Marla Ridenour says farewell to Beacon Journal: Thanks for trusting me to bare your souls

I arrived at the Akron Beacon Journal thinking the pinnacle of my journalism career had been covering the Affirmed-Alydar Triple Crown in 1978.

Then I found myself walking behind a Rolls Royce convertible carrying LeBron James and his family through the streets of Cleveland amid the madness of the 2016 NBA championship parade.

I arrived at the Akron Beacon Journal to escape being pigeonholed, yearning to expand and push myself.

I was fortunate to be named sports columnist, but also to go where I’d never gone before. Two Ohio State football national championships, Cleveland's 2016 World Series, Kent State’s 2012 College World Series and several University of Akron men’s soccer College Cup appearances, including the school’s first team national title in 2010, capped by the Zips’ jump into the Pacific Ocean.

In a span of one year, I covered OSU’s Troy Smith winning the 2006 Heisman Trophy, the football Buckeyes falling to Florida in the BCS title game and the basketball Bucks losing to the Gators in the 2007 NCAA championship. “Curses, chomped again,” I wrote.

I was able to relive personal moments — sitting at my dying mother’s bedside during the Cincinnati Bengals’ 1989 Super Bowl appearance, feeling her spirit beside me in our old church pew on Christmas Eve, reliving the horror of my gang rape in college triggered by the Browns’ March trade for quarterback Deshaun Watson.

But above all, I came to the Akron Beacon Journal in August 1999 to tell people stories. I leave Friday after 23 years, not retiring but accepting a buyout because of the demanding hours of digital journalism and not Watson’s impending reinstatement from league suspension. As I say goodbye to the ABJ, it is the people who trusted me enough to bare their souls about their heartaches, injuries and journeys to personal triumph who will stick with me.

I think of University of Akron golfer Ivana Shah, who hit golf balls off a terrace in Mumbai during the pandemic and won the prestigious Dinah Shore Trophy in 2021. Shah and boyfriend Noah Alfman used social media to develop a database of volunteers they dubbed Call to Action.

I think of middle-distance runner Clayton Murphy and pole vaulter Matt Ludwig, willing to share their rise from the University of Akron to the Olympics. Murphy won bronze in the 800 meters in 2016; Ludwig was a last-minute replacement in the 2021 Tokyo Games, barely making it in time after an exhausting trip.

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I think of softball pitcher Lauren Bay Regula, a Bath resident who at age 40 helped Team Canada win its first Olympic medal, a bronze, at those same Summer Games in Tokyo. The married mother of three now turns her focus to assisting those with postpartum depression, which she battled.

I think of Grace Riley, a ninth grade Green High School junior varsity soccer player who underwent Botox therapy for compartment syndrome to get back onto the field. That 2014 story may have had the longest shelf life. Her father, Todd, willingly responded to emails I forwarded from parents seeking the same treatment for their children.

I think of the incredible bond of the 1972 Akron Zips basketball team, of the irrepressible personality of former Kent State golf coach Herb Page, of the stunning achievement of 2003 British Open champion Ben Curtis. I think of master of reinvention R.J. Nemer, the former sports agent now dean of the UA College of Business. I think of the leadership of UA soccer coach Jared Embick and his predecessor Caleb Porter, the infectious spirit of former Zips midfielder-forward Diogo Pacheco as he battled thyroid cancer, the medical miracle of North Royalton teenager Vinny Mercurio, who survived a hemorrhagic stroke and learned how to play golf.

I think of Clearview Golf Club pro and trailblazer Renee Powell, who fights to keep her late father William’s legacy alive. I think of Browns offensive tackle Chris Hubbard and assistant coach Callie Brownson, who discussed the most traumatic moments of their lives to help others.

I think of one who wasn’t an athlete at all.

I remember “Buckeye Bebe,” the late Bebe Webner. I tracked her down after then-Ohio State coach Jim Tressel mentioned he had a pen pal, an older lady from Akron who had been a fan for 60 years. Before the 2006 game against Michigan, she wrote to warn him that the Wolverines had burned the Buckeyes with the Statue of Liberty play. Tressel decided to call it himself, with Antonio Pittman running for 26 yards in the game-winning drive. The story was included in a chapter of Austin Murphy’s book, “Saturday Rules.”

I interviewed Webner at her Akron condominium, where a “Buckeye Bebe” flag was draped over her balcony. She’d worshipped Tressel since he was hired in 2001 and sent his mother, Eloise, who died before he coached his first game, a pair of Ohio State earrings after he got the job. At least one of Tressel’s notes to Webner was framed.

That sparked my plan for them to meet. When Tressel spoke at the Hall of Fame Luncheon Club in Canton in the spring of 2007, I picked her up and sat her next to me at the media table. As Tressel was leaving, I introduced her to the man she considered her second son. She’d just been feted for her 80th birthday, but on the way home Webner said, “This was better than my birthday party.”

Webner and Tressel saw each other a few more times, including at a 2012 dinner at the Diamond Grille arranged by her brother-in-law, Mack Webner, that I attended. She sent me notes, sometimes called or left a voicemail, the last five months before she died after an article on an award I’d received. She ended it with, “Take care. Love ya.”

As I just listened to it again, the thought crossed my mind that I might have responded to Beacon Journal emails from readers over the years with “Take care, Marla” because of Bebe.

As I move onto my next chapter, consider that my farewell.

This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Marla Ridenour looks back on 23 years at Akron Beacon Journal