Roy Hess†
Inducted 2016
Hometown: Neligh, Neb.
High School: Neligh-Oakdale High School
College: The University of Texas at Austin
Best Known for: Journalist
Jan. 9, 1954-May 28, 2020
Hess has covered Valley sports for five decades (since 1978), and is the only person to ever serve as Sports Editor of the Valley’s three main daily newspapers.
Mission led the expansion of the Monitor's sports coverage territory from just the McAllen schools to a focus on all teams in Hidalgo County when the Monitor transitioned from an afternoon paper to a morning paper in 1991. He supervised The Monitor's selection and story writing of All-Millennium Valley teams in football and baseball in 2000 and 2001. He is the only sports writer to cover each of the five Valley's state championships in soccer. He is the primary Valley sports writer to cover the rise to national prominence of three Valley professional boxers since 2007, when a bi-weekly boxing notebook was started.
Hess was named Region IV sports writer of the year by the Texas Association of Soccer Coaches (TASCO) in 1992, 2005 and 2012. Other awards include UPI first place sports column (1982), AP sports story honorable mention (2005) and AP third place spot sports reporting (2012).