Very sad news from our sister paper, the Nashville Scene: Its editor, Jim Ridley, died today at the age of 50 after suffering a heart attack on March 28.
Read the eloquent tribute by former Nashville Scene managing editor Jack Silverman, and you’ll understand why this is a loss not just for the paper and for the city of Nashville, but for journalism. A quote from former Scene news editor Steve Cavendish, now editor of Washington City Paper, sums up what Jim meant to the people who worked with him:
“He made every single journalist around him better.”
I never met Jim, but his decency, his high standards and his love of language shone through in everything he wrote and edited.
Our condolences to Jim, his family, and his friends and colleagues at the Scene and Southcomm, our parent company. He will be greatly missed.
A GoFundMe campaign has been set up to help the Ridley family cover medical and funeral expenses.
This article appears in Apr 7-13, 2016.
