C.J. Gish
Talk show host and former Santa Fe College professor Ward Scott died overnight, according to friends and associates who posted to social media on Thursday.
Scott taught English at Santa Fe for nearly 40 years and was the host of the Ward Scott Files, a conservative podcast aiming to inform people about local, state and national issues.
“It is with a heavy heart that we announce that Ward Scott passed away peacefully in his sleep last night,” a Thursday post on the Ward Scott Files Facebook page said. “We want to offer peace and condolences to his family and friends. Thank you to everyone who took this journey with us.”
According to a Santa Fe College release, Scott taught at the school from 1969 to 2007 and served as president of the College Senate in the early 2000s. He returned to the college in 2008 as a professor emeritus and received the SF Lifetime Achievement Award in 2009.
“We lost a great friend, a great person, and a great partner this morning,” local marketing executive Freddie Wehbe wrote on Facebook. “Ward was a wonderful storyteller and teacher.”
On his Ward Scott Files website, Scott said in his “About” section, “I am a teacher by trade. I approach being a talk show host as I would a classroom. Using a storytelling form of narrative, I present local, state, national, and international issues in a way that engages the audience and makes them want to think about the subject. Making people think is the way of a teacher. You hear us say, ‘The truth is out there.’ Helping people see the truth is my first goal.”
Larry Wilson, program director for 106.9 I Am Country and 100.9 Classic Hits, recalled meeting Scott during his first week at MARC Radio in March 2018.
“We were talking about my radio shows that I was hired to do here, and we got done with our conversation and Ward (jokingly) said, ‘One last thing, I don’t want to hear you start stealing my material,’” said Wilson. “I was just flattered he would listen to see if I was using his stuff.”
Scott’s website and Facebook page did not disclose the cause of death or pending funeral arrangements.
I’m going to miss Ward. He once told me that when he died I would be the most misanthropic person in the county. I don’t know about that, but it was typical Ward Scott. I did a radio show with him for over two years, Foreign Affairs Fridays (and my own show, Beyond the Headlines on Saturday) and his Socratic method of moving my narrative along was unique and highly effective and nothing if not entertaining. If only the audience could have heard the stuff he managed to say during the breaks, we could barely compose ourselves in time for the show.
My last email with him was just a few weeks ago where, not liking that I wasn’t able to call in on his show for business reasons, accused me of having been “neutered” by “the man”. I told him, “Probably not”, and then we had another one of our hilarious conversations where he said incredibly important and intelligent things. I guess we’re lucky in one respect, we have hundreds and hundreds of hours of Ward Scott on video, so he’s never going to be forgotten.
Best wishes to his family, I’ll always remember Ward in the fondest of ways.
R