J. G. Taylor Spink
J. G. Taylor Spink was a significant figure in American sports journalism, best known for his long tenure as the publisher of *The Sporting News*, a prominent sports publication. Born in 1888 in St. Louis, Missouri, Spink came from a family with a rich legacy, including a grandfather who was a legislator in Quebec. His early life involved selling copies of *The Sporting News*, which was managed by his father, Charles Claude Spink. After dropping out of school, he quickly advanced from a copyboy to a pivotal role in his father's publication.
In 1909, he published *The Sporting News Record Book*, which became popular for its reliable sporting statistics. Following his father's death in 1914, Spink took over the publication and implemented substantial changes, including the introduction of a network of sports correspondents and expanding the newspaper's circulation both domestically and internationally. He was known for his fearless writing style, often taking a stand against dishonesty in sports. Additionally, Spink engaged in baseball politics and authored a book critiquing judicial interference in the sport. He continued to lead *The Sporting News* until his death in 1962, leaving behind a lasting impact on sports journalism.
On this Page
Subject Terms
J. G. Taylor Spink
- Born: November 6, 1888
- Birthplace: St. Louis, Missouri
- Died: December 7, 1962
- Place of death: St. Louis, Missouri
Biography
John George Taylor Spink came from a large, interesting, and illustrious family. His paternal grandfather, William Spink, was a legislator in Quebec, Canada, who immigrated to the United States with his wife, Frances Woodbury Spink, and their eight children around the time of the Civil War, eventually settling in Chicago. The boys in the family had been cricket players in Canada, but in the United States they soon gravitated toward the American pastime, baseball.
Spink was born in 1888 in St. Louis, Missouri, where his parents, Charles Claude and Marie Taylor Spink, moved from the South Dakota property they were homesteading after Charles was offered an opportunity to become business manager of the Sporting News. Charles’s brother, Al, had purchased this publication in 1886 with a loan from his father-in-law and with help from his nephew, Ernest J. Lanigan, who gained fame as a baseball statistician, was making it a resounding success.
By the time he was in grammar school, Spink’s father conscripted him to sell four copies a week of Sporting News, which he did easily, along with selling issues of the Saturday Evening Post. Never a devoted student, Spink dropped out of school after the tenth grade. After working for five months at the Rawling Sporting Goods Company, he became a copyboy in the sports department of the St. Louis Post- Dispatch, then one of the leading newspapers in the United States. After six months at that job, he quit to work for his father at Sporting News, which his father now owned.
Spink rotated through most of the menial jobs at the publication while learning to write about sports. In 1909, he published The Sporting News Record Book, which presented reliable sporting statistics and gained considerable popularity. Despite a grueling schedule that included working on Saturdays and Sundays, on April 15, 1914, Spink took time out to marry Blanche Keene. The couple had two children. While he was on his honeymoon, he received word that his father had died. At that point, Taylor, was placed in charge of Sporting News and of the corporation his father had headed.
Spink made substantial changes in Sporting News, creating a network of sports correspondents who covered sporting events, presenting them in a fresh and varied manner to readers. He also arranged to sell 150,000 copies of each issue outside the United States and greatly increased the publication’s domestic circulation. Spink died in 1962 while he was in his office, working on the next issue of Sporting News; he had published the periodical for forty-eight years.
Spink was fearless in his writing and publishing, with his publication attacking any form of dishonesty in the sports it covered. He also became involved in the politics of baseball when he published his book, Judge Landis and Twenty-Five Years of Baseball, a response to attempts by the judicial system to control the sport of baseball.