J. Roy Stockton
J. Roy Stockton was an influential American sports journalist, born on December 16, 1892, in St. Louis, Missouri. He began his career in journalism after leaving college, initially working for the St. Louis Republic and later the St. Louis Globe-Democrat. In 1917, he joined the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, where he would spend most of his nearly forty-year career. Known for his clean writing style and engaging storytelling, Stockton became particularly renowned for his coverage of baseball, especially the St. Louis Cardinals.
Throughout his career, he wrote a popular sports column called "Extra Innings" and was an early pioneer of sports talk shows. His most notable work includes a series of articles about the vibrant Cardinals teams of the 1930s, which were later published in his book, *The Gashouse Gang and a Couple of Other Guys*. Beyond baseball, he was involved in various roles, including serving as the sports editor for the Post-Dispatch and briefly as president of the Florida State League.
Stockton received recognition for his contributions to sports journalism, including the J. G. Taylor Spink Award in 1972, shortly before his passing from leukemia on August 24 of that year. His legacy continues through his writings and the impact he had on sports journalism.
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Subject Terms
J. Roy Stockton
Writer
- Born: December 16, 1892
- Birthplace: St. Louis, Missouri
- Died: August 24, 1972
Biography
James Roy Stockton was born on December 16, 1892, in St. Louis, Missouri. As a child he played baseball, football, and basketball and also hunted, fished, and read widely. He graduated from McKinley High School in St. Louis, and in 1910 he enrolled at Washington University. Partway through his junior year he quit college to become a reporter for the St. Louis Republic, a daily newspaper, covering sports and local news. From 1915 to 1917 he wrote for the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, which sent him to Cuba to cover the St. Louis Federal League team’s spring training.
In 1917, Stockton became a reporter for the St. Louis Post- Dispatch, where he remained for most of the next forty years. After fifteen months of military service in World War I, he returned to the Post-Dispatch in 1919 and joined the sports department the following year. In 1921, he married Charlotte Burton, a professional violinist and musicologist. The couple had one son, Richard.
Stockton was recognized for his clean writing style, which he credited to his apprenticeship under skillful editors. He covered many sports during his career, but baseball was his favorite. He started covering the St. Louis Browns in 1922, and in 1926 began his long association with the St. Louis Cardinals. By the mid- 1930’s, he was writing a popular column, “Extra Innings,” appearing regularly on the radio as an announcer and the host of one of the first sports talk shows, and writing articles for the Saturday Evening Post. He began a friendship with the pitcher Jay “Dizzy” Dean, writing humorous pieces about Dean and sometimes ghostwriting for him.
Stockton’s most important work was the series of articles he wrote for the Saturday Evening Post about the Gas House Gang, the colorful Cardinals’ baseball teams of the 1930’s and early 1940’s. The articles were collected and published in Stockton’s first book, The Gashouse Gang and a Couple of Other Guys. In 1946, he became sports editor for the Post-Dispatch, and he provided his reporters with the kind of guidance he received in his early career. In 1953, Stockton’s wife Charlotte died, and he wrote his last piece for the Saturday Evening Post. That same year, he collected his earlier pieces about Cardinals manager Rogers Hornsby and published them as a book, My Kind of Baseball, giving Hornsby most of the writing credit.
Stockton married Josephine Knox Rassieur in 1954. He retired from the Post-Dispatch in 1958 and moved to St. Petersburg, Florida, where he continued to write occasional articles. In 1963, he became president of baseball’s Class A Florida State League, but he held the job for less than a year before the demands of the job proved too much for him. He died of leukemia on August 24, 1972, at the age of seventy-nine.
Over a long career, Stockton was consistently a solid and popular writer. His peers recognized his work by electing him president of the Baseball Writers’ Association in 1932 and by awarding him the J. G. Taylor Spink Award in 1972. The Gashouse Gang was a best-seller and a critical success.