David Myers Photo Collection
David Myers Photo Collection
David Myers Photo Collection
David Myers Photo Collection
David Myers Photo Collection
David Myers captured this moment with Charlie Smith of Simon Kenton just before the ball hit his glove. The runner is unidentified. Myers worked for the News Journal editorial staff for 11 years.
A bespectacled Wilmington High School hurdler clears the barrier along with several other track and field athletes in a photo taken by David Myers.
David Myers
A trio of Clinton County Sports Hall of Famers are in this David Myers photo, Phil Snow (25) of Sabina, Bobby Hooper (20) of Simon Kenton and Larry Miller (23) of Sabina during one of the great basketball games in Clinton County history. Said Myers’ sister Margaret, “I am fairly sure that this photo was from the game that David had headlined as the anticipated “Armageddon” between Sabina and Kenton. It was played in the newly built Wilmington gym because neither Sabina nor Kenton had capacity for the presold tickets.”
Sabina’s Larry Miller hits the tape first in the 100-meter dash, setting a record for the county in an image taken by David Myers.
Many of David Myers photos that appeared in the Wilmington News Journal more than 60 years ago were ground-breaking images.
His written word, like the photos, is still remembered by those he covered to this day. In short, David was simply one of the best to ever cover sports in our area.
Myers died June 26 in California. He was 86.
“David Myers ‘documented’ many of my husband’s high school (Sabina) and college (Miami University) basketball games,” Vicki Snow wrote of Myers’ coverage of her husband Phil. “David’s photographs in the Wilmington News-Journal are ‘legendary’ and ahead of their time. We bid a fond farewell to a long ago friend.”
Though he had penned numerous stories for the News Journal, mostly about 4-H, it appears his first official sports byline was on Sept. 19, 1955, reporting on a Wilmington College football game against Adrian College. He was a senior in high school at Simon Kenton.
In the spring of 1957, Myers began covering high school sports for the News Journal on a full-time basis, with general assignment duties and feature writing, along with award-winning photography. He began working full-time at the WNJ when he was 19.
He won three awards in the Ohio Press Photographers Association after becoming the News Journal’s full-time photographer in 1962.
“He was my camp counselor at the Clifton 4-H camp when I was 10 or 11 years old,” Charlie Smith wrote with Myers’ obituary. “His value was crucial to us youngsters experiencing our first away from home alone.
“David is mentioned often when I show a photo taken by him to my friends which appeared in the News Journal about 1960. It was of me in baseball action and I always point out the baseball in flight is so clear you can see the stitches. His contributions to the coverage of local sports is still recognized and appreciated to this day.”
That Myers was such a hit, pun intended, as a sports writer and photographer is not surprising.
In a May 24, 1957 column “The Daily Grist” by Dusty Miller, it was said Myers “has the knack of lead-paragraphing that any big-time newspaper would like to have. Just you watch.”
Butch Hooper, an athlete during Myers’ time at the WNJ, recalled many nights when his father Vernon would be on the phone with Myers reporting the results of a game. Vernon Hooper Sr. was a legendary coach in Clinton County.
“I remember Dad being on the phone with (David) for hours after a game,” Butch Hooper said. “There were 10 or 11 schools in the county at the time. David was everywhere. Win or lose, Dad felt like he should call because he knew David was interested. I remember Dad going in on a Saturday morning, giving David information on the Friday games. David did such a good job with all the schools, even though he was from Simon Kenton.”
From November to February on Friday nights, there were as many as 6-10 games to cover, counting the games any of the 12 teams played beyond the Clinton County league. Myers produced coverage for all of them, with photos and game recaps published the next morning in the eagerly anticipated Saturday edition of the News Journal.
According to David’s sister Margaret and brother John, David — along with his wife Marilyn who assisted him — covered three of the county basketball games on Friday nights, driving from one location to the next and to the next within the time period of the varsity games. The rest of the games were covered by a team he recruited and assigned to take photos — J.J. Florea, Larry Curliss, Bill Dougherty, and David’s brother John Myers.
Late on Friday nights, everyone returned with their film to David’s house where he had a darkroom in his basement. David developed all the film, hung the film strips to dry, called the coaches for their comments on the games, went back to the darkroom to print the images he carefully selected from all the film strips, wrote the story of each game, and oversaw the making of the engraved plates that the photos would be printed from for the eagerly anticipated Saturday edition of the News Journal. Every Friday night was a hectic all-nighter.
The result was unprecedented quality coverage of high school sports. David developed a technique of shooting fast-moving action without flash, “pushing” the recently released Kodak Tri-X black-and-white film far beyond its stated speed. He had the eye and the timing to catch action at its peak. The photos in the News Journal showed the athleticism of the players in an inspired way that seemed to fuel the elevated level of play itself.
The technique was far ahead of its time, with other much larger newspapers calling to find out how the News Journal was producing such photo coverage. David freely shared the details of exactly how he was doing it with whomever asked, including answering a Letter to the Editor that asked the same question, Margaret and John said.
The impact of the photos and game stories was intense. As one star high school player of the time recently wrote, the Myers family passed along:
“Everyone David touched felt the intensity, professionalism, talent, and funny side of David Myers. There was nothing more important to Clinton County residents than sports, which meant high school basketball. David and his team brought that to life in words and pictures. Everyone could not wait to get the Saturday edition of the Wilmington News Journal. Even if you lost, there was a fair and accurate reporting of the game. Of course, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t look to see if I made it into a photo first. My mom cut out and kept every clipping. She looked at and read the scrapbook clippings many, many times. It helped her to understand better why her son spent almost every night shooting hoops in the dark at Sabina high school until at least 11 p.m. Those words and pictures meant a lot then, and they still mean a lot today. We did not realize how lucky we were to have grown up in the David Myers era of reporting, but it is great that we try to acknowledge that now.”
