A longtime sports journalist, Angelo Biondo was a fount of institutional memory for the now-defunct Chicago Daily News.
Mr. Biondo died Thursday, Jan. 22, in West Suburban Hospital, Oak Park, of pneumonia and congestive heart failure. He was 93.
During his 47 years at the Daily News, Mr. Biondo covered every sport and participated in almost all aspects of the paper’s production, according to family and friends.
“Angelo was very versatile. He was knowledgeable about all kinds of sports and could fill in for anyone,” said Harvey Duck, a former Daily News sports reporter.
Mr. Biondo, the 10th of 11 children born into an immigrant Italian family, grew up across the street from Mrs. O’Leary’s house, where the Great Chicago Fire was said to have started. During his time at Lane Tech High School, Mr. Biondo published a homemade neighborhood newspaper with his own letterpress.
In 1922 Mr. Biondo went to his first baseball game at the age of 11 and witnessed the highest scoring game in major-league history as the Cubs beat the Phillies, 26-23, according to Donna Silvestri, his daughter.
Mr. Biondo started as a copy boy for the Daily News in 1928, working for the likes of poet Carl Sandburg, who was a Daily News staffer at the time. “He used to tell me that Carl Sandburg brought a guitar to office parties,” his daughter said. Mr. Biondo had been the last person still alive to have worked at the paper’s old site at 15 N. Wells St., colleagues said.
Mr. Biondo rose through the newspaper’s ranks and started reading copy and putting together box scores. Someone on the staff thought he had talent, so Mr. Biondo began taking night courses at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism.
“He wasn’t the colorful guy, but he was the guy you could count on,” said Joe Rein, a former executive sports editor for the Daily News.
Mr. Biondo served 2 1/2 years in the Army, guarding German prisoners of war near Phoenix. When he returned to Chicago, his job was waiting, Rein said.
Mr. Biondo was instrumental in setting up a professional husband-wife bowling tournament and was part of a bowling writers team that participated in an annual tournament in Las Vegas.
Mr. Biondo was considered one of the best at handicapping horse races and for years prepared the daily racing coverage, colleagues said.
“He was able to pick up things and could analyze the statistics well,” Rein said. His daughter said Mr. Biondo probably got into handicapping because he needed to make a little extra money to pay for her wedding and then realized how good he was.
Mr. Biondo worked at the Daily News until 1975. He kept up with his journalism friends through the Daily News alumni organization and the Chicago Press Veterans Club, said Edward Baumann, a former Chicago Tribune reporter.
Mr. Biondo began living at Casa San Carlo Retirement Home in Northlake when he was 88.
Friends and family remember him as a humble man who had many stories about the golden era of Chicago sports. “He knew so many famous people. I told him to write a book, but he didn’t think there would be any interest,” his daughter said.
He was married for 58 years to the former Lorraine Belmont, who died in 1996. He is survived by his daughter; two grandchildren; and a great-grandchild. Services have been held.
