Thursday
Oct142010
Remembering Reid Hanley
Thursday, October 14, 2010 at 4:14PM
Writing from Chicago
Thursday, October 14, 2010
I don't know anybody who ever had a bad word to say about Reid Hanley. Had one ever been uttered, I would have questioned that person's judgment. He was a great competitor on the golf course, worked hard to scoop those of us who also covered golf in Chicago, and a friend to all. He'd beat you like a pinata on the course or on a story, and it was impossible to get mad at him.
Like any good Cubs fan, he was an incurable optimist. Even last month at Cog Hill, carrying a portable oxygen tank around, he sounded so optimistic about his upcoming treatment, he made his ailment seem no worse than a case of the sniffles.
That's what all of us who knew him have now. Reid died at about 2 a.m. Thursday of complications from the lung cancer he was fighting. He had just been transferred from the University of Chicago Hospitals to a hospice facility in Park Ridge. The trip proved to be too much for him. He was only 64.
When interviewing a player, Reid would invariably end it by saying, "Play hard." Reid played hard on the course, lived life the right way off the course, and had a legion of admirers. I don't want to imagine the golf scene in Chicago without him. His cheerful nature is irreplacable.
I remember him being angry only once. Reid loved pizza. I love pizza. After the second round of the 1991 Western Open – the first one held at Cog Hill – we were both hungry for pizza. We ordered one from a place in Lemont, and it was delivered to the press tent at Cog Hill. Reid and I were chowing down while writing, when out of nowhere comes this big paw sliding under a big slice. The paw belonged to Jay Mariotti, then of the Sun-Times. He grabbed the slice, then looked at us and said, "Oh, is this yours?" Reid said, "Well, we paid for it." He could have brained Mariotti.
Reid requested no wake or funeral, but there will be a private memorial in his native Iowa at a later date. Meanwhile, next time you play golf or have pizza, think of Reid Hanley, who loved life, made no enemies, and had none – unless pizza was involved.
Cheers, old pal. You don't know how much we all loved you.
– Tim Cronin
Thursday, October 14, 2010
I don't know anybody who ever had a bad word to say about Reid Hanley. Had one ever been uttered, I would have questioned that person's judgment. He was a great competitor on the golf course, worked hard to scoop those of us who also covered golf in Chicago, and a friend to all. He'd beat you like a pinata on the course or on a story, and it was impossible to get mad at him.
Like any good Cubs fan, he was an incurable optimist. Even last month at Cog Hill, carrying a portable oxygen tank around, he sounded so optimistic about his upcoming treatment, he made his ailment seem no worse than a case of the sniffles.
That's what all of us who knew him have now. Reid died at about 2 a.m. Thursday of complications from the lung cancer he was fighting. He had just been transferred from the University of Chicago Hospitals to a hospice facility in Park Ridge. The trip proved to be too much for him. He was only 64.
When interviewing a player, Reid would invariably end it by saying, "Play hard." Reid played hard on the course, lived life the right way off the course, and had a legion of admirers. I don't want to imagine the golf scene in Chicago without him. His cheerful nature is irreplacable.
I remember him being angry only once. Reid loved pizza. I love pizza. After the second round of the 1991 Western Open – the first one held at Cog Hill – we were both hungry for pizza. We ordered one from a place in Lemont, and it was delivered to the press tent at Cog Hill. Reid and I were chowing down while writing, when out of nowhere comes this big paw sliding under a big slice. The paw belonged to Jay Mariotti, then of the Sun-Times. He grabbed the slice, then looked at us and said, "Oh, is this yours?" Reid said, "Well, we paid for it." He could have brained Mariotti.
Reid requested no wake or funeral, but there will be a private memorial in his native Iowa at a later date. Meanwhile, next time you play golf or have pizza, think of Reid Hanley, who loved life, made no enemies, and had none – unless pizza was involved.
Cheers, old pal. You don't know how much we all loved you.
– Tim Cronin
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