He Wrote About The Game Of Life- Bob Balfe, May 26, 1909 – Dec. 22, 1987

Bob Balfe covered sports for The Palm Beach Post and Evening Times for more than half a century. He worked 14-hour days and seven-day weeks, developing a style and philosophy that caused people to describe him as “the conscience of the community.”
“He had a humanistic approach to sportswriting,” said retired Forest Hill High principal Bobby Riggs, who was born in West Palm Beach and knew Balfe as an athlete, coach and administrator. “He didn’t write about who won or lost but how they played the game.”
Balfe’s name was synonymous with sports in Palm Beach County from the 1930s until his death in 1987. With golfer Jack Nicklaus and baseball manager Mayo Smith, he was a member of the Palm Beach County Sports Hall of Fame’s first induction class in 1977.
His funeral was attended by hundreds of civic leaders, educators, athletes and coaches, many of whom he had profiled in his columns, “Time Exposure” and “It’s Post-Time.”
Riggs once asked him, “As great a writer as you are, why do you stay here instead of going to a big metropolitan newspaper?”
Balfe’s reply: “Why leave? Sooner or later, every great sports person is going to come through here.”
“He believed that,” Riggs said, “and he was right.”
Cardinal Newman’s Sam Budnyk, the winningest football coach in the county’s history, remembers Balfe for his “impeccable character and total integrity.”
“I had complete trust in him,” Budnyk said. “He never broke your trust. He was a man of such honor – an inspiration and an example. He lived the values that made this country great.”
- CHUCK OTTERSON

Tags: sports