Remembering Bob Sheridan

The Diederich College of Communication mourns the loss of Bob Sheridan, Comm ’58, who passed away on November 8. His longtime friend, Paul Salsini, shares memories of Bob’s life and their times together.

When he was a senior at Marquette University High School, Bob Sheridan applied to Marquette and was accepted as a premedical student. But then he discovered how “hopeless” he was in a chemistry class, and a friend, he wrote later, told him that journalism students were “incredibly smart, funny and admired.”

He changed his application to journalism.

Lucky for journalism, because after he graduated in 1958, Robert E. Sheridan had a notable newspaper career for 46 years.

Bob died November 8, 2020, in Bronxville, N.Y., of interstitial lung disease.

Bob attended Marquette on an Evans Scholars scholarship and had a job waiting tables and washing dishes at O’Donnell Hall. He also was a student assistant in the news bureau and was co-editor of the Hilltop, the yearbook, in his junior year.

After graduating, he was a reporter and editor at The Cape Cod Standard-Times, The Catholic Free Press and The Hartford Courant before becoming a copy editor at The Milwaukee Journal in 1964.

Joining The New York Times in 1972, he served in various editing positions before retiring in 2005 after 14 years as assistant news editor/nights.

Bob was a skilled photographer and in a years-long exhausting feat, walked every block of every street in Manhattan, taking thousands of exquisite photos which he published in the book “Manhattan Eye Land.”

Also a poet, he published more than 900 poems in a thick book. And he was a racing and classic car enthusiast, proudly owning a rare 1947 MG TC.

Bob is survived by Peggy, his wife of 57 years, four daughters, three sons, and eight grandchildren.

(I will miss Bob very much. My wife Barbara and I and Bob were in the same class at Marquette and remained friends since. He was my best man and I was his.)