Last Press Bus Out of Middletown: A Memoir

By Bob Hammel

For 30 years, celebrated sports journalist Bob Hammel has reported on a variety of games and athletes–the Olympics, Pan American Games, 23 NCAA Final Fours, Major League Baseball playoffs and World Series, college football bowl games, Muhammad Ali's last championship victory, and dozens of Indiana high school basketball Final Fours. In all that time, however, he's never written much about himself–ntil now.

In Last Press Bus Out of Middletown, Bob tells the story of how an Indiana sports journalist without a college degree, armed with talent, gumption, and a whole lot of inspiration and advice from those he worked with, earned national attention while still working for his small-town newspaper. From Bob Knight to Mark Spitz, from the horrors of the Munich Olympics tragedy to the Hoosiers' exhilarating clinching of the NCAA basketball championship, Bob Hammel's journey has been unforgettable. Even in his 80s, it's a dream that still has him smiling and storytelling.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Indiana University Press
• Release date: Feb 1, 2019
• ISBN: 9780253044693

Bob Hammel

Bob Hammel was sports editor of the Bloomington Herald-Times for thirty years before he retired following the 1996 Olympics. He is the author of nine previous books, six of which were on Indiana basketball.

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