R.I.P.: Jim Weatherly, Songwriter-Singer

Jim Weatherly

Jim Weatherly, a former star quarterback at the University of Mississippi who moved to Nashville and authored megahits such as "Midnight Train to Georgia" in a prolific career as a singer-songwriter, died at his home Wednesday, Music Row mogul Charlie Monk told the Tennessean. 

He was 77, according to The Tennessean.  A cause of death was not immediately available. 

Weatherly helped lead Ole Miss to an undefeated season, the SEC championship and the national championship in 1962 — one of three national championships claimed by the football program. The Rebels repeated as SEC champions with Weatherly at quarterback in 1963.

Born March 17, 1943, in Pontotoc, Mississippi, Weatherly began writing songs as a teenager and was in a band while attending Ole Miss. 

He wrote some of Gladys Knight & the Pips' greatest hits, including "Neither One of Us Wants to Be the First to Say Goodbye," "Midnight Train to Georgia" and "You're the Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me."

In 2003, “Midnight Train to Georgia” was named one of the top 500 songs of all time by Rolling Stone magazine.

Weatherly was a member of the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame and ASCAP's Country Songwriter of the Year in 1974.

"When I inducted Jim into the Songwriters Hall of Fame I said, 'This may be the most honorable human being I've ever known,'" Monk said Wednesday. "He never had a cigarette in his mouth, he never had a taste of alcohol, he didn't chew (tobacco), he didn't cuss. The only cuss word I ever heard him use was 'Foot! Charlie.' He probably was one of the top five most talented songwriters to ever drop into this town."