NOTE: The following piece is a commentary, but also a tribute to local journalists Jeff Harvey and Tom Bone who covered Concord Athletics until their recent deaths.
ATHENS, W.Va. - In a time when local journalism has become a dying profession, or for some more of a hobby, two pillars of the quaint, small town of Athens, West Virginia—Tom Bone and Jeff Harvey—stood out to take a fair approach to reporting in rural southern West Virginia.
When I started working at Concord University in the fall of 2013, I came from a media background having interned at West Virginia MetroNews the two previous summers. I was under the impression that most media folks were supposed to ask hard-hitting questions, but Tom and Jeff took a different approach.
I had known Tom for a few years prior to working at Concord, but did not meet Jeff until that fall of 2013.
Tom and Jeff attended nearly every weekly on-campus media session, whether it be basketball or football, from late August until early March when the roundball season wrapped up. Jeff initially reported for
The Princeton Times until its closure in 2022 before working alongside Tom at
The Bluefield Daily-Telegraph, which was Tom's employer for nearly 20 years. Even in retirement, Tom did stringer work for the daily print in Bluefield until his death in October 2025.
When Concord basketball and football coaches met with the media for their weekly sessions, it was understood by everyone in attendance that Tom got the first question, or maybe even the first three. And Tom's questions weren't exactly putting coaches on the witness stand, they turned into full-blown conversations with the coaches feeling at ease and not having a sense that they were facing the press at The White House.
Meanwhile, Jeff would sit patiently at the media availabilities and scribble notes in his notebook, looking for a spot to throw out a question.
The only thing that rivaled the attendance of Jeff and Tom at the weekly press conferences inside the Carter Center was their trusty notebook and notepads that made their way into the room for every interview. Jeff's notes had everything from quotes from a press conference from 2014 to the Princeton City Council minutes from April 1996. And Tom's legal pad had an eclectic mix of handmade baseball scorecards from the 2007 Coppinger Baseball Tournament—a local high school tournament—to what former Concord football head coach Garin Justice said after a 2015 win over West Virginia Wesleyan.
I'm purely speculating on the information inside those notebooks, but man if those notes could talk.
Even though both Tom and Jeff loved sports, when you're a small-town reporter you have to be well-rounded in all facets of news.
Tom was a renowned cartoonist, drawing caricatures of everything from political happenings to holiday events. He even went outside the box once, and honored the Concord football seniors, along with then head coach Paul Price who was cast as a pirate in this particular Tom Bone cartoon.
Not only did Jeff cover the Concord Mountain Lions with pride, but he took passion in covering city council meetings in nearby Princeton, and Mercer County Board of Health meetings—even having to miss a weekly press conference or two to attend his city and county obligations.
In their coverage for the Mountain Lions, Tom was also the public address voice of Concord men's and women's basketball and football for more than two decades—he was inducted into the Concord Hall of Fame in October 2024. And sitting to Tom's left on game days in his later tenure behind the mic at Callaghan Stadium was Jeff, serving as his spotter in case something from the preceding play didn't get relayed to Tom from my gameday staff and I.
In his hall of fame speech, Tom said, "When a by-stander sees someone wearing a shirt with a college's name on it, he or she can't help but judge that institution partly by the behavior of the person who is wearing its name. So, when you're wearing a Concord shirt and even when you're not, you are an ambassador for Concord University.
"I urge to remember that and to live out that responsibility to make your alma mater proud," he said.
And for Jeff and Tom, both of whom were Concord graduates as well as small-town southern West Virginia guys—Jeff from right here in Athens and Tom from Union, I fully believe they represented their alma mater in everything they did around the community.
When Tom came in to tell me he may have to miss some CU basketball games during the 2023-24 season due to some health issues, you could hear the disappointment in his voice, but not from his health news rather because Tom so enjoyed being at the scorer's table for basketball or in the press box for football—he often referred to the Callaghan Stadium press box or any Division II press box, "as being one big family reunion where no one is related, but they enjoy each other's company."
Tom's passing near the end of the 2025 football season absolutely gutted me. Sure, we still had media members attend press conferences throughout the rest of the year. But when it came time for the first questions, there were always blank faces with everyone knowing this was Tom's time to shine.
In Tom's absence, I got to know Jeff more than I already did. And I was well aware that Jeff had the memory the size of an elephant, especially when it came to Major League Baseball. He could tell you the two teams that played in the 1993 NLCS, what the final score of game four was and who the winning pitchers were. Ok, that may be a little exaggerated, but you get the idea. By the way, the Phillies beat the Braves 2-1 to even the 1993 NLCS at two games apiece.
Jeff had his own health battles, and unexpectedly passed in June 2026.
Local journalism that combined to see so many joyous occasions in Athens on the gridiron and inside the gym gone. Two guys that I considered friends and colleagues. And who I knew I didn't have to hold my breath for what question may come next. Fair. Objective. But firm and friendly at the same time.
The door has swung open and closed several times in the local media markets with numerous faces coming through the proverbial doors of southern West Virginia over the last 13 years, but up until their deaths, Tom Bone and Jeff Harvey were mainstays in the small-town journalism world of Athens and Concord Athletics.
And the games and practices and interviews will continue to happen in and around the Carter Center for years to come, but I'll miss the consistency and professionalism and the light-heartedness of seeing Tom Bone and Jeff Harvey walk through the door, whether it be the press box of Callaghan Stadium on a fall Saturday or coming into the Carter Center on a late wintry morning to cover a basketball media session.
