McCloskey services scheduled Nov. 4

Friday, Oct. 20, 2000 | 10:12 a.m.

Services for longtime Nevada newspaperman Jack McCloskey, columnist and former editor of the Mineral County Independent News, will be Nov. 4 in Hawthorne.

McCloskey, who long wrote his column under the pen name "Jasper," died Oct. 13 of heart problems at the Washoe Medical Center in Reno, where he had been taken from his Hawthorne home by medical helicopter on Oct. 12. He was 89.

Services will be 11 a.m. at Our Lady of Perpetual Health Catholic Church at 8th and A streets in Hawthorne, where McCloskey ran his paper from 1933 until his retirement in 1994. He continued to write his column until late September, when he was initially hospitalized for a heart condition.

Born Sept. 19, 1911, in Goldfield, McCloskey was raised in Tonopah and began his newspaper career as a paperboy at age 11. He was a veteran of World War II.

McCloskey and a partner bought a defunct newspaper in 1933 and renamed it the Mineral County Independent. He later merged that publication with the Hawthorne News, where he had previously worked.

McCloskey became sole owner of the weekly Independent News in 1954 and became known for his outspoken views and vast knowledge of state politics.

He is survived by his wife, Pauline McCloskey; two daughters, Joanie Gazaway of Hawthorne and Jean Abel of Carson City; and two grandchildren.