By Jeff Duewel of the Daily Courier
Sports Editor Larry Cathey, who spent five years with the Daily Courier, died on Saturday in Grants Pass at the age of 34.
Cathey, a Michigan native, was diagnosed with colon cancer in April, and began months of chemotherapy. He continued to work part time during this rigorous routine.
He and wife Linsay, a reporter at the Daily Courier, welcomed their first child Samantha Rose, in August.
"The proud papa quickly decked out the little one in Tigers gear and flooded Facebook with her pictures -- the whole time hanging in there with all the heart and courage any person could muster, and then some," wrote Art Brooks, who taught and mentored Cathey at Eastern Michigan University.
Cathey was still in good spirits when former Courier sports and outdoors writer Zach Urness last spoke to him a few weeks ago.
"He talked about sitting on cloud nine with the birth of his daughter Samantha Rose," Urness wrote. "He spoke of getting back to work, asked about a good inflatable kayak and said he'd come visit my new house in Salem after the next round of treatment. In other words, there were more good days to come."
But treatment couldn't stave off the cancer, which also invaded his liver.
Visitation will be hosted by the family on Wednesday from noon to 8 p.m. at Hull and Hull Funeral Directors, 612 N.W. A St. A funeral will be held in Michigan.
Cathey brought his love of sports to the Echo, the college newspaper at Eastern Michigan, then got his foot in the door at the Detroit News, where he met his future wife. He worked in Hugo, Okla., and Paris, Texas, before coming to Grants Pass.
He was here just six weeks in 2008 when he wrote that Oregon's Civil War football game should be renamed and "anything less would be uncivilized," unleashing a torrent of letters to the editor.
He became sports editor in February 2012.
"Larry was extremely intense, especially when it came to his work as a sports writer and editor," said Courier Editor Kevin Widdison. "That intensity was a result, I believe, of the great pride he took in his work."
Cathey's best work may have been a feature on roller derby in Medford.
"His video of working out with a local women's (roller derby) team never got its due as a comedic classic," Brooks wrote.
He won best sports story in his division in the Oregon Newspaper Publishers Association's 2012 awards, for a piece on a Michigan football player wearing the No. 11 jersey of Wolverine great Al Wistert, a Grants Pass resident today who was all-pro in the late 1940s.
In his last column for the Courier, published on Sept. 27, Cathey wrote that the Grants Pass Cavemen were turning the corner in football, and since then the team is 3-0, with a five-game winning streak.
Former sports editor Lance Ogden had more kind words for the man he said had great passion for life and work.
"Larry was one of the most outgoing, charismatic and truly bright guys I've ever met," Ogden said.
"The great thing about Larry was, he always knew how to make people laugh, and he loved to write. Larry cared about people and that showed not only in his life, but in his work as well."
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