Wabash College Athletics Hall of Fame
If the old Irish proverb is correct, that the work praises the man, all necessary to raise you to the Wabash Athletic Hall of Fame would be to list your activities as champion of all the sports activities at Wabash College since 1987.
Hired to be Sports Information Director a few days before your graduation, you hit the ground running. Your pace has accelerated over your eight years as Sports Information Director, and in the last five as Director of Public Affairs. You never seemed to notice that Wabash is a small Division III college. You proceeded as if you were working for the most spectacular professional team – in every sport! As SID you attended a minimum of 570 sporting events; cleaned the press box; sold program ads; wrote and ran off thousands of press releases (usually alone in Kane House on Saturday nights except for the ever-devoted Chris;) produced nationally and regionally ranked media guides; wrote for Wabash Magazine, and the local newspaper; served as SID for the Indiana Collegiate Athletic Conference; shot hundreds of game and team photographs; persuaded ESPN2 to broadcast the Monon Bell game live; and worked closely enough with a Sports Illustrated writer sent to describe the 100th Monon Bell game that it hardly seemed DePauw was part of the rivalry. Those are some of the professional accomplishments that caused coach Mac Petty and many others to say that you put the Wabash sports information office on the map.
Former football great Sean Lyons ’95 describes your contributions to the individual athletes: “He’s an icon, a Wabash legend. He makes it a better place because he highlights things that would go unnoticed otherwise.” You are always there for the Wabash athletes, fueling their energy level with your own. Jumping around the sidelines in the snow; waiting in the rain at the finish line; or sweltering in the spring heat of a baseball game, you are there for them. With equal intensity you can chew out an errant referee and hug a defensive lineman who outweighs you 2 to 1. You have seen parents through the heartache of their son’s injuries and coaches through rough seasons. Jim, you have brought as much energy and credit to the athletics program as our finest athletes. As fiercely partisan as you are, you still show our competitors what it means to be a Wabash gentleman.
With many sports seasons still before you, James Lee Amidon, Jr., the National Association of Wabash Men is pleased to induct you into the Wabash College Athletic Hall of Fame.
