Harper: From hobby to profession

For more than three decades, Billy Harper covered the sports beat in the Athens area, expertly utilizing his to-the-point prose to create scrapbook memories for multiple generations throughout the region.

The Augusta native, who moved to Athens in 1959 to attend the University of Georgia, served as a sports writer and editor at the Athens Banner-Herald and the Athens Daily News from 1968 until his retirement in 1997. Along the way, he was the local writer of record for some 30 Masters tournaments, more than his share of postseason bowl games, one Final Four and the Georgia football team's 1980 national championship season.

Harper is only the second journalist to be inducted into the Athens Athletic Hall of Fame, joining the iconic Edwin Pope. He's obviously pleased with the honor, but appears happiest that he spent his life in a job he loved.

"I knew going in that (journalism) wasn't the best-paying profession, but for me, the job was like a hobby," said Harper, who was the longest-serving sports editor in Banner-Herald/Daily News history. "I got paid to go to games and talk to coaches and athletes. It was what I always wanted to do - I'd even go in on Sunday mornings sometimes to write. It sure wasn't a 9-5 job - I was never suited for that. I guess you can put it this way - I got paid to cover Georgia football."

The most memorable events Harper covered included that 1980 championship season, the Georgia men's basketball team's run to the Final Four in 1983 and the 1996 Masters, when 46-year-old Jack Nicklaus shocked the field with his come-from-behind victory.

"Covering that Final Four was terrific fun," he said. "I went to Albuquerque, but before that I went to Syracuse to see Georgia beat North Carolina, which was interesting because they won the national championship the year before and had Michael Jordan and Sam Perkins, who I remember saying he didn't even know what conference Georgia played in. I was lucky to be able to cover some really great events."

When asked about some of the personalities he most enjoyed covering, Harper listed a litany of familiar names, including Herschel Walker, Vince Dooley, Eric Zeier, Billy Henderson, Dan Magill, Pete Maravich, Howard Cosell and Mickey Mantle. One of his most favorite subjects might surprise a his longtime readers, however.

"I think the best interview I ever has was with Bill Goldberg," Harper said of the defensive lineman whose brief NFL career was overshadowed by his meteoric rise in the late 1990s as a professional wrestler. "You'd say hello to Bill and he'd take over. You didn't even need to ask any questions. He was just terrific."

Although Athens benefited from Harper's expertise, his most significant contribution to journalism at large was the coaching and mentoring he provided for scores of writers and editors through his many years here.

"My goal was for people to enjoy themselves and to enjoy their work," he said. "I wasn't a tough boss and I wasn't real strict - I let people do their own thing. I don't think I ever got mad at anybody more than once. I wanted to be more than a boss - I wanted to be a friend. Too many people dread going to work every day. I wanted this to be a place where people wanted to come to work."

Harper covered dozens of major sporting events, but said he never grew tired of the Friday night lights.

"I really enjoyed following the high schools," he said. "I can remember when we'd write a feature about every starter on the Clarke Central and Cedar Shoals football teams. It was a lot of fun, and that's probably what I hear the most from folks. I was getting my car worked on recently and Troy Porterfield (of Porterfield Tire) told me that his mother still had clippings of stories I'd written about him. And I recently met a woman who pulled a column I had written in 1978 from her purse. You know when they keep it like that, it means a lot to them."

A four-time honoree as the Georgia Sports Writers Association's columnist of the year, Harper has won more than 60 writing and section awards. Prior to coming to Athens (where he started out as the business editor and police reporter), he worked at the Greenwood (S.C.) Index Journal, the Spartanburg Herald and the Atlanta Journal.

And while Harper is best known in town for his newspaper service, there's another group of people who know him as the guy they see at mid-morning, running on Milledge Avenue. He's been hitting the pavement in and around the University of Georgia campus for 34 years.

Harper and his wife, the former Francis Barrow Hodge of Athens, have been married for 47 years and have two daughters and five grandchildren.

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