Michael Lollar, longtime Commercial Appeal reporter, has died

For years, Michael Lollar faithfully pursued an unusual hobby that testified to his kind heart and to his love of family (and family pets).

He bought chicken breasts at the grocery store, sliced them up, baked them in the oven and then dehydrated them, as special treats for Cosmo and Lemmy and Zoe and Rosco, the dogs owned by his daughters, Kate Lollar and Rachel Spencer.

In other words, the chicken, like Lollar's wit, was dry. And like the stories Lollar wrote during an astonishingly lengthy and prolific career at The Commercial Appeal, the treats lacked fat, yet were enjoyable as well as beneficial. They were the products of meticulous and conscientious preparation.

James Michael Lollar, who reported on federal courts and Elvis Presley and everything in between during a 44-year career at Memphis’ morning daily newspaper, died Wednesday at his home in Bartlett, according to his daughter, Kate Lollar, 37.

"Mike" — as he was known to friends — had been in ill health recently, with emphysema and bouts of pneumonia. He was 74.

'One of Memphis’ best reporters and a brilliant writer'

On Facebook, former reporter Tom Jones called Lollar “one of Memphis’ best reporters and a brilliant writer.”

“We spent many months together covering federal court trials, and Mike could charm sources like no one I ever knew,” Jones wrote. “He had a clever wit, he seemed to know someone in every part of Memphis, and anyone who knew him can attest to how much we will miss him.”

An old-school newspaper reporter with a wide range of interests and an ability to cover any type of story, Lollar was not only a reliable reporter but an expert wordsmith who brought empathy and clarity and — when suitable — even humor to news and “feature” stories alike.

In a career at The Commercial Appeal that began in 1970 and ended when he retired in 2014, he covered numerous Memphis events of national interest, including the infamous “Deep Throat” obscenity trial and attempts by James Earl Ray to alter his prison sentence after originally entering a guilty plea in the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Yet Lollar couldn't be pegged down. He exposed environmental waste scandals, rode night shifts with police officers, reviewed the 1975 Australian art-horror film "Picnic at Hanging Rock," and produced in-depth stories on Memphis bounty hunters, homelessness and "Androgyny" ("Culture is making gender strictly negotiable," he wrote in 1985) as a staff writer for The Commercial Appeal’s now-vanished glossy Sunday supplement, Mid-South Magazine.

Covering the 'Elvis beat'

Born in Maryville, Tennessee, near Knoxville, Lollar was a recent graduate from the University of Tennessee when he came to The Commercial Appeal with a journalism degree and a yen to write. He quickly established himself as invaluable, and in later years staked a claim to the informal but always active "Elvis beat."

The newspaper even referred to Lollar in print as “the CA’s resident ‘Elvis reporter’” because of his numerous stories on Graceland and Presley-related tourism, and his interviews with such figures as Priscilla Presley and “Hound Dog” songwriter Mike Stoller, who in 2012 offered Lollar a verdict on Elvis' manager, “Colonel” Tom Parker, that is similar to one argued in director Baz Luhrmann’s new “Elvis” movie: “I always say the Colonel made Elvis and killed Elvis... I think Elvis might still be alive today had he been allowed to grow as an artist, which is what he wanted to do."

“We dealt with Mike for a long time,” said Jack Soden, CEO of Elvis Presley Enterprises. “He was a good guy who was always interested in the next big thing going on (at Graceland), but he also was interested in all the little things we do around here, all the daily happenings, which was nice."

"He was a natural storyteller, and he had a way of getting people to open up," said Lollar's former wife, Joan Lollar Cusick, a former reporter and editor at The Commercial Appeal who now lives in Sacramento. "I once asked him how he made his stories so readable. He said he wrote them as if his Granny Lollar was going to read them."

In addition to his daughters, Kate Lollar of Memphis, and Rachel Spencer of Lakeland, Lollar leaves two grandchildren. The family said a public funeral service likely will not be held. Memphis Funeral Home & Memorial Gardens has charge.

This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Michael Lollar, longtime Commercial Appeal reporter died at 74