Dick Snider

Writing of and about the late newspaper columnist Dick Snider

A few nice words about Dick Snider

Posted on April 27, 2012 by Editor

(In March 2001, Topeka Capital-Journal outdoor writer Jim Ramberg penned this birthday bouquet. Ramberg, a friend of my Dad’s and a regular visitor in the final days, passed in 2007. To read writer Rick Dean’s excellent obit in the C-J, click here.)

Outdoor notes compiled while coming up with a tribute to fellow columnist Dick Snider, who celebrated his 80th birthday a couple days ago.

Let’s see. Dick Snider is …

Well, let’s start off first with some outdoor notes while I think about this. Continue reading →

Columnist Dick Snider dies at 83

Posted on April 27, 2012 by Editor

With Will Snider

By Rick Dean, Topeka Capital-Journal

It once was said that the mark of a good newspaper columnist was the ability to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.

By that criteria alone, as well as several others, Dick Snider was a great newspaper columnist.

Snider, the longtime Topeka Capital-Journal columnist and former sports editor, died Saturday after a short battle with cancer. He was 83.

A former oil industry executive, he worked briefly in the Kennedy administration before producing “College Football” — a long- running highlights show for the ABC network in the 1960s.

A man who walked comfortably in the world of sports, politics and business, Snider’s ability to apply a sharply pointed needle to people in power, as well as to himself and those he loved, made him as popular with readers as he was pilloried by politicians. Continue reading →