Sikeston's Terry Teachout, WSJ critic and prolific writer, dies at 65

SIKESTON, Mo. -- Former Sikeston resident Terry Teachout, a theater critic and writer for The Wall Street Journal and Commentary magazine, died Thursday in Smithtown, New York. He was 65.

"Terry always considered Sikeston home and that never changed," David Teachout of Sikeston said Friday about his brother.

Born Feb. 6, 1956, son of the late Bert and Evelyn Teachout, Terry Teachout grew up in Sikeston, graduating from Sikeston High School in 1974. He then attended William Jewell College in Liberty, a suburb of Kansas City. Majoring in music and journalism, he worked as a music critic for the Kansas City Star.

In 1985, Teachout moved to New York City, where he worked as an editor for Harper's magazine. After two years, he started freelancing full-time for several newspapers and magazines.

"From that time on I have been a writer, not a musician," Teachout told the Standard Democrat in 2002, "although I continue to play for fun."

At the time of his death, Teachout was the drama critic of The Wall Street Journal and the critic-at-large of Commentary. In addition to his Wall Street Journal drama column and his monthly essays for Commentary, he also wrote "Sightings," a bi-weekly column about the arts in America, for the Journal and "About Last Night," a blog about the arts in New York City and the rest of America, for Arts Journal.

Douglas McLennan, editor of Arts Journal, shared news of Teachout's death in a post Thursday on the Arts Journal's website.

"He was a generous and valued friend," McLennan said in the post. "Though we spoke rarely, we had an active correspondence over the years, and he was one of the hardest-working people I've ever known. He will be much missed."

Teachout also authored several books including a memoir, "City Limits: Memories of a Small-Town Boy"; "The Terry Teachout Reader," a collection of his essays about American art and culture; and biographies of H.L. Mencken, Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington.

Teachout was appointed in 2005 by President George W. Bush to the National Council on the Arts, which is an advisory board for the National Endowment for the Arts. In 2014, he was awarded the Bradley Prize in a ceremony at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.

In 2005, Teachout told the Standard Democrat he wrote his first story for publication for the Sikeston High School newspaper, Bulldog Barker. At the time, Teachout was preparing to speak about journalism and his career at the Sikeston Depot Museum.

"When I started doing this, I wrote on a manual typewriter. Nobody had a computer," Teachout recalled at the time.

According to David Teachout, his brother returned home to Sikeston often to visit family.

"He never forgot where he came from and he always considered Sikeston home," David Teachout said of his brother. "He would come back every chance he got."

David Teachout said he and his brother talked frequently, but due to restrictions with COVID, Terry Teachout had not been back to Sikeston in some time.

During one of his visits home, while tending to his mother as she recovered from spinal surgery in 2005, Terry Teachout continued to work during his visit, writing reviews for The Wall Street Journal and his visit for his blog, "About Last Night."

"It's funny; my readers love those postings from Sikeston," Teachout told the Standard Democrat at the time. "I always get lots of e-mails, and they love to hear about it."

The critic had a national audience yet he never forgot his Sikeston roots.

"Terry did a lot of great things; he was still a simple man," David Teachout said Friday. "He had his own code of ethics and lived by them. I've never been more proud of someone than I am of him."

For more about Teachout, visit terryteachout.com.