Don Baird didn't have the biggest voice on radio, but everything he did spoke volumes. A versatile, tenacious reporter, he followed the news and newsmakers wherever they led him, especially during the turbulent 1960s.

A respectful crafter of language, he wrote for radio and television —- and even a country song that was recorded by Willie Nelson. A solid newsman with an endearingly soft side, he tracked down former co-workers for reunions and courted his wife with a single flower.

The Who's Who of people he knew and covered during a 40-year journalism career in Georgia extended from one-time governor and segregationist Lester Maddox to civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr.

More remarkable still, he rarely met an enemy anywhere he went.

"He was a wonderful, warm human being," said Frank Stiteler, who worked at Atlanta radio station WSB for 25 years, spending much of the 1960s on the on-air side with Baird.

"There was not a phony bone in his body," Mr. Stiteler said. "Some people in the media are kind of artificial. Don was anything but that, and anyone he spent time with could sense that and appreciate it."

Recalled current CNN Radio anchor Dave Kirschner, who began his career at WSB, 750 on the AM dial: "We used to have a phrase back when the station played records. We'd say, 'Now here's a real 750 favorite.' You could call Don that. He was a real 750 favorite."

Mr. Baird, 72, died of cancer Friday in his Douglasville home. He is survived by his wife, Claudia; stepchildren Rusty Weinberg of Stone Mountain, Shannon Weinberg of Douglasville and Kim Hallenbeck of Sugar Hill; and two grandsons.

Working at WSB from 1962 to 1974, Mr. Baird's reporting took him deep inside the civil rights movement and the state Capitol. Veteran radio reporter Mike Kavanagh didn't arrive at WSB until the mid-1970s, but he had long known of Mr. Baird from his reports that went out over the NBC radio network.

"He was the voice of Atlanta, as far as I was concerned," said Mr. Kavanagh, who recalled covering a news conference soon after arriving here and hearing Julian Bond, Joseph Lowery and others ask for Mr. Baird by name. "Don was at the forefront of covering the civil rights movement in the '60s —-which today sounds ho-hum, but back then, it was quite revolutionary and controversial."

Mr. Baird, who went on to work for CNN for 15 years before retiring in 2002, could be dogged if that was what the story called for. His former colleagues delight in recalling the time Mr. Baird sprinted after Mr. Maddox for an interview while the latter was busy chasing black diners from his restaurant.

But he also possessed the touch of the poet. Married to Claudia for three years, he showed up at their first date clutching a single red rose, having read in her Match.com profile that she considered that the most romantic gesture.

He wrote a song, "It Will Come to Pass," that appears on Mr. Nelson's CD "Legends," and was in the middle of writing a novel, "Cabbagetown," according to his wife.

Mr. Baird never grew self-important about his work, his associates said. At the same time, he never failed to appreciate the significance of it.

"In later years, Don told me that one of his greatest thrills was to be able to hold Martin Luther King's Nobel Peace Prize when he interviewed him," Mr. Kavanagh said. "I haven't met many people in this business who've had a wondrous enthusiasm for the work, who thought they were the luckiest person on the planet to be doing it. But that was Don."

About five years ago, that same sense of history led Mr. Baird to organize a reunion of people who had worked at WSB since the 1950s.

"He said, 'We've got to get all these great people and stories together,' and darned if we didn't have a great reunion at Manuel's Tavern," Mr. Kirschner recalled. "It was so great that someone said, 'Let's have another,' and we did."

And they'll continue having them, Mr. Kavanagh vowed Saturday.

A memorial service for Mr. Baird is planned for 11 a.m., April 7 at the United Methodist Church in Douglasville.

—- Staff writer Rhonda Cook contributed to this article.