Venerable Bowling Writer Dick Evans Dies

ARLINGTON, TX — Dick Evans, an award winning writer for both The Miami Herald and Daytona Beach News- Journal, died Sunday, July 4 in Daytona Beach, Fla. He was 78.

Evans began his journalism career in 1943 as a paper boy for the Miami News. He started his 60-year association with the Miami Herald at 17 first as a copy-boy, then eventually moving to the sports department where he wrote about all high school sports, college football, boxing, bowling, golf, tennis, water skiing, wrestling, horse/dog/harness races, jai-alai and also served a short stint as interim religious editor. In 1957 he began covering his favorite sport - bowling. He retired from the Herald in 1989 and moved to Daytona Beach, Fla. Where he continued to write a monthly bowling column that appeared in numerous bowling publications in the U.S. and overseas.

In 1990 he was hired by the Professional Bowlers Association (PBA) as its media director for the PBA Senior tour where he worked 77 tournaments over the next seven years.

Evans had the distinction of being the first daily newspaper reporter inducted into the PBA Hall of Fame (1986) and also the American Bowling Congress' Hall of Fame (1992). Among his many awards, Evans received the Billiards' and Bowling Industry Service award in 1986 and in 2007 he was awarded the Bowling Proprietors' Association of America V.A. "Chief" Wapensky award, which recognizes an individual who has made a major contribution to the advancement of the bowling industry. He was also a past president of the Bowling Writers Association of America.

Dick Evans is survived by his wife Joan Gano Evans, son Richard V. Evans, an attorney in Louisville, Ky., and three grandchildren — Peyton, Carter and Walker. Arrangements are pending