Jerry Josey

Year Inducted: 2019

Jerry Josey came up from the ranks in true old school newspaper fashion beginning as a carrier for the Statesville Daily Record. In the fall of 1947, he began helping cover county basketball games and by another year the high school student was considered part of the sports staff. Jerry graduated from Statesville High School in 1949 and served in the U.S. Navy in the Pacific during the Korean conflict. Before his discharge he worked in the military newspaper office at Pearl Harbor.

After the service, he worked briefly for the Lenoir Topic before joining the newly-merged Statesville Record & Landmark in 1954 as its first full-time Sports Editor. In 1962, Jerry was promoted to City Editor and by his retirement in 1998 had risen to Executive Editor. His by-line, however, continued to appear on the sports pages as he filled in as Sports Editor in the late 1960s and often contributed columns about sports in general and specific sporting events.

Jerry was a decorated sportswriter. In 1961, he was honored at the North Carolina Sportswriters and Sportscasters Hall of Fame banquet as the winner of their Community Service Award for Sportswriters. Jerry also won multiple North Carolina Press Association awards in the Spot Sports Reporting Category. A judge praised one of his winning entries as “excellent entertaining writing in colorful style.”