In the beginning ...
It started in 1950 when William Randolph Hearst was still in charge of the Los Angeles Examiner. He wanted his sports section to be the paper of record for prep sports in Southern California. Hearst beckoned his track and field writer, journeyman journalist Ralph Alexander and asked him to assemble a band of high school writers who would cover their team's sports in exchange for meal money and a byline in the Examiner or the Los Angeles Herald Express, the afternoon Hearst paper in town.
Alexander did not have to be encouraged. He and his wife, Millie, had a strong affinity for helping kids. They had adopted Kathleen when she was a toddler to give her a better chance at success in life, and Ralph frequently mentored high school writers.
Thus began the Scholastic Sports Association. Most of the boys covered football, baseball, basketball and track at their local high schools and phoned the results in to a core group who gathered at SSA headquarters in downtown Los Angeles clacking away on old Smith Corona typewriters and wearing ancient head sets. The kids in the field got a byline in the paper. The boys with the drive working in Los Angeles got four dimes (for meal money) and an education in life and journalism that was incomparable. Working under the curmudgeonly glare of Alexander, the sports writers learned how to write compelling stories on deadline.
They also earned a slot in 1951 at the first ever high school journalism workshop at California State Polytechnic University in San Luis Obispo – not far from Hearst’s beloved San Simeon. There the boys learned the academics of sports writing, photography, layout and other aspects of journalism under the tutelage of Alexander and several other key members of the Hearst journalism family.
It was supposed to be a one-shot deal. But Alexander knew a good thing for his “kids” and encouraged Hearst to sponsor a second workshop in 1952. And a third in 53. And a fourth. And a fifth. A sixth…