2008 Woodie Awards
Reasons to mourn the unknown
Richard Lowe
Issue date: 12/3/07 Section: Sports
Everyone has felt the sadness of his or her team losing a game. This past week, Middle Tennessee fans felt the sadness of losing a member of our team. Many fans of the Blue Raiders had never heard the name of John Wilson until he passed away on Nov. 23 in a fire at his home in Watertown, Tenn. Little do they know, the Blue Raider nation has admired the work of Wilson for several years now.
Wilson worked with MT on their football and men's basketball coaches' shows, providing footage of the games that were showcased each week. Since his passing, memories have been shared on and off camera of his time working in the middle Tennessee area. As much as I enjoyed those memories, I could not contribute to the conversation. I never got a chance to meet John Wilson.
I sit in the same place today as many sports fan whenever a death arises. The unique thing about the entertainment industry is that when someone passes away it is like your favorite aunt just died. Many of us have never met the athletes we idolize. We just admire from a distance or, thanks to the technological advances of television cameras, observe up close. The nation was in mourning when John Lennon was killed in front of his home in Manhattan. It didn't matter that 90% of the people that knew of Lennon did not actually know him.
A more recent example is this week's passing of Sean Taylor, the Washington Redskins safety that was gunned down inside of his home in Miami. Even with his checkered past, that were no ill words spoken about Taylor after his death. I am not a Redskins fan and even I wanted to shed a tear for the fallen NFL player.
This brings about the question of "Why would you mourn the loss of people you don't know?" In order to be upset about losing someone, they have to have provided something in your life. Very rarely will we see someone in near-depression over the passing of a random person. There is no emotional connection to the victims. If the reason of "I watched them on TV" comes to mind then you aren't digging deep enough.
This is the situation I found myself in when it came to the passing of John Wilson. Nobody asked me to mourn him. Wilson's legacy stretches far enough that the presence of a bandwagon would be insulting. But there I was on Nov. 25 inside of the Kennon Hall of Fame building listening to Charlie McAlexander talk about the dedication of Wilson and how much of a perfectionist he was. Then it struck me; I saw myself in John Wilson.
For years, I was running around the Murphy Center Complex, just wishing someone would say "hello" to me first instead of vice versa. I grabbed a camera from MTTV and started getting footage of athletic events on my own to prove that I didn't need any handouts. I started TV shows and wrote for Web site even though I just wanted to do a sports radio show. I wanted to be the guy everyone looked to and said, "He knows what he is doing."
I will miss John Wilson not because of the relationship he had, or didn't have with me. I will miss him because of the relationship he had with this university. I will miss John Wilson for the same reason everyone misses those they don't know personally; he was always there, even when we didn't know it. You can't ask for anything more.
Richard Lowe is a junior broadcast journalism major and can be reached at rlowe@mtsutv.org
Wilson worked with MT on their football and men's basketball coaches' shows, providing footage of the games that were showcased each week. Since his passing, memories have been shared on and off camera of his time working in the middle Tennessee area. As much as I enjoyed those memories, I could not contribute to the conversation. I never got a chance to meet John Wilson.
I sit in the same place today as many sports fan whenever a death arises. The unique thing about the entertainment industry is that when someone passes away it is like your favorite aunt just died. Many of us have never met the athletes we idolize. We just admire from a distance or, thanks to the technological advances of television cameras, observe up close. The nation was in mourning when John Lennon was killed in front of his home in Manhattan. It didn't matter that 90% of the people that knew of Lennon did not actually know him.
A more recent example is this week's passing of Sean Taylor, the Washington Redskins safety that was gunned down inside of his home in Miami. Even with his checkered past, that were no ill words spoken about Taylor after his death. I am not a Redskins fan and even I wanted to shed a tear for the fallen NFL player.
This brings about the question of "Why would you mourn the loss of people you don't know?" In order to be upset about losing someone, they have to have provided something in your life. Very rarely will we see someone in near-depression over the passing of a random person. There is no emotional connection to the victims. If the reason of "I watched them on TV" comes to mind then you aren't digging deep enough.
This is the situation I found myself in when it came to the passing of John Wilson. Nobody asked me to mourn him. Wilson's legacy stretches far enough that the presence of a bandwagon would be insulting. But there I was on Nov. 25 inside of the Kennon Hall of Fame building listening to Charlie McAlexander talk about the dedication of Wilson and how much of a perfectionist he was. Then it struck me; I saw myself in John Wilson.
For years, I was running around the Murphy Center Complex, just wishing someone would say "hello" to me first instead of vice versa. I grabbed a camera from MTTV and started getting footage of athletic events on my own to prove that I didn't need any handouts. I started TV shows and wrote for Web site even though I just wanted to do a sports radio show. I wanted to be the guy everyone looked to and said, "He knows what he is doing."
I will miss John Wilson not because of the relationship he had, or didn't have with me. I will miss him because of the relationship he had with this university. I will miss John Wilson for the same reason everyone misses those they don't know personally; he was always there, even when we didn't know it. You can't ask for anything more.
Richard Lowe is a junior broadcast journalism major and can be reached at rlowe@mtsutv.org
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