Ginny Ogden’s Letter: How a Proud West Virginian Confronted an Icon

By Thomas L. Moore

This is the story of a remarkable lady you’ve probably never heard of: Virginia Ogden of Shinnston, who died in 1984 at the age of 79. Friends, including my Mom and Dad, knew her as “Ginny,” so we will refer to her that way, even though I always called her “Mrs. Ogden.” This essay concerns a letter Ginny wrote in 1962 to a famed sports columnist of the Los Angeles Times, a letter that became iconic in the Moore and Ogden families. In it, Ginny proudly defends her home state while giving a bully his comeuppance. When the bully goes on to a venerated career and is remembered fondly by millions of readers, it would be sad if Ginny’s letter were buried with the last of us who remember it, and GOLDENSEAL seems like the obvious place to give the letter its due.  

When this essay idea sprang into my head, I was able to reconnect with the youngest of Ginny’s kids, her only son Dick. Dick and I had not been in touch for many years, and I am very grateful for the enthusiasm, encouragement, and help he gave me, which were critical for telling the story properly. We will make the back story brief, so that The Letter may stand in its proper context and on its own two feet.  

First, the protagonist. Ginny Ogden with her husband Bill were custodians for the Shinnston schools from 1946 to 1973. Ginny and Bill served Shinnston in many ways: through work, church, and town, and by raising six children all of whom became solid citizens in their own right. But Ginny Ogden may best be remembered as the fiercest booster the town ever produced. Does your high school or college have a Hall of Fame? How many of its members are there for one thing: being great fans and boosters of the school? Ginny was inducted into Shinnston High School’s Hall in 1997 for that precise reason: She was Fan and Booster, Par Excellence. Jack Moore, my dad, who started his teaching and coaching career at Shinnston, wrote one of the letters of nomination for that honor, concluding with these words: “She was unabashedly out-spoken, completely biased, loyal to the hilt but always there to promote the cause of Shinnston and Shinnston High School. There could be a thousand people in the stands, but I would be asked, ‘Who was that woman?’ and I would proceed to try and describe the indescribable Ginny Ogden.”

Dick remembers a trip to a basketball game at Elkins on a snowy night when the only three Shinnston fans in the stands were Ginny, her friend Mid Boggess, and little Dick. The Ogdens did not yet own a car. Elkins was maybe 90 miles from Shinnston. As Dick recalls it, “The weather was treacherous, and drivers were advised to stay off the roads, but Mom talked Mid into driving. My mother had a loud soprano voice and Mid was pert near as loud so after the traditional singing of the alma mater by the home team [in those days at the start of the game], those two ladies stood up and proudly bellowed the Shinnston alma mater as though they were in Carnegie Hall.  Being grade school age, it was embarrassing to me, but as I got older, I realized that her spirit was undeniable and something of which to be proud.”

“Ginny may have made this calculation when she wrote in private, but we suspect a more likely reason—sincerity.  Ginny’s heart was huge, and her sleeve was ample.”

For many years, Shinnston High School had a tradition of honoring two senior students, male and female, annually, with the designation of “Mr. Spartan” and “Miss Spartan,” based upon their academic success and overall involvement in school activities.  When Ginny died, the Shinnston News ran a story that said this:  “For many graduates of Shinnston High School, they might over the years forget who Mr. Spartan or Miss Spartan were.  We feel those graduates will long remember, however, Mrs. Spartan, Virginia Ogden.”

Two events made the year 1961 memorable for the LA sports scene:  Jerry West had joined the Lakers, who had just moved from Minneapolis, starting the momentous career we are all familiar with; And Jim Murray had become a sports columnist for the LA Times, a story Ted Geltner tells superbly in his 2012 biography Last King of the Sports Page: The Life and Career of Jim Murray (University of Missouri Press).  

Murray’s talents soon gained fans, but he aspired to a larger audience through syndication. Geltner tells how with one column Murray stumbled into a strategy. After a series of rain delays covering the Dodgers in Cincinnati, he still had to make copy.  In desperation, he began his next column with these lines: “… you come into a city like Cincinnati at 3 o’clock in the morning. Now, if you have any sense, you don’t want to be in Cincinnati at all.  Even in daylight, it doesn’t look like a city.  It looks like it’s in the midst of condemnation proceedings.  If it was human, they’d bury it.”

The public outcry of Cincinnatians followed: “Boo Murray!” signs at ball games, letters in the paper, and editorials. The strategy was born, syndication numbers rose, and dissing cities became Mr. Murray’s MO toward increased readership.

Fast forward six months and we come to Murray’s Feb. 7, 1962, column titled, “Zeke From Cabin Creek” about our all-time great, Mr. Clutch, The Logo, Jerry West.  The entire column is easy to find on the internet and it does get around to the virtues of West, but it also spends much of its time dissing the state of West Virginia and Morgantown.  The opening paragraphs give the gist:

“MORGANTOWN, W.VA. — The state of West Virginia is America’s poorhouse, an area of such permanent arrested economic development that its only out is to declare war on the United States and try to lose. Even the Confederacy didn’t want it. Its oil fields were so shallow, they played out as soon as the first Texan stopped for gas. There are sections of the state where they don’t stare if you’ve got shoes — but they do if you’ve got laces in them.

The other night, as the Lakers rolled in over ice-slick cobblestone streets, Rudy La Russo looked at the weathered brick buildings and shuddered. “I got to pick my wife up something from Morgantown,” he leered. “Why not Morgantown?” someone cracked.

The people look like they’re on their way to a hard-times party and maybe they are. The last time fresh money came in, a couple of guys were trying to buy a pass to the White House with it.”

Public protest followed from offended West Virginians, the usual editorials and letters-to-editors in West Virginia papers. West Virginia’s Commissioner of Commerce, Hulett C. Smith—who later became Governor—had a response published in the LA Times soon after the “Zeke” column. It was a fine letter, in which he refuted Murray point by point using solid statistics and historical citations; it concluded: “I consider this editorial attack vicious, senseless, and pointless, in addition to being a masterpiece of fabrication.  It is my feeling that by calling this matter to your attention, other cities and states might, in the future, be spared the sad and dubious experience of having Mr. Murray do a similar critique on them.”

We agree with Smith’s summary except for one word—“pointless.”  There was a clear point to the “Zeke” column as there had been with Murray’s attacks of Cincinnati and other cities:  He wanted to boost syndication. And it worked. Tremendously. Geltner tells us that ultimately Murray would be syndicated in over 200 papers, increasing his annual salary a whopping $50K.

But note that when Commissioner Smith writes “your attention” the “you” is not Jim Murray; it is the LA Times or its editors.  And this is what makes Ginny’s letter special: she speaks directly—and privately—to the guilty party.  The “you” in “You make me sick at the stomach” is Murray and only Murray. Why she chose the personal approach we can only surmise. Ginny was whip-smart and even without having read Murray’s previous city dumps she could smell a baited hook like a 20-year-old largemouth. Geltner describes how the editor of the West Union Record took the bait and became fodder for a Murray rebuttal a month after “Zeke.” Murray got both a column from it and kept the kettle roiling. In a tit-for-tat with a master writer, it was no-win: Murray would always get the last tat and his readers would get to slapping their knees.

Ginny may have made this calculation when she wrote in private, but we suspect a more likely reason—sincerity.  Ginny’s heart was huge, and her sleeve was ample.  When Dick was in the Navy, she wrote him daily.  When the Moores left West Virginia for their new life in Florida, it was Ginny who drove Mom, Tom, and brother Mike to the train station for final hugs and final tears. It was the Ogden family that drove south to visit the Moores most years.  Ginny’s beef was with Murray, not the Times.

We can only guess whether Murray read Ginny’s letter, but if he did, he would have learned things.  Appropriately, she used many sports examples, including that cool coincidence of Stydahar, McKay, and the Ogdens.  But she broadens beyond sports, and do any of us doubt she could have, indeed, gone “on and on.” (Who would you add to the list were you writing it today?)  But Ginny knew the difference between making her point and belaboring it, so she stopped with the elegant First Lady and the elegant glasswork that Jackie favored.

We love how Ginny uses sarcasm to put the master of sarcasm in his place. Jim Murray was a great writer.  He won 14 Sportswriter of the Year awards and a Pulitzer.  And his stock in trade was satire, which involves sarcasm.  But there is a difference between satire and ridicule; Ginny knew the difference and felt compelled to call out the perpetrator.

So, this is the Ginny Ogden we knew: direct, loyal, and flamboyant. But she also understood forgiveness, and we end by noting how the letter’s tone shifts: Ginny begins with “sick at the stomach,” “jerk,” and “punk” but by the end has moved to a plea to “please” be nicer in the future—The indescribable Ginny Ogden.