Longtime local sportswriter Ron Bracken adds PNA Hall of Fame to long list of accolades

Longtime local sportswriter Ron Bracken couldn’t quite believe it at first.

When he initially received a golden-colored envelope in the mail, containing a letter congratulating him on his upcoming induction into the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association’s Hall of Fame , he worried it might be a scam. The former Centre Daily Times sports editor didn’t trust its authenticity until he called the organization to confirm.

Ever the professional journalist, even if he’s been retired since 2008, Bracken still wanted to fact-check before celebrating.

“It’s pretty cool,” Bracken said with a smile, when asked about the honor on a recent afternoon. “And then you think, well, it’s a reward for the work you did, and somebody thought it was worthwhile. That’s how I’ve always looked at awards — and I’m thrilled that somebody thought that much of whatever I did.”

The induction is a prestigious one for the 80-year-old Bracken, who worked at the CDT from 1967 to 2008. The Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association is inducting 100 journalists in November to celebrate its 100th anniversary, and those already inducted include legendary reporters such as Nellie Bly, a pioneer of investigative journalism in the late 19th century, and John O’Hara, a reporter/author praised by contemporaries like Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Bracken, who authored two books himself , is no stranger to journalism awards. The Bald Eagle Area graduate who never ventured far from Centre County counts among his accolades three national Associated Press Sports Editor Awards, two state Associated Press Managing Editor Awards and 11 Keystone Awards from PNA. He’s also a member of six other halls of fame — ranging from the Centre County Sports Hall of Fame to the National Wrestling Hall of Fame for his lifetime of service.

Ask the current Philipsburg resident what he owes his success to, and he’ll simply respond, “Luck.”

After all, he was never formally trained in journalism. He spent two years studying at Penn State with plans to become a dietitian, before finding himself recodifying borough ordinances in a building that housed Penns Valley Printing. On a lark, pained by boredom, Bracken asked the CDT sports editor at the time if he needed help during the high school football season.

Bracken worked part-time for one season, “caught the bug” and was offered a full-time job. He declined — and then instantly wished he hadn’t. “I didn’t want to get 10 years down the road and regret it,” Bracken said.

Once Bracken reconsidered, he was told the CDT already had a job interview lined up with another candidate. But that candidate never showed. So Bracken took the gig — and, for the next 40 years, he never looked back.

“Like I said, I was really lucky,” Bracken added. “Right place, right time.”

Bracken began covering sports in a unique time in Centre County history. Joe Paterno was only in his second season as Penn State’s head coach, and local high schools still had their best sports seasons ahead. Bracken would go on to cover both of the Nittany Lions’ 1980s national championship seasons, in addition to some of the county’s top scholastic sports achievements — such as BEA’s top wrestling ranking in the country in 1999 and eventual Chicago Bears FB Matt Suhey taking the State College Little Lions by storm in the 1970s.

He covered state championships and district titles, the dissolution of local leagues and the expansion of the PIAA. He did all that, every day, without losing sight of the fact he was covering people, not just sports.

To this day, when he reflects on his thousands of bylines, his favorite stories aren’t simply the ones decorated with awards. It’s the ones that caused stirs in the community, articles that forced readers to stop and think — like an article on a BEA All-American boy who returned from Vietnam and was never the same, or a localized look remembering veterans on the 50th anniversary (1995) of the Battle of Iwo Jima.

“There were probably five days in my whole career where it felt like work,” Bracken added.

Alongside at least three others, the longtime sports writer helped establish the Centre County Sports Hall of Fame in 2016. He hopes that endures as his main legacy. But for anyone who picked up a newspaper in Centre County before 2020, or played high school sports in the area, Bracken earned a reputation as a reporter who had a nose for a good story and as a man who never lost sight that he was writing about people first and foremost.

He’ll be officially inducted into the PNA Hall of Fame — his seventh hall of fame (Centre County Sports HOF, National Wrestling HOF, PA Wrestling HOF, District 6 Wrestling HOF, Bald Eagle Area Wrestling HOF, District 6 Softball HOF) — on Nov. 14 during a celebration gala at Hershey Country Club. Others to be inducted then include Marie Hardin, dean of Penn State’s Bellisario College of Communications; John Curley, whom Penn State’s Center for Sports Journalism is named after; and Sara Ganim, who became one of the youngest to ever win the Pulitzer in 2012.