out for me. I didn't always know which end was up, but folks made sure I had a story when I left. And more often than not at the bigger events, the people there fed me as well - an important consideration when you like to eat like me (and when you cook like me).
The day I announced I was leaving, the officials at New River Valley Speedway presented me with a trophy (I guess they were happy to get rid of me). And upon seeing the notice that I was leaving in "Class Notes," one coach - Radford High's Brenda King - called my new telephone number in West Virginia to wish me well.
Like any job, there have been days that weren't as fun as others. And there are stories that I never got around to writing. But more often than not, it has been fun living the fan's dream, going to sporting events - or even government meetings - and then getting to ask questions of all the participants afterward.
I am not worried about the stories that I would have liked to have written but didn't get a chance to write. If the stories need to be written, the people who replace me will make sure they are written. (Of course, it helps that I told them about those stories before I departed.)
As I enter the next stage in my life, I hope I will find the people I meet along the way as nice and as helpful as those I have met through my work at the newspaper. But no matter what happens, one thing is certain. I will never be able to achieve the level of fame that this job has brought me. No matter where I went in the NRV, someone seemed to know who I was.
That reknown, and the people, are the two things I will miss the most about this place.
Making deadlines and trying to come up with leads, those are a completely different manner. That I won't miss. But I am sure that my new job will have challenges all its own.
M.J. Dougherty has been a fixture in the sports pages of the New River Current since it began publishing in February 1988.
by CNB