Murray Olderman (March 27, 1922 – June 10, 2020) was an American sports cartoonist and writer. His artwork often accompanied the sports stories he authored. His art also has been used by the

Pro Football Hall of Fame The Pro Football Hall of Fame is the hall of fame for professional American football, located in Canton, Ohio. Opened on September 7, , the Hall of Fame enshrines exceptional figures in the sport of professional football, including players, coac ...

and hung above the Hall of Fame busts. The Hall of Fame made all of the artwork digital so it must be accessed by visitors to the hall through electronic kiosks.

Early life and education

Olderman was born in

Manhattan, New York Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. stat ...

, the son of Jennie (Steinberg), a homemaker, and Max Olderman, who worked in the garment industry. His parents were Russian Jewish immigrants. He aspired to be a sportswriter at an early age. When he was in his teens, he wrote sports columns for a county weekly. He practiced drawing cartoons through trial and error. One of his drawings was first published in ''

The Columbia Missourian The ''Columbia Missourian'' is a digital-first newspaper based in Columbia, Missouri, published online seven days a week and in print five days a week. The newspaper is affiliated with the Missouri School of Journalism, and is owned as a 501c3 no ...

'' during his junior year at the

University of Missouri The University of Missouri (Mizzou, MU, or Missouri) is a public land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus University of Missouri System. MU was founded ...

. Olderman graduated from

with a B.J. degree, Stanford University with a B.S. in humanities, and

Northwestern University Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world. Chart ...

Medill School of Journalism The Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications is a constituent school of Northwestern University that offers both undergraduate and graduate programs. It frequently ranks as the top school of journalism in the Unite ...

with a master's degree in journalism.

Career

Olderman was hired by the

McClatchy Newspapers The McClatchy Company, commonly referred to as simply McClatchy, is an American publishing company incorporated under Delaware's General Corporation Law and based in Sacramento, California. It operates 29 daily newspapers in fourteen states an ...

of Sacramento as a sports cartoonist. Olderman's work appeared in 750 daily newspapers for the greater part of 35 years. His columns and cartoons were distributed by the

Newspaper Enterprise Association The Newspaper Enterprise Association (NEA) is an editorial column and comic strip newspaper syndication service based in the United States and established in 1902. The oldest syndicate still in operation, the NEA was originally a secondary ne ...

(NEA), a Scripps-Howard syndicate. Olderman's employment with the NEA began in 1952; he became its sports editor in 1964; executive editor in 1968; and a contributing editor in 1971. Although he "retired" in 1987, he was active until the news service was overtaken by a larger corporation. Olderman is the founder of the

Jim Thorpe Trophy The Jim Thorpe Memorial Trophy was an American football award presented by the Newspaper Enterprise Association (NEA) to the most valuable player (MVP) of the National Football League (NFL) from 1955 to 2008. It was the only NFL MVP award whose ...

, for the National Football League’s Most Valuable Player, and distributed by the Newspaper Enterprise Association. He also founded the NEA's

All-Pro All-Pro is an honor bestowed upon professional American football players that designates the best player at each position during a given season. All-Pro players are typically selected by press organizations, who select an "All-Pro team," a list t ...

team in 1955, which ran through 1992. It was considered the "player's All-Pro team", since Olderman would poll NFL players to compile the team, as opposed to other publications which was based on writers' opinions.

Awards

Olderman received the

National Cartoonist Society The National Cartoonists Society (NCS) is an organization of professional cartoonists in the United States. It presents the National Cartoonists Society Awards. The Society was born in 1946 when groups of cartoonists got together to entertain the ...

Sports Cartoon Award for 1974 and 1978. He received the Pro Football Writers Association

Dick McCann Memorial Award The Bill Nunn Jr. Award is bestowed annually by the Professional Football Writers of America (PFWA) to a reporter for their "long and distinguished contribution to pro football through coverage". It is named after Bill Nunn Jr., who worked for 22 ...

in 1979, which is considered to be the writer's wing of the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Olderman was inducted into the

National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association The National Sports Media Association (NSMA), formerly the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association, is an organization of sports media members in the United States, and constitutes the American chapter of the International Sports P ...

Hall of Fame in 1993. In 1997 he was inducted to the

International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame The International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame ( he, יד לאיש הספורט היהודי, translit=Yad Le'ish HaSport HaYehudi) was opened July 7, 1981 in Netanya, Israel. It honors Jewish athletes and their accomplishments from anywhere aroun ...

. He was inducted into the Northwestern University Medill Hall of Achievement for 2014. Olderman was a longtime resident of

Rancho Mirage, California Rancho Mirage is a city in Riverside County, California, United States. The population was 17,218 at the 2010 census, up from 13,249 at the 2000 census, but the seasonal (part-time) population can exceed 20,000. Incorporated in 1973 and located ...

, and died there on June 10, 2020.

Books

* Prentice-Hall series: ** ''The Pro Quarterbacks'' (1967) ** ''The Running Backs'' (1969) ** ''The Defenders'' (1980) * ''Starr: My Life in Football'', with

Bart Starr Bryan Bartlett Starr (January 9, 1934 – May 26, 2019) was an American professional football quarterback and head coach for the Green Bay Packers of the National Football League (NFL). He played college football at the University of Al ...

(William Morrow & Co, 1987) * ''Mingling With Lions: The Greats of Sports Up Close'' (Seven Locks Press, 2004) — Olderman's career as a sportswriter and the people he has met along the way. Filled with sketches. * ''Angels in the Forest'' (iUniverse, Inc., 2006)— memoir written with Earl Greif about the latter's survival from a ghetto massacre during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

and how he escaped

the Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...

* ''Just Win, Baby—the

Al Davis Allen Davis (July 4, 1929 – October 8, 2011) was an American football coach and executive. He was the principal owner and general manager of the Oakland Raiders of the National Football League (NFL) for 39 years, from 1972 until his death in ...

Story'' (Triumph Books, 2012) — a biography of the late owner of the

Oakland Raiders The Oakland Raiders were a professional American football team that played in Oakland from its founding in 1960 to 1981 and again from 1995 to 2019 before relocating to the Las Vegas metropolitan area where they now play as the Las Vegas Ra ...

* ''A Year Apart... Letters from War-Torn Europe'' (Saint Johann Press, 2013) — based on letters written from Europe at the end of

by the author to this wife, with added commentary. * ''The Draw of Sport'' (Fantagraphics, 2017) — Cartoons and sketches of more than 150 prominent sports figures by Olderman, each accompanied by an essay by Olderman, sharing his memories of them.

References

External links

*
Lambiek Comiclopedia article.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Olderman, Murray American cartoonists American caricaturists American columnists Dick McCann Memorial Award recipients 1922 births 2020 deaths University of Missouri alumni Stanford University alumni Medill School of Journalism alumni People from Spring Valley, New York Jewish American artists Artists from New York City Writers from New York City 21st-century American Jews