Headline: "GREG FREEMAN WAS THE BEST OF OUR NEWSPAPER. HE WAS, IN MANY WAYS, OUR HEART."
Reporter: By Bill Smith\Of The Post-Dispatch

Publication: ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
Last Printed: Sun., Jan 5, 2003
Section: SPECIAL SECTION, Page: E2, Edition: THREE STAR

* Greg Freeman's colleague and friend, Bill Smith, prepared these remarks for Greg's memorial service Saturday.

I think I'll remember his laugh the most.
    
It was big, but not loud - a kind of bemused chuckle that rose up from someplace inside that thick chest and warmed everything it touched.
    
I heard it from across a plate of fried fish three years ago this month in Atlanta, when we were both there to cover the 2000 Super Bowl. It was the winter that many of us first noticed it had become a challenge for him to climb even the shortest flight of steps.
    
I heard it again near the end of 2001, as he lay in a stark hospital room at Barnes, his sister's kidney fresh inside his belly.
    
And we all heard it that afternoon just a few short weeks ago as he sat in his wheelchair near the fifth floor elevator, surrounded by a newsroom of fellow journalists who had gathered to recognize him for what he had done for the newspaper and for the community.

Greg Freeman was the best of our newspaper. He was, in many ways, our heart.

And he was my friend.

He wrote in black and white and in 100 shades of gray - of street crime and hot dog vendors, of welfare reform and chitterlings with hot sauce, of troubled schools and a house on DeGiverville with Christmas decorations always left up too long.
   
Of racism and potholes and three zany fellows he treasured so much: Moe, Larry and Curly.
   
Occasionally - not nearly often enough for many of us - he'd write of his family: Elizabeth, Will, Cornelius the Cat and his beloved mother, who liked a bit of Scotch in the Christmas eggnog.

It seemed that Greg could find a common interest with nearly everyone. With me, it was Superman.
    
It was a shared joy from both of our childhoods: George Reeves with that great "S" shield across his chest battling for truth, justice and, of course, the American way.
    
Twice, in 1996 and 1997, we traveled with our families to the small town of Metropolis on the southern tip of Illinois for the annual spring Superman festival there.
    
For those few hours in Metropolis, we were kids again, with life spreading out in front of us like some great yet-to-be-traveled adventure.

Years ago, he wrote in the Beaumont High School Digest about his future. He would be, he wrote, the first black president of the United States.
    
He was one of the proudest men I will ever know, but also one of the most humble. He was, at the same time, both street savvy and incredibly innocent. Hoss Cartwright with a computer.

He was just 46.

On Tuesday morning, just moments after learning that he had died, I picked up the Post-Dispatch and looked to the all too-familiar photo of the smiling man in the dark mustache atop the Metro page.
    
"Greg Freeman is on vacation. His column will return Jan. 7."
    
Were it only true.

It was a big laugh, but not too big. It was a laugh from the soul of a good and decent man.
    
The kind of laugh that told you, "Hey, you know what, I like you. I value who you are."
    
I can hear this laugh still, echoing through the hallways of 900 North Tucker Boulevard.
    
I am confident that we will hear it for a very, very long time.

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