FALLS, Joe 1928-2004

OBITUARY NOTICE—

See index for CA sketch: Born May 2, 1928, in New York, NY; died of heart failure, August 11, 2004, in Detroit, MI. Journalist and author. Falls was a Hall of Fame sports writer and editor with the Detroit News and Detroit Free Press. He started his journalism career while still a teenager, working as a copy boy in New York City for the Associated Press from 1946 until 1951, and then as a sports writer there until he moved to Detroit in 1953, where he continued with the AP as a sports editor. He joined the Detroit Times as a baseball writer in 1956, and when the Times closed four years later he moved on to the Detroit Free Press, first as a baseball writer, then as a sports editor and columnist. Next, in 1978, Falls switched to the Detroit News. During his long career, Falls covered almost every imaginable major sporting event, from the Super Bowl and World Series to the Stanley Cup, Kentucky Derby, and Indianapolis 500; he also covered college and high school events, once declaring that the high school basketball tournament was his favorite competition to cover. He was friends with such legends as Ted Williams and Al Kaline. In 2002, Falls was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame and honored with the J. G. Taylor Spink Award. The next year, suffering from diabetes, he retired. Falls was the author of several sporting books, including Man in Motion (1973), The Detroit Tigers (1975), and So You Think You're a Die-Hard Tiger Fan (1986), as well as the autobiography Joe Falls: Memories of a Hall of Fame Sportswriter (1997).

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Detroit Free Press, August 13, 2004.

Los Angeles Times, August 13, 2004, p. B11.

New York Times, August 13, 2004, p. A18.