Longtime Richmond reporter Bill Wasson dies

Bill Wasson, a retired Richmond Times-Dispatch reporter whose byline was familiar to Richmond readers for nearly 40 years, died at his rural Goochland County home Sunday after a lengthy illness.

A skeptical assessor of all things, Mr. Wasson was a mentor to young practitioners of the writer's craft and a veteran standard-bearer of truth. He remained true to that mission even as his health failed from cancer and as newspapers underwent paradigmatic changes.

Mr. Wasson, 68, a native of Charlotte, N.C., covered events great and small, from the remnants of Hurricane Camille in 1969 that devastated western Virginia communities and much of the James River watershed to the numbing murders of the Harvey family on Jan. 1, 2006, in South Richmond.

Among his last pieces for The Times-Dispatch was a delicate, selfless article about the possible link between night work and cancer, "a concept once considered wacky," he wrote.

Mr. Wasson is remembered by co-workers and the people he met as unfailingly fair but tireless in his search for truth, even as deadlines loomed.

"I would always tell him, 'If you cross my yellow tape, I'll lock you up because you're smoking in my crime scene,'" veteran Richmond Police Captain Paul Kiniry recalled with a chuckle. "And he'd come back with something like, 'Make it short and sweet, Kiniry, because I've got a deadline.'"

Kiniry said if you stripped away the veneer of wisecracks and tough talk, you got the true face of Mr. Wasson.

"Because of the nature of the beast, we were always showing up at tragedies together but always had the opportunity to talk about family," Kiniry said.

Jerald A. Finch, the last managing editor of The Richmond News Leader and the retired ombudsman for The Times-Dispatch, said:

"Bill Wasson was a classic reporter with a quick wit and impressive intelligence. I recall during his job interview at The News Leader in the 1960s wondering why a man with a university degree in Russian studies would consider a newspaper position. He quickly proved himself as a news reporter and led our coverage of the 1969 Hurricane Camille disaster in Nelson County."

Times-Dispatch Managing Editor Peggy Bellows notified the newspaper's staff yesterday of Mr. Wasson's death. She urged the staff to "take time to listen to and share the old stories . . . We are all better journalists and people because Bill Wasson worked here for nearly 40 years."

Mr. Wasson joined The News Leader, an evening newspaper, in February 1969 and retired from the morning Times-Dispatch at the end of 2007. The newspapers, owned by Media General Inc., merged in 1992.

Jay Strafford, a Times-Dispatch editor, recalled the day in 1975 when a Louisa County judge was shot to death in his courtroom. Strafford, then a young reporter, rode with Mr. Wasson to the scene and passed a speeding state trooper on Interstate 64.

"The trooper didn't bother with us," he said. "But that was Bill. Always wanting to be first at the scene and get the freshest, most immediate details."

In April 1974, Mr. Wasson was dispatched to cover a music festival that turned violent at Richmond's City Stadium, and he ended up being among those injured.

With his bloodied head bandaged, Mr. Wasson finished covering the assignment. Friends said he always said he could not remember who attacked him.

Mr. Wasson relished the solitude of rural life. He lived with his family on 36 acres of woods "where we cannot see or hear our nearest neighbors," he wrote on his Facebook page.

He described his enlistment in the U.S. Army as an effort to dodge the draft. He was in Germany when the Berlin Wall was erected and added, "I was a Cold Warrior. We won that war."

Shooting was a hobby, he wrote, "but not shooting anything with four legs or feathers."

The University of North Carolina graduate and longtime soccer referee's survivors include his wife, Wynne; three sons, Mark Wasson of Washington, Ben Wasson of Richmond and Luke Wasson of Cincinnati; a brother, John Wasson of Lenoir, N.C.; and a grandson.

A memorial service will be held at a future date. Anyone who would like to be invited or wants to deliver a message to the family can do so by sending an e-mail to .