Ed Given, who had been the oldest living Tennessee baseball letter winner, died on March 24. He was 91 and had been in hospice care.

Given, who was from Ripley, Tennessee, played basketball and baseball at Tennessee in 1953 and 1954. He transferred to Union University after the 1954 season to be near his ailing mother, where he finished his degree.

It was when he arrived at Union that Given decided on sports writing as a career.

“I figured that I probably was never going to be a rich man anyway,” Given told The Daily News Journal in 2015. “So I thought I might as well enjoy what I was doing.”

Given is survived by four sons: Kerry (Rhonda), Scott, Kyle (Melanie) and Paul (Prudence), and one daughter: Lisa Spillman (Michael), as well as 11 grandchildren, 14 great grandchildren, two nephews and a niece.

After graduating from Union, Given started out working part-time at the Jackson Sun, located about 45 miles from his home in Ripley. He moved to Nashville shortly after that, after receiving a full-time position as a sports writer for the Nashville Banner.

In 1962, Given left the newspaper business and became the assistant public relations director at Western Kentucky, working primarily in sports. He left Bowling Green, Kentucky, in 1978 to become the sports information director at Middle Tennessee State.

Given remained at MTSU for 16 years before his retirement.

He was inducted into the College Sports Information Directors of America Hall of Fame in 1998 and the Tennessee Sports Writers Association Hall of Fame in 2015.

A private memorial service will be held at a later date.

Reach Mike Organ at 615-259-8021 or on X @MikeOrganWriter.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Tennessee baseball’s oldest living letterman Ed Given dies at 91