16-Time AL Sportswriter of Year, Former NSSA Board Member Pruett Dies at 83

By Mark McCarter

John Pruett, whose graceful and insightful writing entertained, enlightened and occasionally enraged readers for more than four decades, died Wednesday morning, June 25.

Pruett’s highly decorated sportswriting career, primarily with The Huntsville Times, may have been his livelihood, but his life was centered around faith and family. He and his late wife Barbara “Bobbi” Pruett had three children, seven grandchildren and two step-great grandchildren who were the center of their lives. He was a long-time member of Sherwood Baptist Church and consistently displayed his faith in his interaction with the countless friends he collected inside and outside the world of sports and the newspaper business.

Funeral arrangements are pending through Laughlin Service Funeral Home.

John Kenneth Pruett was born Aug. 9, 1941, in Cullman, Ala., to parents, Herman T. Pruett and Opal J. Pruett of Cullman, Ala., who precede him in death. He moved to Huntsville in 1965 where he met Barbara “Bobbi” Macomber and married on September 3 of that same year – a date that occasionally proved problematic because it coincided with the beginning of football season. They were married 57 years and raised three children. In those 57 years they were faithful, loving, and doting on each other until Bobbi preceded him in Heaven. John was very involved in the children’s lives, attending every type of function they were involved in. He was the ultimate role model on how to be present in his loved one’s lives. As grandchildren came on the scene and as they grew, he continued to attend baptisms, recitals, ball games, graduations, and many numerous other events. His grandchildren loved their “Papa” dearly. He truly was an integral part of their lives, and his influence will be greatly missed. The family’s closeness is directly due to the family culture he fostered.

He is survived by son Thomas Pruett (Sonia) of Huntsville; daughter Afton Pruett Travens of Huntsville; son Patrick Pruett (Tracey); seven grandchildren, Cassandra Campbell Travens (Kevin), of Huntsville; Jimmy Travens of Huntsville; Dr. Clay Pruett and his wife, Dr. Brittany Pruett of Washington, D.C.; Micah Pruett Lee of Huntsville (David); Laney Pruett Chenault (Casey) of Atlanta; Caleb Pruett of Huntsville; and Katie Beth Pruett of Huntsville, and two step-great granddaughters, sisters Hazelee and Jupiter “Jupie” Scott, of Huntsville.

Pruett was a graduate of Auburn High School (1959) and received his bachelor of arts degree in English-Journalism from Auburn University in 1963 and Masters degree from the University of Georgia’s Grady School of Journalism and Mass Communications (1964). He was an enlisted member of the U.S. Army Reserve from 1965-1986. Though honorably discharged with rank of Master Sergeant, E-8, he was long-saluted by newspaper colleagues as The General.

His “civilian career” found him as sports editor of The Huntsville News (Jan. 1965-Sept. 1966), then as a sportswriter at The Huntsville Times before being appointed Assistant Sports Editor in 1969, then Sports Editor from 1974 until his retirement in 2008. He was inducted in the inaugural class of the Huntsville-Madison County Athletic Hall of Fame (1989), the Athletic Booster Club of Huntsville Hall of Fame (1986), and the Alabama Sports Writers Hall of Fame (2003). He was named Alabama’s Sportswriter of the Year 17 times by the National Sports Media Association and was one of the first two recipients of the Mel Allen Award, presented by the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame to a media member who made an impact in the state’s sporting community.

Among other honors, he won the Alabama Sportswriters Association’s Bill Shelton Award (2000); The Huntsville Times Journalist of the Year Award (1993); the All-American Football Foundation Outstanding Sportswriter Award (1999); the Distinguished Alabama Community Journalist Award presented by the Auburn University School of Journalism (2007) and multiple state, regional and national writing awards from various media organizations. He served two terms as president of Alabama Sports Writers Association (1978-80, 1984-86), was a member of the Huntsville-Madison County Athletic Hall of Fame Board of Directors; former board member of the National Sports Media Association, member of the Auburn University Journalism Advisory Council and the Auburn Alumni Association and member of the Huntsville Quarterback Club. In 2015, along with long-time friend and colleague Bill Easterling and other Times writers, he was honored as one of 50 Legends of Alabama sports writing.

Such was John’s impact in his field, and having been part of a generation in which friendly relations could be enjoyed between journalists and coaches, the late Alabama director of athletics Mal Moore, coach and now Senator Tommy Tuberville and former coaches Sonny Smith and Wimp Sanderson were in attendance at his 2008 retirement party. In tribute to Pruett, Times sports editor Bill Bryant wrote to Pruett, “you’ve touched so many lives with your eloquent words and giving nature and … your name becomes synonymous with the newspaper itself.” The late Don Mincher, the long-time major leaguer and Huntsville’s “Mr. Baseball,” said then that Pruett was “the most interesting, fair and entertaining columnist I’ve ever read anywhere.”

Pruett covered virtually every major sporting event, from the Olympics to the NCAA Final Four, dozens of bowl games and was a fixture at The Masters and the Kentucky Derby. However, he’d often say the most joy he received in sportswriting was covering local sports, particularly as he concentrated on high school coverage in his early days. The coaches and players from that era remained his loyal readers until his retirement and loyal friends who mourn him now.