He’s filed stories on top of a 50-pound roll of bologna and from a payphone outside of a Texas Burger King.
He’s been forgotten in the dead of night by the University of Maine hockey team, forced to trudge through Boston with his typewriter to get back to their hotel.
And for all that hard work, Larry Mahoney is heading into the Maine Sports Hall of Fame this weekend.
Mahoney arrived at the Bangor Daily News 52 years ago as a teenage sports clerk, and to the benefit of readers and the paper alike, has never left.
“It’s something I’ve always enjoyed. There’s never a dull moment,” Mahoney, 71, said on Thursday. “I can’t say that I’ve ever once looked at the clock to see when my shift ended.”
In an industry that has seen seismic shifts over the years, Mahoney’s commitment to the Maine sports community has been unshakable.
“It hasn’t seemed like 52 years, other than the technological advances,” he said. “When you go from carrying a typewriter, a telecopier and your bag of notepads and things like that to the computer era, it’s a lot different.”
The technology has changed, but the people haven’t.
“I’ve worked with so many wonderful people,” Mahoney said. “I’ve got good friends at other papers, rival papers, and the TV and radio media.”
In addition to his work in print, the six-time Maine Sportswriter of the Year has also served as the longtime color analyst for UMaine hockey home games. Mahoney has covered the UMaine hockey program since it began in 1976.
“Larry’s like an encyclopedia of Maine hockey,” said Jon Shields, his current broadcast partner for those games. “He knows everything that has happened in the program’s history. So just having somebody like that with you on the air is invaluable.”
Shields described Mahoney as the type of person who will do anything for anybody, whether it’s helping at work or jumping in to help change a tire.
“He’s not only an amazing sports reporter — he’s a great friend, father, husband. He’s just an all-around great guy,” Shields said. “Larry’s the best.”
Growing up as a base kid
Mahoney attributes his willingness to help others and connect with them on a personal level to his upbringing in a military family. He credits his parents for setting that tone for him and his four siblings.
“They believed in discipline, they believed in kindness,” Mahoney said. “My mother really cared about everybody. She just really was a very caring person who would do anything for anybody.”
His father, Lawrence Sr., was a decorated veteran who was deployed for three years in Vietnam, Thailand and Turkey. And while he was away, Mahoney’s mother, Nancy, had double duty taking care of the family herself.
“She instilled that you treat people the way you want to be treated, and that everybody is interesting, everybody has a story,” Mahoney said.
Growing up as a military family also meant the Mahoneys were often on the move.
Mahoney attended three schools during ninth grade alone in England, Massachusetts and eventually Bangor. He said that as a kid moving from one military base area to the next, you learn how to interact with different people.
The experience also made Mahoney acutely aware of the difficulties that can accompany moving. It helps explain why he makes it a point to connect with the coaches and players he covers beyond the Xs and Os.
“I do care about them and their lives and their families,” Mahoney said. “And if I can help and offer some advice, I will. Because I’ve been through a lot, with all the moves and everything. And this is the first home that I’ve ever had — the first full-time home. I love it here, so that’s why I’ve never moved.”
He has helped others feel welcome as they have made the Bangor area their home as well, including UMaine hockey coach Ben Barr and his family.
“That’s probably not his job to do that, but he just does, and that’s the type of person he is,” Barr said.
‘The ultimate sportswriter’
Mahoney, who was also a captain on the Bangor football and baseball teams along with playing club hockey, heads into the Maine Sports Hall of Fame just one year removed from being inducted into the Maine Press Association Hall of Fame. The dual recognitions as both a journalist and sports figure come as no surprise to the people who work with him every day.
“Larry is the ultimate sportswriter, a total pro and a warm and generous colleague,” said BDN Executive Editor Dan MacLeod. “Talking with him about family, sports and the stories he’s working on is always a bright part of my day. His colleagues in the newsroom are so proud of him for this well-deserved honor.”
His family is overflowing with pride as well. His wife, Sally, made that abundantly clear earlier this week.
“It means so much to our sons Michael and Andrew, and me, that Larry is being inducted into the Maine Hall of Fame,” she said. “It’s heartwarming that Larry is being recognized for the contribution he has made to Maine sports for more than 50 years, both professionally and personally.”
That appreciation certainly goes both ways.
“I couldn’t have accomplished any of this without her,” Mahoney said about his wife, noting how years ago she would have to take care of their sons alone while he was on the road covering different sporting events, sometimes all around the country.
Mahoney estimated that he’s traveled to 20 states while on assignment for the BDN, including many college baseball World Series and college hockey Frozen Fours. He was there in person when UMaine hockey won both its national titles.
And for all that travel, he remains captivated by the “wonderful, humble, hardworking people” here in Maine.
Every day is different
The best athletes know that they can always get better. And Mahoney carries that same sentiment.
“Every day is different. Every story is different,” he said. “And you can always get better. I can get a lot better than I am right now.”
He still loves what he does, which is something he and longtime Husson University women’s basketball coach Kissy Walker have talked about recently.
“We kind of joke like, well we’re still at it,” said Walker, whose formidable resume includes more than 600 wins.
Walker has spent over 30 years at the helm of the Husson program and is already a member of the Maine Sports Hall of Fame.
“We’re kind of in that same boat, we feel very fortunate,” Walker said about Mahoney.
She respects that he has found something he’s so passionate about.
“If you land a job where you look forward to going to work every day, consider yourself blessed,” Mahoney said.
The job certainly hasn’t come without its complications and interesting moments, like when he
once had to file a story from a meat locker in the back of a Portland store. He needed a phone that was compatible with his telecopier — a fax machine-like device with a dizzying process that the Millennial brain can scarcely comprehend. And the store happened to have such a phone back in the meat locker.
“So I was sitting on top of a 50-pound roll of bologna filling that story,” Mahoney said.
Then there was the story filed using a pay phone outside a Burger King in Austin, Texas. And he still grins at the thought of once making a collect call to reach the BDN newsroom only to find his mother, who was working as a phone company operator, on the other end of the line.
“She knew it was me, and she said something like, ‘How’s my son?’” he recalled.
That was surely a much more pleasant experience than the time he was traveling with the UMaine hockey team for an away game against Northeastern.
“After the game, it took me a while to send my story. They had left,” Mahoney said. “I had to walk through Boston, like at midnight, back to the hotel.”
Always looking on the bright side, he felt lucky that the walk wasn’t an especially long one. But he still had to carry his typewriter, telecopier and a bag from the hockey arena to the hotel.
“I’ll never forget that,” he said.
Even with all that history, Mahoney is still focused on the present. While he was being interviewed this week about his Hall of Fame induction ceremony, he had to take a break to answer his phone. It was a high school basketball coach calling back to answer some questions.
Still, after 52 years, there’s always another story.
