Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
For more than 30 years, John Kiesewetter has been the source for information about all things in local media — comings and goings, local people appearing on the big or small screen, special programs, and much more. Contact John at johnkiese@yahoo.com.

Services Sunday June 14 For Lonnie Wheeler, Cincinnati Sportswriter And Author

lonnie wheeler books
Courtesy of Amazon
Books written by Lonnie Wheeler include, clockwise from top left, 'Intangiball;' 'Long Shot;' 'Sixty Feet, Six Inches;' and 'Pitch by Pitch.'

UPDATED 11 A.M. FRIDAY JUNE 12:  The Wheeler family will do an online Zoom memorial service for Lonnie at 2 p.m. Sunday June 14.

"We wish we could gather every single one of Lonnie's friends and family together in one big room, hear every one of your stories in person, and hang around as you inevitably tell inappropriate jokes as the crowd thins.

"In lieu of that, we are moving forward with the next best thing, which is an online Zoom memorial gathering.

Attendance will be capped at 300 people. Here's the link to the Zoom session, and info for those wanting  to speak at the service.

UPDATE THURSDAY, JUNE 11, 9:15 A.M.: More tributes to Lonnie Wheeler's writing style by his sportswriting colleagues, a story from Lonnie himself (from 2018) on his failed attempt to write a book with Aretha Franklin, and the family's statement:

Former Enquirer sports columnist Mark Purdy: "What an eye he had, and what a touch. I remember vividly one series of stories he did on 'Cincinnati’s Most Interesting Intersections.' He took a mundane thing and made it incredibly fascinating and fun to read. I think in some sense he wanted my job, and to be a regular columnist, but he was so good at the features he did. His writing was a level above what we were doing in sports—and then raised our talent level when he did work in the department."

Post colleague Bill Koch: "I was the sports columnist at The Post when Lonnie was hired as a part-time feature writer. After a while, he was asked to write columns on the days when I didn’t. Before he agreed to do it, he asked if it was OK with me. It was ridiculous for a writer of his stature to seek my permission, but that’s how Lonnie was... He was a fine man, proud of his family, and one hell of a writer. He was more than a writer. He was a writing stylist."

Associated Press sportswriter Joe Kay: "Lonnie knew the importance of detail and nuance in telling a story as fully and accurately as possible. He had an innate curiosity about people, an open-mindedness that invited dialogue, and a genuine kindness that invited others to share their stories openly. Spending time with Lonnie was a joy and a gift.

On the book he didn't write:  Wheeler explained in a 2018 Facebook postwhy he didn't end up collaborating with Aretha Franklin after meeting her in a Detroit restaurant in the mid 1990s:

"I've committed idiocy numerous times in my career, but never so blatantly as that lunch date with Aretha Franklin. This was mid-90s, and I'd just finished collaborating on Coleman Young's autobiography. He and Aretha were friends, and she called one day asking about working together on her memoir. But first, there would be a meeting at the Detroit restaurant where Jimmy Hoffa was last seen.

"I drove from Cincinnati, got there early--the only person in the place--and she pulled up in her limo, stepping out in a gold-colored robe (I could be misrepresenting that) and slippers. She ordered steak, took a look at it, pushed it away, and summoned the fish instead.

"Early on, she asked about my favorite song of hers. I had nothing. Respect, I said, unable to think of anything else. Now, if it were today, of course, I'd be all over the internet, listening, reading, immersing in advance. But that wasn't so easy in 1994, and I intended to sell her on empathy and social consciousness, figuring you can always pick up the rest as you go along. I wasn't the least bit prepared to do diva. Needless to say, we never spoke again."

No word yet on services. Here's a link to the family's statement.They suggest that donations be made to the Ohio ACLU, Urban League,City Gospel Missionor the First Church of Christ Scientist, 7341 Beechmont Ave., Anderson Township, 45230.

ORIGINAL POST NOON WEDNESDAY JUNE 10:  Lonnie Wheeler, a Cincinnati sportswriter who authored books with baseball greats Hank Aaron, Bob Gibson and Reggie Jackson, died Tuesday after a long battle with muscular dystrophy.

Wheeler, 68, worked at both the Cincinnati Enquirer and Cincinnati Post, and for USA TODAY, and wrote more than a dozen books.

Credit Courtesy Simon & Schuster
Lonnie Wheeler wrote 13 books, in addition to writing for the Enquirer and Post.

Born in St. Louis on March 27, 1952, he was first hired by the Enquirer as a features writer in 1977.  He  switched to sports in the 1980s after a stint with the start-up of USA TODAY, a sister Gannett publication.

His first two books were published in 1988: The Cincinnati Game, a Reds history with John Baskin, and Bleachers: A Summer In Wrigley Field. He was best known for collaborating with home run king Aaron on his 1991 biography, I Had A Hammer: The Hank Aaron Story.

The Aaron book opened the door to writing three books with Gibson, the Hall of Fame St. Louis Cardinals pitcher: Stanger To The Game: The Autobiography of Bob Gibson; Pitch By Pitch: My Views Of One Unforgettable Game; and Six Feet, Six Inches with Gibson and Hall of Famer Reggie Jackson.

"Lonnie Wheeler was my best man and one of the best men I have known," says Tim Sullivan of Louisville, a former Enquirer sports columnist who met Wheeler at the University of Missouri. As sports editor The Maneater, Missouri’s student newspaper, Wheeler "set high standards for both the quality of his work and the compassion he showed subjects and colleagues even as an undergraduate."

Sullivan described Wheeler "as a prose stylist who rarely raised his voice, either in person or in print, writing to reveal rather than to trigger reaction. He wrote columns for both the Enquirer and the Post, but is best known as an author of baseball biographies of Hank Aaron, Bob Gibson, Mike Piazza and, coming soon, Cool Papa Bell. His Intangiball won an award from the Society of American Baseball Research."

Peter King, NBC Sports' "NFL Insider," started his career at the Enquirer working five years with Wheeler, who was his mentor and close friend.

"Lonnie was my North Star, in writing and in life. We both lived in Mount Washington and I got to know him and his wife Martie so well. We coached a Knothole team together. The most important thing about Lonnie personally and professionally was his principled kindness. I'll take his ethos with me for the rest of my days," King said.

“Lonnie was a very good friend, devoted to his family and Christian Scientist faith, and the most talented writer I have ever known," says Wayne Buckhout, a former Enquirer business reporter. "We met as Enquirer reporters, and our families spent great times together. As his health declined, it was my privilege to spend lunchtimes with Lonnie talking about our families and politics, about his Reds and my Yankees, and our shared hopes for fairness and social justice in all aspects of American life. Anyone who reads his work, whether about baseball, basketball or anything else, will come to understand what a humble but exceptionally gifted man he was."

"I'm truly saddened to hear of Lonnie Wheeler's death," says Keith Herrell, Post sports editor from 2004 to 2007. "The Post's Sports Department doubled as a debating society, and Lonnie was undefeated, untied and unscored on without ever raising his voice. And of course he was the one we turned to for the sports centerpiece on our last day of publication."

Wheeler's other titles include Intangiball: The Subtle Things That Win Baseball Games; a Reds history called The Cincinnati Game; Cincinnati Schoolboy Legends; a University of Kentucky basketball book called Blue Yonder: Kentucky, the United States of Basketball; and biographies of Hall of Famer Mickey Mantle, Negro Leagues star Cool Papa Bell, catcher Mike Piazza and former Detroit mayor Coleman Young.

Sullivan wanted everyone to know what an outstanding writer Wheeler was, and sent me these excerpts for readers of this tribute to him:

From Bleachers: A Summer In Wrigley Field:

"My infatuation is with real places. I think of a real place one that feels different than other places, and there aren't very many of them left in America. An image I had -- I can't even say what the image was, exactly; it was just an indistinct but unmistakable something -- persuaded me that the bleacher section of Wrigley Field was such a place. . .I imagined that the bleachers at Wrigley Field were what baseball was all about, and that if I could capture the bleachers, I could capture baseball."

From I Had A Hammer: The Hank Aaron Story:

"I recall sitting on a picnic table at the Art Gaines Baseball Camp in rural Missouri as the coaches talked about hitting a baseball hard -- not high and far but hard -- and raising my hand to tell them that I had been to Busch Stadium in St. Louis and seen Hank Aaron hit a ball that banged off the left-field wall quicker than, well, I don't know what, but quicker than anybody else alive could make a baseball bang against an outfield wall. I knew that would impress them, because they were baseball people and they would know that Hank Aaron was the right name to drop in that situation."

From Stranger To The Game: The Autobiography of Bob Gibson:

"Gibson pitched the last few years on guts and brains. (Reggie) Smith would have seen him before that, when the guts and brains had legs -- long, strong, basketball legs that seemed, as he kicked and whirled and catapulted off the rubber, to make up about three-fourths… of maybe the best athlete who ever squinted at a catcher's gnarled fingers. Anybody who cares anything about baseball or has an interest in what the game used to be all about or what it's like when a great athlete takes it to the limit should have seen Bob Gibson in his prime."

Wheeler lived in Silverton with Martie. They have three adult children.

I'll add to this post when I hear from more of his coworkers, and get information about services.

John Kiesewetter, who has covered television and media for more than 35 years, has been working for Cincinnati Public Radio and WVXU-FM since 2015.