Hall of Fame
Jim Bailey, a native of Emerson, is Southern Arkansas University’s first Sports Hall of Fame Inductee for Meritorious Service. He was a student at SAU in the early 1950’s, the beginning of a long and illustrious career as a sports writer. While at SAU, his distinguished career began by writing about Mulerider athletic teams. After graduation, he began a long career in the sports department of the Arkansas Gazette in 1956
For more than 35 years, he covered the Arkansas Travelers baseball team, Southwest Conference football and basketball, the Arkansas Intercollegiate Conference (AIC) and the St. Louis Cardinals. He covered the Travelers for 30 seasons, the AIC for 20 years, the SWC for a decade, worked the St. Louis Cardinal beat for five years and covered the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame 43 of its first 44 years. Bailey and the late sports editor Orville Henry formulated one of the top journalistic duos in the newspaper industry in the nation.
Bailey’s peers voted him Arkansas’ “Best Writer” an incredible 16 times. He has captured Associated Press and national honors, including an award from the National Sportswriters and Broadcasters Association in 1963.
Bailey co-authored a book with Henry “The Razorbacks,” published in 1973, and co-authored Frank Broyles’ autobiography in 1979.
Following the sale of the Arkansas Gazette, he worked for the Arkansas Times before retiring in 1998. Following retirement, he continues to write freelance for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
Bailey received a Distinguished Southern Arkansas University Alumnus Award in 1990 and was inducted into the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame February 28, 2003.
