12 Facts About Joe Vila

Joseph Spencer Vila was an American sportswriter and editor.

Joe Vila has been regarded as one of the most influential sportswriters during the first third of the 20th century, while setting fundamental changes in sports coverage during the decades to come.

Joe Vila attended Boston Latin School, where he learned to play baseball and football, and entered Harvard College from 1886 to 1887 and the Harvard Law School for a brief time.

Joe Vila started his journalism career in his native Boston through a series of newspapers before joining the most sports-oriented daily paper in town, the Boston Herald.

In 1889, Joe Vila moved to New York City, where he collaborated for the New York Morning Sun.

Four years later, Joe Vila was hired by the New York Evening Sun, one of the city's most prestigious daily newspapers.

From 1900 through 1910, Joe Vila covered mostly horse racing and baseball, but later devoted strictly to baseball.

In 1902, Vila was instrumental in the Andrew Freedman's decision to sell the New York Giants National League club to John T Brush.

Joe Vila's column was, unlike those of many of his contemporaries, very factual and straightforward, being often historic and less opinionated.

Joe Vila collapsed at his desk in 1934, while covering the opening of the horse race spring meeting at Jamaica Race Course.

Joe Vila was taken to a hospital and then to his home in Brooklyn, where he died later of a heart failure at the age of 67.

Joe Vila was one of 12 writers who were named to the Honor Rolls of Baseball as selected by the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1946.