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Who Was Jack Murphy? His Statue at New Snapdragon Stadium Doesn’t Say

Jack Murphy and his dog Abe outside Snapdragon Stadium. Photo by JW August

Jack Murphy was a mover and shaker in San Diego’s sports world. His statue once greeted fans exiting the trolley at the main entrance of “the Murph,” a nickname attached to former Qualcomm Stadium. 

Now you can see the statue of the veteran sports editor and columnist with his dog Abe loyally at his side outside of the new Snapdragon Stadium, looking north towards Los Angeles. That’s fitting because he played a key role in convincing the Los Angeles Chargers to move south to San Diego. Some say if he was still alive, they might still be in town.

He has an extensive list of contributions to San Diego’s sports legacy. Longtime fans might well label him the Tony Gwynn of San Diego’s sports reporters.  He was that important to the city’s sports profile.

Prompted by a recent column written by Kirk Kenny,  a sports writer at Murphy’s old stomping grounds, the San Diego Union-Tribune, I went to see the statue at…

How the World’s Most Infamous Jewel Thief Turned to Murder

Nearly 60 years ago, a surfer named Jack Murphy pulled off one of the most audacious jewel heists in US history when he and a buddy scaled the American Museum of Natural History, broke through glass, and stole the Star of India sapphire, the DeLong Star ruby, and an assortment of diamonds and emeralds. R.J. Cutler’s new four-part docuseries, Murf the Surf: Jewels, Jesus, and Mayhem in the USA, premiering February 5 on MGM+, makes clear that Murphy wasn’t an expert thief. At 27, Murphy was a tanned party boy who simply lucked out with the museum’s unbelievably lax security. It was 1964, and the museum’s alarms had stopped working.

The true-crime story became catnip to a country still grieving John F. Kennedy, and Murphy—nicknamed Murf the Surf—was portrayed as a wise-cracking folk hero by the press. Bob Dylan referenced him in his liner notes and Nora Ephron reminisced about the “delicious” crime decades after covering it as a rookie reporter. “These guys had committed the perfect victimless crime,” Ephron said in 2010. “They just seemed like fabulous party boys.”

Murphy’s jewel heist and persona were so compelling that he remained a mythic figure to the press and…