Remembering Bob Kenney, a sports editor who broke the mold

Bob Kenney was the sports editor of a midsize suburban newspaper when it meant something to be the sports editor of a midsize suburban newspaper.

It meant influence. It meant power.

Kenney used his to the everlasting benefit of half the population.

"He changed the world," veteran Camden Catholic girls' basketball coach Chris Palladino said of Kenney, who died Sunday at 80.

Kenney was like a dinosaur who roamed the earth in prehistoric times - a larger-than-life figure in sports journalism in the days before Twitter, before Facebook, before Instagram, before the Internet.

A classic newspaper man - standard attire: white short-sleeved shirt, tie, black-rimmed glasses - with boundless energy, Kenney was part journalist (that was the largest chunk), part coach, part promoter, part establishment man and part revolutionary.

As the sports editor of the Courier-Post from the early 1970s through the early 1990s, Kenney was the driving force in the expansion of coverage of high school sports, especially girls' sports.

It's almost impossible to overstate Kenney's impact on girls' sports in South Jersey, both in terms of the raised visibility of those athletes, coaches and teams through the newspaper's daily coverage and all-star sections but also as the founding father of organizations such as the Field Hockey Club of South Jersey and the South Jersey Girls' Basketball Club.

"He made you feel like you counted," said Millville field hockey coach Claudia McCarthy, who is set to begin her 46th season. "He cared about girls' sports at a time when not many others did."

It's a wonder how he found the time. Kenney was a decorated journalist who covered seven Olympiads for Gannett News Service, spent 45 years in the press box at Phillies' games (including about 1,200 home games as the National League's official scorer) and worked overtime for 40 years as an officer with the Philadelphia Sports Writers Association.

He coached baseball teams in the Rancocas Valley League and softball teams in the Women's Fastball League of South Jersey.

He volunteered his time at St. Peter's parish in Riverside, the small town in Burlington County where he made his home.

He served as president of the Riverside Historical Society, as vice chairman on the planning board and on the board of directors of the public library.

Oh, and Kenney and his wife Emma raised six children and doted on 16 grandchildren and 16 great-grandchildren.

It was Kenney's great timing to be sports editor during halcyon days for newspapers, when there were virtually no limitations on newsprint and staffing and budgets.

Kenney and his sergeant-at-arms, late Courier-Post assistant sports editor John Vogeding, presided over a bustling staff that in the 1980s included about 40 people, counting part-timers and a sports desk of copy editors and layout specialists.

I swear, there were a lot of nights when there weren't enough seats in that section of the newsroom for everybody to find a place to work.

But the Courier-Post - like every other newspaper in that bygone era - had more than resources. It had reach.

In those days, people got the score by reading the next day's newspaper, not by following the Twitter feed of some sophomore's dad in the stands.

"Many of us in South Jersey depended on Bob's local high school sports coverage as the quintessential mark of our mornings, even more so than our first cup of coffee," Camden County Freeholder Director Lou Cappelli said of Kenney's influence.

Kenney recognized the importance of girls' sports before just about anyone else in the business.

He had the Courier-Post devoting nearly equal space to girls' sports as boys' sports - a revolutionary vision in those days.

"I can't tell you what a difference he made in South Jersey girls' sports, particularly field hockey," said Drexel University professor Karen Weaver, who was the head field hockey coach at Salisbury (Md). State in the 1980s.

It seems so obvious now. Why wouldn't you cover girls' sports as well as boys' sports?

You want to tell Carli Lloyd she's not worth the effort? Or Ronda Rousey?

"We take it for granted now," Palladino said. "But it all changed because of Bob and his insistence that we be treated equally."

As the sports editor of a midsize newspaper in a suburban market in the 1970s and 1980s, Bob Kenney had the power to "change the world."

His legacy: He did, and for the better.