Many of our writers at PressBox DFW knew Dan Jenkins, whether it was at TCU football games or in a press room at Colonial or the Masters.
A few of them shared their personal remembrances of Dan. We hope you enjoy them.
Gil LeBreton:
Truth be told, it took years before I was able to summon the courage to introduce myself to the most illustrious writer this city has known, Dan Jenkins.
I would see him at TCU games. I would observe him from afar at golf tournaments.
He would stand there, a cigarette in one hand, greeting some Augusta National member or seasoned golf scribe with the other. The legends of the sportswriting world would pause to greet him – Sherrod, Furman Bisher, Edwin Pope, Dave Anderson, Dave Kindred, Bob Ryan, et al.
But the guy from his hometown – the sports columnist whose newspaper was tossed on Jenkins’ front lawn each morning – couldn’t muster the fortitude to approach him.
After all, Dan Jenkins was famous. He was witty. In his writing, granted, he could be a little bit of a wise-ass, but he was brilliant. What was I supposed to say, “Excuse me, Mr. Jenkins, but I’m the guy on page 37 of your newspaper each day”?
I even thought about calling Sally Jenkins, Dan’s immensely talented daughter, a Washington Post sports columnist and a best-selling author herself.
I had met Sally in 1985 when we both were covering the U.S. Olympic Festival in Baton Rouge, La. She needed a ride to the basketball arena at Southern University, and I lied and said that’s where I was going, too.
I mean, this was Dan Jenkins’ kid. And every guy who ever ordered chicken fried steak for breakfast and had memorized lines from Shake Tiller and Barbara Jane Bookman knew who Dan Jenkins was. I would have driven Sally to Shreveport if she had asked, just to talk with her.
It was in the Masters media center one day, perhaps buoyed by a courtesy pimento cheese sandwich, that I finally walked up to Dan at his customary position near the edge of the press room scoreboard.
“Sure,” he said. “I know who you are.
“You need to get on Pat Sullivan’s ass more.”
Our visits became a regular thing – my choice, probably not his. Forget what heroics were taking place out on the Augusta National course. My favorite memories of those years were the few minutes I shared with Dan, usually laughing.
I would run into Sally every now and then, frequently at Cowboys-Redskins games, and I would ask about her famous dad. It was disheartening, therefore, when she told me last November that he was struggling.
Getting around involved either a walker or a wheelchair, Sally said. His attendance at TCU football games now depended on the weather.
Dan Jenkins’ prose could be salty, but TCU had no more eloquent ambassador. He loved being a lifelong Horned Frog, and TCU loved him back.
One of his most prized possessions was the Rose Bowl ring that coach Gary Patterson presented to him.
When I walk into the press box at Amon Carter Stadium and see his name – Dan Jenkins Press Box — it reminds me how blessed I was to know the man I considered to be the poet laureate of Fort Worth.
Jenkins his ownself would have considered the title too stuffy, of course. He didn’t write poetry — he wrote sports, and the poetry just happened.
Riff, ram, bah, zoo. Give ‘em hell, Dan Jenkins.
Jimmy Burch:
The first time I met Dan was at the Masters Tournament in Augusta in 1995. I was writing some stories about Ben Hogan as part of a special section the Star-Telegram was planning. Dan was the ultimate authority on that subject, and we clicked instantly. He even wound up letting the S-T run an excerpt from a book he had in the works about Hogan as part of the section.
Soon thereafter, the book publisher called and asked if we could pay Dan “a little something” for using the excerpt. When Dan heard about that, he immediately shot down the idea and said he wanted the excerpt to be part of the Hogan section – as a free contribution from him — because he wanted to be a part of the effort to honor Ben in Fort Worth. If Fort Worth ever had a better ambassador than Dan Jenkins, I don’t know who it would have been.
Through the years, Dan and I became good friends. For me, one of the highlights of covering a golf major championship would be the time I’d get to spend with him, talking about college football or the state of the PGA Tour and what needed to be done to fix both. Dan had plenty of opinions, along with some great one-liners. I’ll always remember a story he told me about playing golf with Ben Hogan in front of a crowd and how nervous he was that day. After Dan struggled on the first hole, Hogan walked up beside him and said, “You know, I think you could swing a little bit faster if you really tried.” It was Hogan’s way of teasing him and urging him to slow down his swing. Dan said it was the best in-round golf tip he’d ever gotten.
As a Fort Worth native who grew up to be a sportswriter, Dan was always a hero to me. The first time he told me that he liked a story I had written, I felt about 10 feet tall because I could tell he meant it. He was a very genuine person. I’ve won a few awards through the years, but none of them ever meant as much to me as hearing “good job” from Dan Jenkins in regard to something I’d written.
Wendell Barnhouse:
I came across “Semi-Tough” by Dan Jenkins in a book store in Quincy, Illinois. The cover art was a curvaceous and scantily clad blonde astride a football. I was 21 and working at my second job at the wonderfully named Herald-Whig.
As I read it I was equally enthralled by the characters/story line and appalled at the raunchy language. My co-workers were quizzical when I kept saying “sumbitch.” With my typical lack of success, I went to bars at night “chasin’ wool.”
I had no idea who Dan Jenkins was – by then he had established himself as one of the top writers at Sports Illustrated. I was too dumb to realize or understand that I was captivated by a writer who during his career helped invent modern sports writing, the career I was pursuing.
That football season the local Catholic school I covered lost in the semifinals of the state tournament. I couldn’t resist starting my story by quoting Shake Tiller from “Semi-Tough”:
Hell, we all cried. You can take your wars and your starvation and your fires and your floods, but there’s no heartbreak in life like losing the big game in high school.
As Jenkins cranked out books, I found ‘em and read ‘em. “Dead Solid Perfect.” “You Gotta Play Hurt.” “Sports Make You Type Faster.” “Fast Copy.” “Life Its Ownself.” That’s far from a complete list. The more I read, the more familiar character types appeared but I hardly thought he was plagiarizing himself. The dialogue and the scenes were pitch perfect.
And there was this from “Baja Oklahoma,” the “ten stages of drunkenness:”
1, Witty & Charming
2. Rich and Powerful
3. Benevolent
4. Clairvoyant
5. Fuck Dinner
6. Patriotic
7. Crank up the Enola Gay
8. Witty & Charming, Part II
9. Invisible
10. Bulletproof
I was always partial to No. 7.
As fate and luck and happenstance would have it, I spent over half of my career working in Dan’s hometown at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. Starting in 1994 I started covering college football and a few years after that I learned Dan and his wife were moving back to Fort Worth.
Believing that he would likely be reading my stories, I fell into what should have been a career-ending habit – I started to try and write like Dan Jenkins. Thankfully, that was an unbearable burden and I went back to trying to make sure verbs agreed with subjects.
A few years after Dan had moved back to Fort Worth, I met him at Colonial. I was playing in the media event to preview that year’s PGA Tour stop. We were in the buffet line getting lunch. I introduced myself and he said, “You’ve got one of the greatest jobs covering college football.” Then he took me upstairs to show me the Hogan room.
What he said and what he did – proudly showing me and telling me about the great Ben Hogan – was one of the highlights of my career.
When I heard the news that Dan had passed away, I read the many tributes and condolences pouring across Twitter. Then I did what Dan called “typing,” a self-deprecating description of his wonderful writing style.
Soon on the No. 1 tee in Heaven there will be Dan Jenkins and his fantasy foursome Ben Hogan, Davey O’Brien and Sammy Baugh.
Hit ‘em straight and not too often, Dan.
Art Garcia:
I met Mr. Jenkins not long after assuming the TCU beat for the Star-Telegram in the fall of 1999. At first, I just thought he was another wealthy alum who for some reason just enjoyed hanging around the press box. And this was the old, scary press box at Amon G. Carter Stadium. The one with the rickety elevator and space heaters under your seats.
Having come from San Antonio, I had heard the name Dan Jenkins, but honestly didn’t know much about him. I was a fan of Sally Jenkins’ work. Her old man, I knew little.
That soon changed. Dan loved to talk TCU and writing. Not knowing much about the former and working to improve the latter, I was encouraged by our late, great sports editor Celeste Williams to nurture those sessions with Dan. I did just that.
Mr. Jenkins invited me to his home once. I have a faint memory of looking at memorabilia from his storied career. We talked about his books. He asked me what my dream beat would be. I answered the Dallas Mavericks. He shrugged. The NBA wasn’t his thing.
I soon got my wish and moved on from TCU. I didn’t see Dan much after that. But I began reading his books. For a time, I was obsessed. Dan Jenkins was alongside for many a road trip, with Semi-Tough, Dead Solid Perfect, Slim and None, Baja Oklahoma riding shotgun. Waiting for my next flight at a gate once, I remember Dan’s words forcing a real laugh-out-loud moment long before lol was a thing. I wrote about that in Postcards, a Page 2 staple of the of the old Star-Telegram sports section.
For many years, my fantasy football team was called the West Texas Tornadoes after the fictional NFL team founded by Billy Clyde Puckett. I always dreamed of playing Goat Hills.
When I’m in the Amon G. Carter Stadium press box these days, I can’t help but think of Mr. Jenkins. I’d like to think we all do. It’s always been his space.
Thank you for sharing. Rest in Peace, Dan Jenkins.
Mark Mourer:
I took a flier on “You Call It Sports,” when I was a junior at TCU, and am still laughing at how great that book was. Other than my wife, it’s the best thing I’ve picked up. That book inspired me to pursue sports writing, and still exists as a reminder that we should follow our dreams. Dan did, and we’re all better for it.
“All I ever wanted to be was a sports writer,” he said often. And he was the best. I think we are all grateful for having been literate while he was writing, either for the Fort Worth Press, or with his novels, or on Twitter.
He emailed me a little over a month ago saying that, as a result of doctor’s orders, he could no longer travel to cover golf. But he was still looking forward to tweeting during the majors courtesy of Golf Digest. Clearly, they knew they had a treasure there.
And so did I. I first met Dan when working with the TCU Frog Club. He came in to the office on a Friday afternoon with four books to autograph and give away at the next Frog Club Luncheon. This was in October of 1999, and I was able to stammer out a couple of lines from “Bubba Talks” as I nervously introduced myself to a hero and legend.
“You read that book?” Dan asked. “Not many people read that book…”
That an icon could humble himself with humor is one of the many memories that will stay with me. He remained accessible and appreciative of his fans throughout his career.
“I like people who like me,” he said in an interview once. Borrowing from our mutual friend Jim Tom Pinch in “You Call it Sports,” I was certainly “guilty.”
Thank you for the laughter, my friend. Hope you’re clacking away on a divine Smith-Corona, laughing with Blackie and them others while pinning great leads to the eternal Fort Worth Press bulletin board.