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Pizza Adventures....by Bob Sanders

I'm not sure where or when I had my first pizza.  My best guess is that it was in Tulsa in the early '60s and definitely in a Pizza Hut.  This would figure since the chain was begun in 1958 by a couple of students at Wichita University--something like 130 miles north of Tulsa.

Pizza Hut was a reasonable beginning and it wasn't until 1968 that matters got serious when I moved from Los Angeles to Chicago to work for Playboy Enterprises.  L.A. was essentially pizza-deprived back then although Sam and Joe Martorano had established Casa Bianca at 1955 Colorado Blvd., a couple of field goals from the Rose Bowl.  The Martoranos had worked at Tony's Pizza in the Windy City but their approach bore little resemblance to the deep dish Chicago product; the crust, I'm told, was light and the toppings slight by comparison.  The California approach to cooking was underway and the pizza obsessive under-served.

I don't recall any L.A. pizza places largely because my dining was pretty much limited to West Hollywood and environs running to the ocean.  With an office at 9255 Sunset Blvd, my favorite places tended to be within walking distance and included: the Cock & Bull across the street; Hamburger Hamlet, eventually a chain created by the still with us Harry and Marilyn Lewis who started at the corner of Sunset & Hilldale; and Frascati, a casual yet classy place with outdoor dining at the rear.  Oh, yes, there was Musso & Frank Grill, still there since 1919.

My discovery of Chicago pizza was made possible by a convention at The Drake Hotel that forced me to stay at the St. Clair on Ohio Street.  The Drake, immediately across the street from the Playboy Building, was the logical place for me but timing, as always, was everything and I was told I could move to The Drake when the convention was over.  We know the importance of timing when we reflect upon Turner Classic Movie's decision to play next Tuesday's (May 29) Irving Thalberg tribute show at 6 a.m. EST.

I didn't need The Drake.  I had settled in at the St. Clair, a place complete with a large contingent of raffish folks from the entertainment industry.  On the top floor was the Chicago Press Club and down the street Ike Sewell's uncommnly popular restaurants, Pizzeria Uno and Due.  I soon found myself eating a fair amount of deep dish that contrasted enormously with prior culinary adventures of the Italian genre.

Sewell, having served in Italy during World War II, had become a regional vice president of Fleishmann's Distilling Corp. and wanted something more exciting.  He found it when he teamed up with pal Ricc Riccardo, an established restaurateur who in in 1935 had turned a former speakeasy into Riccardo Restaurant and Gallery.  A Texan, Sewell wanted to specialize in Mexican food but fate, in the form of a very bad enchilada in a test dinner played a significant role in cuisine history.  Riccardo became so sick that Mexican food was out of the question so he suggested pizza.  Like Sewell, Riccardo had encountered the food while serving in Italy; both were of a mind that the real thing was little more than an appetizer, and they set about inventing something more substantial.  What evolved was a meal-sized pizza with a thick crust and lots of cheese. 

Business did not flourish immediately at the corner of Ohio and Wabash and Sewell soon gave orders to his bartenders to provide free sample slices to customers.  Fortunately for Sewell (Riccardo by then was concentrating on his own restaurant up the street at Rush and Hubbard Streets), Pizzaria Uno's clientele were heavy drinkers and the pizza eventually caught on.  More about the remarkable Riccardo and son Ric, Jr. at a later date.

I lived at the St. Clair for a month, then moved into an apartment on Division Street between State St. and Lake Michigan.  As things turned out, Betty and the kids did not join me in Chicago until August of that year.  It wasn't all bad since Hugh Hefner's home was two blocks away and I had an open invitation to parties that, seemingly, had no end.

The true origins of pizza are difficult to pin down.  People inclined toward conspiracy theories tend to believe that Marco Polo brought back more than spaghetti when he returned from China although such claims are tenuous at best.  We are told the Greeks had a vegetable pizza in ancient times and the Italians improved the product with a variety of fillings before baking.  We do know that Virgil, who lived in the lst Century BC, had the good sense to write a pizza recipe for posterity.

It is generally conceded that the first pizzeria in this country was opened in New York City in 1905 thus planting the city's incestuous family tree.  Like Sewell's experience 50 years later, it was slow to catch on.  It took World War II and a taste acquired by GIs to create a fondness for the food.  Today there are more than 70,000 pizzerias in this country producing an average of 46 slices or 23 lbs. a year for every man, woman and child.  Deep dish pizza, still served at Uno and Due, has run afoul of criticism during recent years for a calorie count of 2,310.  Pizza Hut is out of contention in that league with a modest 9-inch Triple Meat Heliano of 1,280 calories.  And you wonder how this nation got to be one of big butts?

Not credited with a national sense of humor, South Korea spoofed itself when the country's artery-clogged Mr. Pizza unit produced a YouTube pizza story suggesting that Marco Polo stole the pizza recipe not from China but from Korea.  The send up was produced by Gumshoe Pictures and is worth viewing.

In 1990, wife Jan and I moved to the Pacific Northwest and San Juan Island's Friday Harbor where nary a pizza could be found until an expanded gas station started cranking out product geared for those of decidedly limited dining experience.  Even the availability of the mainland 60 minutes away by ferry was of pizza disappointment.  Alas, the exquisite pizza and the magnificent hamburger are rarities of the Pacific Northwest.  We eventually discovered, thanks to then banker Brian Brown, an approximation of hamburger heaven on Commercial Avenue in Anacortes.  The Brown Lantern is a burger discovery that resurrected fond memories of Charlie Beinlich's in Northbrook north of Chicago.  Mainland mainstay Bob's (nine locations--three in Bellingham) knows what to put in a bun; by all means, hit the bar in the Barkley Village location for a genuine pub feeling.

Each of us has had memorable dining experiences.  One of mine occurred in 1992 when Jan and I were guests in Barcelona of Antonio Susquellas Escala, whose employment as presidente of EniChem Iberica, S.A. put him in the midst of the Olympic Games.  Tony had been an exchange student in Thousand Oaks, California living with Jan and her family.  Our six weeks with Tony was his "thank you" and included a highly impressive number of event tickets including opening and closing ceremonies.

It was while strolling down Barcelona's impressive La Ramblas that Jan and I, accompanied by my brother John and his wife, Terry, decided to have lunch at the Hotel Royal's Cafeteria La Poma.  Curious about whatever Barcelona's approach to the pizza might be, I ordered a thin-crusted beauty whose intriguing ingredients included walnuts and blue cheese positioned in the pie's center--about a four-inch circle.  Outside of a delicate winner consumed at, of all places, a short-lived Two Illinois Center restaurant developed by Arnold Morton (he built steak house giant Morton's), my experience with the light version had been limited.

The Barcelona product was remarkably good and here I am, 20 years later, recalling its virtues.  I was so caught up in the pizza that I paid little attention to Magic Johnson, a member of the U.S.A. Dream Team, unquestionably the greatest basketball squad ever.  Magic was seated nearby dining while a circus-like scene developed outside in front of a huge hotel window where a human pyramid of kids had materialized.  Mesmerized, the kids were shouting "Ma-jeek, Ma-jeek."  Completing his meal, the basketball star vanished out a back door and the kids disassembled.  Pronounced evidence of the departed youngsters was left behind on the window; the glass was heavily befogged by human vapors.

Pizza satisfaction is a personal thing and my problem with the Fourth Corner version can be summed up in one word: pepperoni.  Enthusiasts of the pepperoni experience are inclined to believe that pepperoni pizza is to the Pacific Northwest what the Packers are to Green Bay.  A current television commercial extolling the glories of Pizza Hut is, I find, a stomach churner of prodigious success.  While an imaginatively constructed pizza heavy on vegetables can mirror the exultant beauty of a Joan Miro work, the Pizza Hut TV effort features a very large pie whose disgusting topping consists of nothing but a slathering of pepperoni that appears to have been sitting for a week under a scorching Arizona desert sun.  It is beyond ugly made even more so by bread sticks of almost equal repulsion.

Reaching pizza nirvana is not easy although there is a greater variety available today than, say, 30 years ago.  Now a $38 billion industry, pizza is available in chains dominated by Pizza Hut, Dominos, and Papa John who claim 21% of the pizzeria total.  With hard times upon us, pizzeria prices have come down--partly because of the frozen variety competition whose costs are appealing.  Papa Murphy's, whose come-on is take-and-bake, is a highly interesting game plan.  A warning: do not deviate fromn Papa's instructions.  Among other things, bake within a hour of pickup and make sure you don't get a product that's been sitting around.

Store-bought frozen product is challenging with Freschetta, Red Baron, DeGiorno, Paul Newman, California and the rest battling it out to see who has the least amount of cardboard taste.  The boredom of pepperoni pizza has dominated Fourth Corner freezers and I had all but given up until three weeks ago when I encountered what I immediately determined as homage to Chicago: sausage and mushroom pizza.  It was at Fred Meyer and, indeed, produced by Kroger, owner of FM.  Further, a rather stunning picture of the pizza was on the black oblong box and within an hour I had achieved a blessedness never imagined from a frozen product.  The crust was thin and flaky but not overly so and the toppings more substantial and decidedly tastier than all others experienced.  At present, there are four Private Selection pizzas (11-14 oz.) that sell for $4.50 each.  The mushrooms used are portobella and shitake and the sausage Italian.  There's some jive on the box about the baking having been done on a marble hearth.

This column, always inclined to recognize superior marketing, believes Private Selection deserves recognition for realizing all frozen pizza boxes are the same shape.  Simply by creating an oblong pizza has the firm given the product recognition in a highly competitive environment.

And, frankly, I don't care if Private Selection pizza is baked on Aunt Tilly's breakfast table.  Now, go get yourself some sausage and mushroom pizza and think Cubs; that is, if you can stand the thought.

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Golf Linkage....by Bob Sanders

 

One of the continuing delights of the computer is stumbling upon something from the nearly forgotten past, then pursuing that subject for an update.  Timely enough with the Masters golf tournament nearly upon us, my Googling was links-connected.

Pursuit began with curiosity about the Blue Hills Country Club whose Kansas City origins go back to 1912 and a location some 30 blocks south of where jazz greats developed their talents.  By the time my TV Guide employment got me transferred to the city in 1959, Blue Hills was deep into plans to build a new a very grand course.

I was introduced to the original layout as a guest of Bill Bates, then general manager of WDAF Radio & TV.  Two other members of the foursome were Jay Barrington, manager of WDAF Radio, and Bob Hanger, then co-owner of Jones & Hanger Advertising.

What Blue Hills left behind became one of those deals that young golfers today can't believe possible in a sport that has become very expensive.  In my case, there were a couple of standouts.  The Winnetka Club, designed by Chick Evans, cost $100 for a year's membership when I moved to the Chicago North Shore community in 1968.  Golf was unlimited and there were no greens fees if you lived within the city's limits.  The other remarkable bargain was the left behind Blue Hills whose membership was $90.  The greens fees were $10.  Unable to recall the new name for the course, I attempted to chase it down without success.  The Blue Hills website fails to recognize its origins, a bit of seeming snobbery in view of the now course-less Blue Hills Neighborhood of affordable housing and where the streets are named after jazz greats.

If it's possible for a man to be in love with a golf course, Bill Bates was that man.  Infatuation is not a strong enough word and Bill's deep and abiding affection was touching.  Even when the new course was completed in all its magnificence (it is called by many the best K.C. links today), he preferred to play the old course.

The four of us saw a fair amount of other courses including the south side's Hillcrest and our tendency there was to play very early in the morning to beat the often intense heat; a companion factor, perhaps of greater import, was the course's modest 19th hole featuring inexpensive beer.  Our enthusiasm peaked late one morning that extended way into the afternoon when the four of us wafted 64 16 ounce rascals.  We kept track of our tippling by stuffing each round's empty cups into four mounting stacks.

We all managed to impair our marriages that day and in one case irreparably.  It was Barrington's whose ended shortly thereafter with Hanger eventually marrying Jay's ex-spouse.  If memory serves, it was the day of the great quaff that Hanger made the second of consecutive eagles on the second hole, in each instance holing out a six-iron.  Hanger, easily the best golfer among us, accomplished his feat on succeeding Saturdays and it may have been that our drinking began in celebration of it.  

Barrington and I would hook up in Los Angeles when I was transferred there in 1966.  Jay was teaching sports celebrities, including Los Angeles Dodger Maury Wills, how to work with the media.  More anon about Jay whose second wife once tossed all his clothes out of a room at what is now San Francisco's Westin St. Francis Hotel.  That last thought, whose construction includes references to both  name and clothes dropings, may be a first for me.

Memories came flooding back when I googled the Hillcrest website and found a lede paragraph drawing attention to the course's signature hole, the 243 yards first.  I mention it because, following our 16th round of beers, we decided to tackle the course again.  Details are a bit beclouded but I seem to recall a general inability to coordinate the golf swing in addition to entangling my golf cart with Bates' bag carrier.  There were claims I did the latter twice while managing to win the hole with an 11.  We played no further.

One Saturday in 1964 found us playing what was then the world's longest course, according to the Guinness Book of Records.  The accurately-named Dub's Dread was designed for masochists by touring pro Harold "Jug" McSpaden in Wyandotte County--just west of Kansas City and close to Monticello where he was born.

Dub's Dread had little character other than being very long.  My recollection is that there were few trees.  The course, then of 8,204 yards, today is a cut-down version of 7,224.

McSpaden was one of the best on tour winning 17 tournaments.  In 1949, when Byron Nelson finished first a remarkable 19 times, McSpaden won none but was runner-up 13 times.  They finished 1-2 so often they were called the Gold Dust Twins.  Ten years earlier playing with Nelson in a warm-up round for the Texas Open, he shot 59.  It was Nelson and McSpaden who invented the golf shoe.  Their take was 25 cents a pair.

Nelson and McSpaden remained friends up to McSpaden's death by carbon monoxide poisoning in 1996.  He was 87 and there is no evidence suggesting his demise followed a bad round at Dub's Dread although the course's location remains within a short drive of where he lived all his life except while on tour.

Commenting about his pal, Nelson told the Associated Press: "I feel like I've lost a wonderful friend.  We never had an argument in all the time we played together."  McSpaden once told him: "If you wouldn't have been born, I'd have been known as a pretty good player."

Dub's Dread, while longest no more, is acclaimed by people who care about such things as the course that inspired other 8,000 yards links.  McSpaden's creation, it must be emphasized, occurred in the pre-titanium era when a course of 1,000 lesser yards was considered long.  It wasn't long before The International Club in Bolton, Massachusetts came up with The Pines whose 8,325 yards still plays to a punishing par of 73 from what are called the "Tiger" tees so named well before Tiger Woods' birth.  Lesser challenges may be found at members' tees where the yardage is 6,547.

A bit smug about "longest leadership," The International people have had to move aside for The Jade Dragon Snow Mountain Golf Club located in a very mountainous region of Yannun Province in China.  At first glance, it appears the course's scorecard must be a mistake of some kind; its par is 72 although it plays to 8,548 yards from the back tees.  Among the par 5s is one measuring 711 yards plus two others that exceed 600 yards.  There are five par 4s longer than 500 yards.  That's the bad news.

The good news is that the ball flies 20 percent further at Jade Dragon Snow Mountain's 10,000 feet of elevation than, say, at Dub's Dread.  For golfer's there's nothing quite like elevation redemption as a rationale for playing Jade Dragon.  Still, that 20 percent of extra length gets the yardage down to a reasonable 6,839.  Let's tee 'em up and don't forget the oxygen.

Appearing to be a threat to Jade Dragon was the El Grande Hombre, an 8,600 yard marathon announced for Las Vegas in 3003.  Judging from the way the Sin City economy is going, the last thing Las Vegas needs is 8,600 yards of golf course--still on hold.

Reflective of the many bizarre moments available at the Nullarbor Links is the Dingo Den hole where a resident crow is prone to stealing golf balls.  The Dingo Den is part of the world's truly longest golf course located on the southwestern outback of the country.  So long is the course (848 miles) that it is spread over two states, South and Western Australia.  Holes average 50 miles apart.

It is the vast emptiness of the area that got promotion-minded Aussies thinking about the tendency of motorists to hurtle down the Eyre Highway never bothering to stop, take in some sights, and, just maybe, spend a little money.  That was five years ago and this fall the Fourth Annual Chasing the Sun Golf Festival will be held.

Seven holes are on existing courses while 11 were built at roadhouses.  While The Masters course has a tradition of naming its holes after flowers and shrubs that lend to the majesty of Bobby Jones' masterpiece, the Nullarbor (Latin for "no trees") Links has been inspired by outback landscape resulting in such tests as Watering Hole, Oyster Beds, 90 Mile Straight, Border Kangaroo, and Golden Horse.

Plans are already underway with the tournament set for September 30-October 6.  Last year 50 golfers participated and an even larger field is expected this year.  Surprises are being arranged at the formidable Cocklebiddy's Eagle Nest hole in addition to the highly challenging Fraser Sheep's Back.  Greens at the roadhouse holes, some made of AstroTurf, others of sand and oil, await golfers with fairways in their natural state.  The world's longest golf course is appallingly arid with grass almost as rare as a wink-less Sarah Palin.

More than 2,500 have played the Nullarbor Links so far.  Should you decide to tee it up, keep a sharp lookout for snakes, wayward wombats, and kangaroos.  There's a road sign at the Cockleberry hole indicating the human population is eight, kangaroos: 1,234, 567.

You might consider hitting cheap or cut balls at Dingo's Den where the crow hangs out.

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Newton Minow & The Supremes

 

It was while working for TV Guide in 1957 that I learned some multi-tasking, long before the term was invented, that enabled me to do a particularly good job then and later on for my employer.  My acquisition was in an unlikely place, Dothan, Alabama, and provided additional insight into the inner-workings of small-town television. 

I had been moved to Atlanta from St. Louis in the late winter of that year.  Atlanta was a production center where editions of the magazine were produced for Georgia, North and South Carolina, Florida, Tennessee and Alabama.  My first day on the job was a bit unusual and involved a breakfast to herald the acquisition of MGM films by WSB, a station whose call letters stood for Welcome South, Brother.  Aware that the breakfast was to begin in 10 minutes, I dashed out of my office to find what I thought was a cab parked by the curb.  Leaping into the vehicle, I realized the driver was a cop who saw the humor in what had happened.  "Where do you want to go?" he asked.  "WSB," I answered and we were off.

The cop then drove me to what turned out to be WAGA-TV, the CBS affiliate.  Apologizing for confusing the two stations (perhaps I spoke a strange dialect?), he took me to WSB.  "What an interesting introduction to what I'm sure is a wonderful city," was my Chamber of Commerce comment made to a curbside Norman Shavin, then radio-tv columnist for the Atlanta Journal.  He used the quote in his next day's column.

Having a unique responsibility for coverage areas of many stations, I took an early-on drive through Alabama where I was astonished to find a dirt road in the very heart of Birmingham.  To get to the Florida panhandle, I had to go through Dothan where I learned from the promotion manager of the town's only station that the magazine was getting 50 and 60 spots a week in trade for a half-page advertisement.  Many were in prime time.  Offering proof of performance by showing me station logs, he threw in a comment about "an FCC ruling that any citizen, upon request, must be shown a log."

I never forgot that one realizing I could not only view the accuracy of our programming but, also, the positioning of our trade-out-spots. While stations in markets like New York, Chicago and Los Angeles traded on a dollar-for-dollar basis, it was the Dothans, Topekas, and Chattanoogas where enthusiasm for the magazine often was based upon the answer to a question I was prone to ask station managers and promoters: "Would you rather have a newspaper or a TV Guide in the hands of a viewer seeking program information?"  Because TV Guide was pre-eminent in providing program details, the answer to the question went a long way in the magazine's success.  All it took was a handshake.

Venturing further south to Panama City, I checked the station's logs and learned things that would have raised the ire of the FCC.  In those days, you could not have three commercial spots in a row.  A way around the rule was to drop a station promo spot among the paid-for ones and I was surprised such obvious subterfuge was ignored there.  The log showed popular shows like "Tennessee Ernie Ford" often were resumed in progress--sometimes missing more than two minutes during which commercials ran.

While it's unlikely Newton Minow was ever aware of the specific guile practiced by the Panama City channel, it is true that the former FCC chairman included the spirit of such shenanigans in his charge that the TV industry was a "vast wasteland."  That was on May 9, 1961, four years after my trip to Dothan.  Minow had been appointed recently to his position by President John F. Kennedy and his words shook up TV like no one before or since.

The Minow comment got mixed reviews.  Many regarded his attack before the National Association of Broadcasters long overdue as criticism of excessive violence and frivolity while others thought it elitist hammering of programs enjoyed by viewers who believed the criticism as private enterprise interference by government.  Sound familiar?

Others unhappy with Minow's observations included (not surprisingly) Ayn Rand and Sherwood Schwartz, the creator of "Gilligan's Island."  Schwartz, who died last year at 94, offered a retort in the form of Gilligan's ill-fated ship, the S.S. Minnow.  The ship was used in  pre-program dramatic effect to explain how the seven survivors wound up on the island.  Minow never got specific about what constituted "wasteland" but "Gilligan" had come more than close and the FCC chairman took the jab in stride.

Over the years, I've had the good fortune to chat with Minow while working for WTTW, Chicago's public television station.  A Chicagoan, he was instrumental in getting the station on the air and in eventually hiring a long-needed professional general manager, Bill McCarter.  I also spoke with him shortly before retiring from the Chicago Tribune in 1988.  Although Minow's "vast wasteland" speech is his strongest connection to the public, he is responsible for fostering two initiatives that dramatically changed American TV.  His All-Channels Received Act of 1961 mandated UHF reception for all television receivers thus creating the number of stations that included PBS throughout the country.  He is a past president of the Carnegie Corporation, the original funder of "Sesame Street."  Still active at 86 and holder of many honors, Minow is the Walter Annenberg professor emeritus at Northwestern University.

Minow believes his most important contribution was successfully urging Congress to pass legislation making possible communications satellites.  It was Minow who told Kennedy: "communications satellites will be much more important than sending man into space, because they will send ideas into space.  Ideas last longer than men."

Writing late last year in Politico while taking exception to the Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United permitting unlimited expenditures of union and corporate money in politics, Minow called attention to a law that has been on the books for more than 75 years.  Minow, who continues his law practice, suggests in his article, written with former general counsel of the FCC Henry Geller, that Section 317 of the 1934 Communications Act is the means of discovery and consistent with Justice Louis Brandeis's philosophy that "sunlight is the best disinfectant." 

One of Minoe's complaint examples involves Terry Branstad who ran for the Iowa Republican gubernatorial nomination last year.  Roughly $370,000 worth of TV commercials accused him of being a "liberal" while purchased by "Iowans for Responsible Government."  Not revealed was that the ads were created and paid for by the Democratic Governors Association.  In addition, something like $450,000 commercial time was bought by "Concerned Taxpayers of America" who turned out to be the "Ending Spending Fund" underwritten by one donor who sponsored more than $1 million in campaign ads.

According to the authors, "the long-standing FCC regulation requires an announcement to fully and fairly disclose the true identity of the person or persons...or other entity by whom or on whose behalf such payment is made.  It provides that when a person or entity acts on behalf of another, and this fact is is known or could be known by the station exercising reasonable diligence, the name of the real sponsor must be announced."

Minow and Geller continue: "Broadcast and cable stations are required to determine the true identity of the sponsoring entity or entities and announce that name.  Most important, when viewers and listeners hear an ad that used a front group with a meaningless name--"Americans for a Better Tomorrow"--they should ask the station, with a copy to the FCC, to use reasonable diligence to disclose the real person or entity that put up the money.

"If the station fails to do so, there can be resort to the FCC or, if necessary, the courts.

"The Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United permitted unlimited expenditures of union and corporate money in politics.  'But the court did not rule that these expenditures should be secret.  It ruled, prompt disclosures of expenditures can provide shareholders and citizens with the information needed to hold corporations and elected officials accountable.  This transparency enables the electorate to make informed decisions and give proper weight to different speakers and messages."

Cornerstone of American television policy, the Communications Act has driven conservatives crazy for 77 years and that must have been the case two years ago with narrow-minded members of the Supreme Court whose search for loopholes and re-interpretations resulted in a terrifying decision whose short-sightedness has resulted in the current election mockery as a handful of Republican sugar daddies determine the Republican Party presidential nominee.

Imagine.  The solution to a remarkably outrageous Supreme Court decision that provides increased opportunity to buy elections, has been on the books on 77 years.  Thank you, Newton Minow.  The transparancy law appears to be the same one--certainly it has symmetrical spirit--as that referenced by that Dothan, Alabama station promotion manager so many years ago.

It's time to write some letters and knock on some doors.

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Bear Keane....by Bob Sanders

 

The postcard received two weeks after Christmas displayed a lonely Santa Claus wearily walking along a mist-shrouded deck.  Slung Sinatra-like over his right shoulder was the jacket to his Santa attire.

Brief and touching copy accompanied the card:

Bear was Santa for 35 years,

Lots of joy--lots of tears.

His Santa days are over and gone,

But his Santa heart beats on and on.

 

I met Thomas "Bear" at the San Juan Island Jazz Festival in 1990, 11 years after a group of island Dixie lovers decided to honor the music while doing local merchants a favor.  The population then was around 5,000 and isn't much more now.  My volunteered first assignment was to co-manage the venue by the ferry dock.  Bear was my co-manager and we liked each other immediately in spite of our differing attitudes toward the music; Bear was ardent about Dixie while my tastes were and are more progressive.  As a newly-arrived resident, I soon became a member of the Festival board and was instrumental in bringing a Chicago group, the Ellington Dynasty, to the event.  Bear, who lived hard by the ferry dock in Mukilteo, volunteered for every fest, originally billed as the San Juan Island Traditional Jazz Festival.

Running four days most of its existence, the event was always held the fourth weekend of July, a wise scheduling based upon knowledge gleaned by one of the original board members who determined that the July dates were the most rain-less in what has become known as "the banana belt."  But one day in close to 80 was rained out.  Among the features of the event were: a Jumping the Gun Thursday night opening; a Friday afternoon promenade of bands down Spring Street (The Rainbow Lady always led the Parasol Ladies accompanied by jazzers dressed in 1920s fashion); a Saturday morning show for children plus a Sunday morning gospel service.

The Jazz Fest survived but never prospered as Bear and I partnered from 1990 until 2002 when the board decided to end the event.  It was a strange decision partly arrived at because but two of 12 board members had any knowledge of or interest in jazz.  I was one of the two and a lone voice in keeping the project alive.  The Board President, former County Commissioneer and Friday Harbor Mayor Bill LaPorte, wanted to sell off Festival holdings that included a storage home worth about $150,000.  The money was used to create scholarships for Friday Harbor high school graduates, certainly a noble cause.

Bear and I ate a lot of hotdogs and drank a bunch of beer as we worked the various venues that for a couple of years included Roche Harbor, like Friday Harbor a postcard pretty place.  The bands came from all over and included: the regional Updown Lowdown Jazz Band; Rosie O'Grady's Good Time Jazz Band from Orlando, Florida; and the Palm Springs Yacht Club headed by Conrad Janis, a trombone player whose earlier acting careers were in radio, stage and film.  

Bear Keane, whose quick wit suggested he had kissed the Blarney Stone on more than one occasion, often acted as venue emcee.  He knew a great deal about the event's regular musicians who more and more tended to come from the Pacific Northwest.  Bear and wife Char were inveterate attendees of jazz fests with Jan and I once meeting them in nearby Victoria, B.C. for a few sessions.

During those Festival days inn Friday Harbor an understandable cloud hung over the event and it was early recognition that created name changes.  The audience was graying and our T- shirts (each volunteer received one plus free admission to events) began reflecting our consternation.  We switched back and forth from calling the music "classic" to the old standy "Dixieland."  Meanwhile, according to Dixie fanatics, there occurred far too many "intrusions" of groups who played musical sins including swing.  One of the outstanding jazz singers who played the gig was Rebecca Kilgore who came up from Portland leaving musical partner Dave ("Van Lingle Mungo") Frishberg behind.  I think that was in 1993 and Kilgore, an enormously appealing singer, has a career in full flight today while appearing at such august watering holdes as Feinstein's in New York.

The Sanders worked out an arrangement with Bear and Char for them to house sitduring trips to such places as Italy, the UK, Spain and Thailand.  "The Bears," as we came to call them, loved San Juan Island and we were delighted to have a former member of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms keep a professional eye on the place.

Health problems forced the Sanders to leave Friday Harbor for Bellingham in 2004 but we remained in touch with The Bears who would meet us at various restaurants halfway between Mukilteo and Subdued City.  There was always at least one meeting with Bear giving hirsute evidence around August that the Christmas season would agin find him playing Santa Claus.  No one played Santa better than Bear, a large man with a perfect demeanor for the role.  His belief in the role was just a snowball's circumference this side of Edmund Gwenn's deep conviction in "Miracle on 34th Street."

The Bears began going to Palm Springs for a chunk of winter about 20 years ago and it was that way this year until we received the card displaying a dejected Santa of dispirited gait.  It was difficult to believe a Santa of 35 years was no more.  I failed to reach Char because of a disconnected phone, then could not connect by e-mail.  I turned to the internet, but a search for Mukilteo and Palm Springs obituaries produced nothing.  Bear was gone.

But wait, as they say in the infomercial biz.  The phone rang the other day and Caller I.D. indicated it was from Thomas Keane.  My first thought was that Char would have to change that I.D.  I answered and couldn't believe the voice at the other end.  It was a boisterous Bear and my thoughts ran to Mark Twain's line about words of his death being highly exaggerated.

Bear's reaction to an obvious question  was that "like at least nine others," neither Jan nor I hadd read the Santa card correctly.  "His Santa days now over and gone, but his Santa heart beats on and on."  Santa's are much better at ho-ho-hoing rather than rhyme-rhyme-rhyming.

The Sanders and at least nine others had been had by a waggish Santa.  We'll meet soon at, maybe, Burlington Bob's and rejoice midst some understandable snickering by The Bears.  Perhaps Bear, who has lost a lot of weight the past couple of years and appears rather svelte-like, later this year will return in a reincarnation of sorts: Peter Pan

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You Can't Beat Fun....by Bob Sanders

 

A couple of weeks ago I reached into the past for some vignettes of laughter either experienced by me or told this unremitting appreciator of hilarity.

The following are more of the same and provide, I believe, further proof that seriousness is something we should avoid at any peril.

Some of the best stories come from the world of golf and it could be that a game both wondrous and reviling has contributed more humor than any other pursuit.

I first met actor Forrest Tucker in Tulsa when he and Larry Storch were promoting "F Troop" and we met, again, 18 months later at Lakeside Country Club, a hangout for the entertainment industry in Los Angeles.

Tucker was a terrific golfer playing to a 2 handicap at Lakeside while belong to four other clubs including England's Wentworth.  With skills honed in burlesque, Tucker gained considerable legitimate stage experience with impressive presence augmented by a highly commanding voice.  He made nearly 100 action films although his ingratiating Beauregard Jackson Pickett Burnside role in Auntie Mame was likely his best.

One day I ran into Tuck on the back side of Lakeside where I had hooked a drive on a lengthy par four.  The hole ran parallel to the one being played by the actor and he had pulled his shot so that his ball and mine were within a few feet of each other.  We exchanged greetings.

In his foursome was singer/actor Gordon MacRae whose golfing skills were equal to those of Tucker.  When it came to handicaps on the links, MacRae had two--the other being liquor.

"How you doing, Tuck?" I asked.

"Hey, Bob.  I'm doing fine but Gordie's got a problem.  He ran out of booze on the 11th hole and ever since he's been drinkin' the ball wash."

                                                                *    *    *    *

Among my great good fortunes in living a life includes working at the Cleveland Press in the early 50s.  I started off a copy boy and one of the delights of the job was being privy to the give and take that took place among the print troubadours who included stars, supporting players and supernumeraries of an enormously colorful newspaper.

Among the denizens of the paper's copy desk was a New York Irishman, Joe McCarthy, whose employment included the august Herald Tribune.  Dour of disposition, McCarthy had an unhealthy look about him.  It was as though the only light that had ever been cast upon him had come from a Budweiser sign.  The word was that he was a reformed alcoholic.

One day McCarthy came back from lunch and I could see he was positively glowing.  Demon rum was coursing through his veins as he returned to the copy desk; suddenly, he burst into a story about how he had put one over in the distant past on the Herald Trib's copy desk.  The newspaper business in those days made Tom Sawyers out of, otherwise mature adults and the role of copy boy was similar to being a golf caddy where close proximity to country club players provided insight into human kind.

Covering a police court, McCarthy observed Puerto Rican Jose Rodriguez, new to this country, attempting to persuade a judge that an arrest for having fighting game birds was insensitive to those fond of the sport.  Illustrative of Rodriguez's point of view was his bringing to court some caged birds.  McCarthy turned in his story that "played one edition until some smart ass editor noticed the lede and killed it."

McCarthy then pulled from a tattered wallet proof of his stunt--a dog eared clipping of his triumph with a lede that read: "Jose Rodriguez, 27, of 1341 Bloch Street, strode to the stand with cock in hand."

                                                              *    *    *    *

Helen Hayes and Charles MacArthur have been gone long enough that introductions make sense.  She was one of our great stage actresses (Victoria Regina) who also performed splendidly on the screen (A Farewell to Arms) while he was a playwright whose work with Ben Hecht produced The Front Page eventually filmed a number of times with the Cary Grant/Rosalind Russell version (His Girl Friday) the best of the re-makes.

My favorite very touching romantic vignette is built aroiund their difficult early times, a park bench and a bag of peanuts.  It was in 1928, shortly after their marriage that they shared a Central Park bench while communicating their hopes and dreams that eventually came to exceptional fruition.  MacArthur offered his wife the bag of peanuts commenting: "I wish they were diamonds."

Many years later, the two acclaimed successes sat on the same bench that had become "their's."  MacArthur offered his wife a peanut bag containing diamonds and observed: "I wish they were peanuts."

                                                                *    *    *    *

There are a lot of people still at the party who believe Charles O. Finley was crazy enough to be institutionalized.  Owner of the Kansas City Athletics midway through the last century (he later moved the team to Oakland winning three straight World Series (1972-74) and five straight division titles (1971-75), Finley was baseball's wild card with loopy ideas generated at a remarkable pace.

One involved "The Pennant Porch."  Enormously frustrated because he felt the confines of his ballpark did not accommodate his largely left-handed long ball hitting lineup, Finley called upon a Conference of Carpenters who quickly erected additional stands in right field so that routine fly balls could become home runs.

Bizarre developments followed as Finley became baseball's all-time Machiavelli.  Threatened by the American League president to tear down his creation, the devious Charles O. then had a three-foot alley sawed to the wall--a move of such flagrant deception that the press quickly called it a "Half-Pennant Porch."

Working for TV Guide in Kansas City, I read the magazine's advance piece about Finley's "creativity" written by Mel Durslag, an outstanding writer for the Los Angeles Examiner.  The story extolled Finley's imagination and represented the first positive look at the highly unique team owner.

I called Finley, read him the story, and pitched him about doing a promotional spot for the magazine.  He would be seen sitting in his half pennant porch while wearing an A's baseball cap.

A lengthy pause was followed by: "Well, Bob, that's a very interesting idea, but I can't do it."

"Howcum?"

"Well," said the man whose mode of transportation around an infield following home victories (accompanied by Looney Tunes music) was by mule, "it lacks dignity."

                                                              *    *    *    *

George Davis was drama critic of the Cleveland Press when I worked there and a good one he was.  Well into his 80s at the time, Davis liked to drink in his stocking feet while banging out theatrical observations.  A tidy person, he was very inclined to create trails of newspaper pages which he followed while advancing to the conveniently located men's room.  Decidedly old-fashioned in his attire, the critic favored buttons over zippers.

One evening in the midst of evaluating the night's entertainment, he took the paper trail and was gone an extended period.  Working the 4 p.m. to midnight copy boy shift, I saw Davis re-enter the newsroom.  The elderly newsman was bent over and couldn't straighten up.

"I can't figure this out," complained Davis.  "I can't stand up, yet I don't feel any pain."

An examination of the puzzled reviewer revealed he had buttoned his fly to his vest.

                                                               *    *    *    *

 

Last Laughs....by Bob Sanders

 

I see my regular physician something like four times a year.  The other day, I got the good news that, in his opinion, there are no apparent reasons why my life span should not run another five years.  His words were entirely volunteered and not the result of any prompting on my part.  Assuming he's correct, I will make it at least into my 90s.

His words prompted my thinking about the enormously serendipitous aspects of living a life that appreciates improvisation in a world decidedly inclined to schedule just about everything.  I got to thinking about some of the delightful surprises I've experienced  over the years; with such thoughts come hope there are more down the road.

 

It was early on while working for TV Guide magazine that I found myself in Oklahoma City on the way to the airport to pick up Barbara Nichols, an actress whose charms produced deep conviction by some that she made Marilyn Monroe look by comparison like a boy.  Nichols, who made it into many dignified forms of show business by way of men's magazines, had flown in to bring some added attention to the new Oklahoma Edition of the publication.  It was while driving her to the Skirvin Hotel that I learned she was hungry.

We stopped at a very nice Italian restaurant where the food was good and the conversation sprightly.  Quite suddenly, the actress exclaimed: "Oh, my goodness, there I am," and pointed to a brick wall with an oddly mottled look.  With that, she pulled me out of my chair for a closer inspection.  Our examination revealed a great variety of the more interesting pieces of female anatomy that had been cut from magazines, pasted on the wall, then shellacked.

"Look, there's one of my boobs," she exclaimed, her voice trumpeting a manic sense of pride.  Who would know other than the possessor of it or them or, maybe, Hugh Hefner with magnifying glass in hand?  Later on, she found her derriere although she didn't call it that.

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The Chase-Park Plaza Hotel in St. Louis probably is still going strong and I suspect that public relations there continue to be done by a Mary Chase.  Just as there has been over the course of nearly a century something like 18 Rin Rin Tins, so it has been with the hotel and the myriad Mary Chases.

I met the very attractive Mary in 1956 at a party honoring Nat "King" Cole, the jazz great who had shucked his trio, become a pop singer, and had just acquired a TV show that would be rejected by a number of southern stations because he touched singer Peggy Lee.  More about that one at some future date.  

During a john break at the party, I chatted with pal/disc jockey/newsman Bruce Hayward who informed me that Mary, whom I had promised a resumption of our conversation, was very interested in me.  Married for seven years and alert to the "itch factor," I fled the hotel.  A TV Guide transfer to Atlanta occurred a week later.

During the next three years, I was moved four times eventually landing in Kansas City where my responsibilities included St. Louis.  One evening, I entered the Chase Hotel and there, standing precisely and impressively where I had left her, was Mary Chase whom I had stood up three years earlier.  

"What took you so long?" she asked.

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Tom O'Brien, a retired broadcaster who used t live on Orcas Island, left the party a couple of years ago and I recall his good cheer if only because of a story about musician Boyd Raeburn.

Tom was doing dance band remotes back in the early 40s from such places as the Glen Island Casino and Frank Daley's Meadowbrook.  One evening, O'Brien, then making $25.50 a week, was scheduled to do a remote at Ben Marden's Riviera.  It involved the Boyd Raeburn Orchestra, so progressive it made most other big bands sound funky.

O'Brien was approached immediately before airtime by Raeburn whose name was often mangled by announcers.  "Son, don't mess my name up.  It's Raeburn, Boyd Raeburn, Boyd Raeburn.  That's Boyd Raeburn."

"Yes, sir," replied O'Brien.

The engineer then threw the signal, the trumpet section sounded, O'Brien cupped an ear and intoned: "From coast-to-coast on NBC, it's Roy Boidbrain and his orchestra."

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It was on a lengthy tour of Spain and nearby countries that wife Jan and I checked into The Bajandillo in Torremolinas.  Not far from Gibralter, we quickly gave the hotel the not terribly sober sobriquet: The Banjo Dildo.  The hotel's architecture, U-Shaped, provides water views from all rooms and our second floor location was above a central lobby with the hotel wings angled from us.

Halfway into our 10-day stay, we discovered a laundry problem on a Saturday--bad timing in most countries.  Since our room had a balcony, we washed some clothes and hung them out to dry before setting out for a late lunch.

Returning, we noticed that most of our clothes had fallen to the lobby roof so we put retrieval procedures into motion.  To a wire coat hanger's shoulder was attached a clothesline which I lowered to a position above some underwear, then hooked a pair of shorts.  After a few feet of success, the underwear fell off and I resumed fishing for laundry.  This time I extended the middle of the hanger's base to form a V above the hook.  Although I had never attended an engineering school (a thoroughly laughable notion), I figured an engineer would improve the balance of the coat hanger by doing what I did.  Jan, of course, spelled me during what probably was 20 minutes of mostly frustration.  We finally hauled up the last of the laundry.

It was at that moment that a startling burst of rather deafening applause greeted us from the adjoining wings of The Banjo Dildo.  People, gathered on a great many of the hotel's balconies, either were demonstrating their appreciation of American ingenuity or recognizing our Chaplinesque low comedy.  We treated it as a La Scala moment and bowed graciously from our stage.

During the rest of our stay in Torremolinas, the guests of The Banjo Dildo greeted us with applause and more than one drink was sent our way.  The moral of the story is that loopdy Americans are much more appreciated on foreign shores than ugly ones.

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Living 14 years in Friday Harbor, Washington included a number of reminders that made it clear I was living in a small town.

One of them occurred when Lloyd Benedict and I met over lunch at Fords, a Bar & Grill.  Benedict, a retired insurance executive, had been given the assignment of talking me into becoming president of the San Juan Community Theatre's board of trustees.  We began lunch with straight up Beefeater martinis, then settled back to talk about rutabagas and kings, then matters theatrical.  With drinks reduced to the width of one's small finger, we ordered another round after which our waitress did a silent, awkward, table-side hover.

"Is there anything wrong?" asked Lloyd.

"Well, sir," she responded.  "Those are our only straight-up martini glasses and I guess I'll have to wait for you to finish your first drinks."

The story doesn't end there.  About a year after turning Lloyd down (he took on the trustee presidency himself much as Dick Cheney the George W. Bush administration's vice-presidency), we met once more at Fords where we again ordered martinis and laughed about our prior experience there.  A different waitress this time but the result the same: there were still just two straight-ups in the bar.

Figuring a third questioning would surely be the charm to produce proof of more glasses, I asked the obvious of a co-owner of the re-named Fords--still called Haley's Bait Shop.  A diligent search followed amid much laughter.  That was in 2002, eight years after the first incident.  Four months later, I was assured "we now have six or eight more" although no physical proof was offered.  I think it's time for another martini in Friday Harbor.

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Harry Chan was one of my favorite people and remains so because of memories.  A six-foot third-generation Chinese, he fathered film actresses Meg and Jennifer Tilly while married to a Caucasion.  Harry and I became related by marriage when, after a 15-year courtship, he married my second wife's sister, Susan Christenson.

The marriage took place during a very hot summer in Grand Island, Nebraska and was followed by a reception at a country club.  During the celebration, a quite puzzled little old lady toddled over to Harry.  Commenting about what a good time she was having, the quite elderly woman conveyed her puzzlement.

"Mr. Chan," she began, "I have noticed the mosquitoes are out in full force and they are biting everyone but you.  I don't understand."

"Well, mam," replied Harry.  "Those mosquitoes know that if they bite Harry Chan, they are going to be hungry in 20 minutes."

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Island Life....by Bob Sanders

 

Neither Jan nor I had ever lived in a small town before so I guess the odds were against us when we moved triday Harbor, Washington.  That was in January, 1990 and whatever odds were in play must have been elevated by our having moved from Chicago.

Our discovery of Friday Harbor was one of those fluky things that can work dramatic effect upon lives.  Retired and on a rather lengthy tour of this country's national parks, we had taken a Vancouver Island detour, spent a couple of days in Victoria, then set out for Orcas Island, one of 172 archipelagos that are the San Juan Islands.  Stopping off for lunch at Friday Harbor's picture perfect waterfront, we fell in love with the place, never continued on to Orcas Island, and wound up buying a home some five miles from town.

We quickly learned that not everyone is capable of getting attuned to island life.  Many of the problems can involve attitudinal baggage newcomers might bring with them.;  In settling into a San Juan Island lifestyle, big city types often exhibit an inclination to want things done in, say, a New York way.  Apparently aware of the challenges involved in such situations, New Yorkers pretty much stayed away with the few attempting a rural life achieving collective batting averages not sufficient to play for the Yankees.

The relative isolation achieved by island life was both a blessing and an eventual curse.  As we learned, a limited clinic, while sufficient for mundane medical matters, was not enough for serious situations.  In the general scheme of things, it's one thing to be treated for lower back pain, another for serious gotchas.

Washington State Ferries, the major connector to the San Juans, offered reasonably good service to the island from Anacortes although ferry schedules remain lesser during winter months.  Although it was quite clear to islanders that the ferry system includes a logical extension of highway 20, the state government in Olympia still refuses to buy into the philosophy.  That old debil clout and what doesn't happen when you don't have it is what it's all about.  By the time we left the island more than 14 years later, I think there was an understandable sense of resignation about all matters ferry.

In our early 60s, we determined to embrace island life and quickly became involved in such entities as the San Juan Community Theater, Lions, Whale Museum, the County Fair and Pig War Barbeque.  The latter was started by the wife of the editor/publisher of the Journal of the San Juans.  Memory is a bit murky, but I seem to recall a phone call from her as a result of a feature about me in her husband's newspaper.  Included was mention of public relations triumphs in Chicago and she figured I might be of help in getting the first annual bbq event off to a reasonable start.

The Pig War is about the only war reasonable thinking persons might applaud.  It started in 1859 and lasted 12 bloodless years if you forget about the plugged pig owned by a Brit who lived on San Juan Island.  The shooter, an American, also lived on the island and refused to pay $100 costs demanded by the Brit whose pig had intruded upon the American's potato patch.  Armies faced off on the island where the Brits, with 2,140 soldiers, held a roughly 5-1 advantage.  The sides got along marvelously and the few problems were prompted by the island's enormous stock of liquor.  It was truly a tight little island with Gilbert & Sullivan operettas based upon lesser inspiration.

Jan decided our honoring of the Pig War should involve some kind of Chicago connection--perhaps a team of grill masters whose superiority would recall the notoriety of such Windy City institutions as councilmen, criminals, mayors, precinct captains and the Chicago Cubs.  Recalling Chicago's rich and sometimes inglorious history, we found ourselves confronting an island artist of our choosing who indicated she could create a sign of reasonable significance that would bring attention to our team's name: Pig Al's Trickynoses.  A bit on the serious side (we were never sure the wordplay registered), the artist questioned just what it was we had in mind.

"We'd like a personality logo.  Think of a Chicago gangster wearing a derby.  He has a very tough look and is drawn as a pig.  He's Pig Al, a take-off on Big Al Capone."  Suddenly, the woman's face lit up like the Chicago Theater's marquee.  "Got it," she said, we added a few copy lines and a week later saw proof of her creativity.  The sign was perfect.

The event attracted 22 teams that competed for awards including best ribs (it was an all-pork competition) and best sauce.  Pig Al's Trickynosis (a press release, available at the team's stall, extolled the team's virtues) were aided and abetted by the Hooker Cookers and acappella renditions of songs associated with Chicago.  Many attendees joined in while providing booze of greater intensity than beer and wine to the Hooker Cookers.  The highly attractive HCers were dressed in Chicago 20s style and a couple got more than a little tipsy during the festivities.

Communications on the island were highly interesting.  Islanders but a couple of weeks, we soon found rumor center, a mostly breakfast place called The Donut Shop.  Located on Spring Street next door to Friday Harbor's only cinema, The Donut Shop's apparent rationale for being beyond food was as a starting point for stories of heightened titillation.  Island rumors, their care and feeding, gave evidence of being in the hands of an islander of long duration who claimed he had conducted tests on the spreading of rumors.  A favorite methodology consisted of telling a soon-to-depart for Roche Harbor fellow breakfaster a flawed whopper of incomplete detail.  The amateur sociologist was a firm believer in man's ability to extemporize story components that needed bolstering and whose final form could very well impact the very substance of the original falsehood.  His "studies" often utilized a traveresing of the road from Friday Harbor to Roche Harbor (a community 12 miles away), and the story's return to The Donut Shop brought with it versions of remarkable change.  While not accomplished at a rate as fast as a speeding bullet, the tales of complex altered versions containing such diversities as a town councilman, King's groceries and a bag of cement required as few as 90 minutes to return to its place of origin.

Now living two hours from Friday Harbor, I'm certain the community's direction remains in the hands of five councilpersons and a mayor who guide the citizenry through such challenges as whether or not to post stop signs at intersections ever mindful that the island prides itself on not having a single stop light.  The petunia planters were an entirely different matter.

As we know, capricious government is everywhere and further proven by the Strange Case of The Petunia Planters.  It happened in Friday Harbor and was island comedy relief of 1995-96 while totally devoid of graft--the principal difference between Chicago government and the island.  It was the owners of the Front Street Ale House who wanted to build a deck extension hard by Spring Street, the major connecter from the ferry.  Al fresco dining was the objective but the owners were thwarted twice by councilmanic vote.  During more than two years, the deck, tables, chairs, and petunia planters were in place awaiting the gastronomically-inclined.  The town council believed the deck would force people off the sidewalk into vehicular traffic.

The Ale House appeared to finally win when a teetotaler councilman, having voted twice for the project, suddenly realized the restaurant served booze, then abstained (an interesting word under the circumstances) thus enabling the mayor to break a 2-2 tie coming down solidly on the side of petunia planters.  The mayor's role in the decision was not of great surprise since the mayor had, once again, predictably done the bidding of one of the Ale House owners.

Public outcry ensued and the council went into a monumental dither followed by something of a fulsome funk succeeded by a decision to reverse itself.  The petunias, seemingly ensconced on the deck, were doomed and I wrote a dream sequence column in the Islands Sounder featuring Mayor LaTrivia and council members Bumble, Grumble, Humble, Stumble, and Crumble.

Working with some fellow pranksters and the Ale House people, we organized services plus a petunia procssion similar to a joyous and jazzy New Orleans parade.  Extended life for the petunias was realized when the parade was concluded at a restaurant entrance on Second St. 

A suggestion to the Ale House was irresistible.  Suddenly table-less, chair-less and planter-less, why not initiate a new culinary experience: Japanese dining on floor mats and called Sushi Deck-O-Rama?

That never happened. I do recall that two of the Council members back then consistently referred to those who live in Japan as "Japs."

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"Such Interesting People"....reviewed by Bob Sanders

 

I seem to have come full circle public transportation-wise during these latter years.  I began early on in Lakewood, Ohio where I moved about as a youngster--first on the Detroit Avenue trolley, then the more upscale Clifton Boulevard ride.  The destination was nearly always downtown Cleveland and the movie houses featuring live entertainment including swing era bands such as Duke Ellington, Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey, Artie Shaw, Benny Goodman and Count Basie.  I just remembered not to leave out Jimmie Lunceford.

Now, I'm retired living in Bellingham, Washington and using a free WTA pass available to those who have lasted at least 80 years.  WTA stands for Whatcom Transit Authority and I ride the #15 bus from the Cordata Station three times a week.  It's transportation that takes me within two blocks of a swim at the YMCA.  It's a 25-minute run each way and I manage to read round-trip except when kids with little to say somehow produce boisterous enthusiasms about such things as video games.  It's times like that that I realize how fortunate I've been to have lived most of my life during less techy crazed times.

When I became a working stiff, I still managed to use public transportation--first in Cleveland, then in St. Louis where I went to work for TV Guide in 1954.  Actually, I did St. Louis gigs twice eventually prompting a Canadian friend to observe: "Guess you couldn't get enough of the place the first time around, eh?"  It was after a transfer to Atlanta by the magazine that I turned to the automobile doing the same in Rochester, New York, the Quad Cities and Los Angeles to get to work.  Being without a car in Los Angeles is nearly impossible and I stayed with wheels there and for three more years when I went to work in Chicago for Playboy Enterprises.  That was in 1968.  While big cities offer plenty of auto shortcomings, the Chicago lake route south to my office at Playboy wasn't bad and involved indoor parking for $27 a month.  The parking customers were largely Playboy employees and I never tried to figure that one out.  Maybe someone owed Hefner.  I needed a car for the magazine where so many working hours were at night.  My perky '66 powder blue Mustang convertible, parked one night in front of Hefner's State Parkway home, was the only car in the neighborhood untouched when The Weathermen smashed windows during the Democratic National Convention.  The car's windshield had a Playboy logo.

Most of my 22 years in Chicago utilized public transportation.  Maybe the greatest plus about it, certainly to readers, is the opportunity it affords them.  I once figured out my Chicago Transit Authority trips from and to the Wilmette Station (parking there most of the time for 50 cents and a buck a pop for the CTA) enabled me to read more than 11,000 hours worth.   

One of my great joys has been talking with members of the media whose stories made me aware that the unique qualities of some of the characters in Robert J. Casey's Such Interesting People were reflected in some of my contemporaries.  I got to thinking about Casey and his book maybe a month ago and determined to re-read it.  My thanks to both the Bellingham Public Library for obtaining it and the University of Oregon Library in Eugene for the loan. 

 Published in 1943 by Bobbs-Merrill, the book is an absolute classic and was touted to me by Bill Ashboldt, a photographer I worked with on the Lorain (Ohio) Journal.  Bill eventually moved on to the nearby Cleveland Plain Dealer and is best known for the many and widely-circulated photos he took of Sam Sheppard, neck in a brace.  Sheppard, a doctor convicted of murdering his wife, inspired The Fugitive TV series plus a feature film in addition to an enormously undeserved public chorus shouting Sam's innocence.  The latest is a Sheppard 60-minute "documentary" currently playing the ID Channel with a lot of facts either altered or cast aside.

Casey, who retired from Chicago journalism in 1947, would have loved covering the Sheppard trial.  On the other hand, he had his hands full back in his day with such interesting criminals as Al Capone, Dion O'Bannion, Tough Tommy Megrim and Peewee Poopopolos around and about.  Interestingly, the book's hoodlums are bit players to the journalism stars and eccentrics whose enterprising spirit and creative insanity made possible the greatest of the journalistic shows.

Casey nailed it as in: "The fantastic twenties! Those were the days when there were two cars in every bootlegger's garage and a corpse in every alley--when the kitchen smelled of raisin mash and the tattoo of bursting bottles marked the progress of the home-brew in the basement--when the best places to eat in the city were the speak-easies, or maybe your stomach was too paralyzed to tell--when scotch with a Southern accent cost twelve dollars a quart and the customers all seemed to have twelve dollars--when hearts were young and gay, and livers and lights, apparently, were more durable."

Having earned three citations for bravery in combat during World War I, Casey became an itinerant newsman before he made it in Chicago.  Joining the Chicago Daily News in 1920, he worked as a columnist and foreign correspondent.  He also wrote features, became an expert on the era's gang wars and traveled extensively.  Casey's coverage of World War II included Pearl Harbor and the blitz in London.  He authored 27 books.  All are worth your time.

While the emphasis of Such Interesting People is on Chicago editors including Henry Justin Smith of the Daily News, Walter Howey of the Tribune and Daily News and the American's  Harry Reutlinger plus the idiosyncratic approach to journalism by the reporters, there also are supporting walk-ons of stunning invention who became attached to newsrooms after wandering in off the streets.   

One was "The Ghost Catcher" who spoke with a pronounced German accent, said he was a proof reader and carried cards identifying himself as a "Ghost Catcher" whose name was Professor Otto Reichmann.  Claiming to be a catcher of considerable talent, he had once been hired by the Tribune as part of a claque that went around exposing spirit mediums, story matter probably accomplished by an artful end around Trib publisher Robert R. McCormick.

The Ghost Catcher, described by Casey as looking "like a relic of somebody else's elegance" quickly became a daily visitor to the Daily News and "like the sort of crank who usually pays visits to newspaper offices," temporarily lost out when the paper's publisher, Walter Strong, gave a tour of his brand new building to visiting publishers and editors from South America.  In an unfortunate piece of timing, the copy desk, located at the entrance to the news room, was missing its usual quota of habitues.  Only a "soiled old man in a grease-spotted overcoat and bilious-looking straw hat" sat writing something on a sheet of copy paper.  

Strong touched him on the shoulder asking: "I beg your pardon, but who are you?"

Professor Reichmann turned around and with an odd combination of surprise and indignation, shouted: "I sir," he cried, leaping to his feet, "I am The Ghost Catcher!"

Casey's delight is particularly apparent when he tells the story of Daily News editor Howey, formerly of the Tribune, who wrote a glowing editorial about the paper's leadership in sending a relief train downstate to do good deeds following a cyclone in Murphysboro.  The editorial soared in its successful attempt to properly describe the paper's humanity, timeliness of the project's execution and heroism, then decided what he had written deserved readership beyond that of his paper.  Giving a copy boy detailed instructions, the editor handed the lad a copy of the just-completed editorial scribbling a couple of words on it.  The lad made his way to the Tribune as directed to give the chief copy reader (identified as wearing an eyeshade) Howey's prose.  The scribbled note at the top read: McCormick: MUST.  The copy editor complied and the next edition of Col. McCormick's paper carried the bitter rival's self-congratulatory pronouncement atop the Editorial Page.  It was widely believe Howey had left McCormick's employ unhappily some years before, a likelihood backed up by Casey's suggestion that such a condition "would explain so well the little pleasantries that Mr. Howey extended to the Tribune."

Strong, the publisher who made the acquaintance of The Ghost Catcher, had limited association with the editorial side of the busi8ness and became upset with member of the business community who suggested Daily News reporters were careless.  Strong took public transportation between his home and office and eventually tired of the charges.  One day he invited the critics to dinner on top of the half-finished Daily News Building.  The critics arrived believing they were to be confronted by a gesture of conciliation.  Most of what they knew about the newspaper business was confined to what they saw at the movies.  Forced to make their way in the dark through piles of gravel, they eventually arrived by way of a wooden construction elevator at the 24th floor banquet room.  During the ride, there were strange echoes in the big building.

Strong never finished his opening line of welcome.  Writes Casey: "A man at the middle of the table who hadn't spoken much during the evening and didn't seem to know anybody suddenly pushed back his chair, jumped to his feet, pulled out a pistol and fired point-blank at the guest sitting opposite.  The guest fell over backward.  A police whistle shrieked outside.  The door opened and a woman was glimpsed in the entrance.  But only briefly.  As she stepped across the threshold the lights were out and there was another series of shots and two or three more screams.  An electric lantern flashed to reveal a brace of policemen and as that single ray of light died out the air was filled with a noise of clanking iron.  Then the lights flashed on again to discover the petrified diners in a number of odd attitudes and to reveal that both the murderer and corpse had gone away.  Where there had been a bedlam there was now a dead and terrifying quiet.  Through  it broke the voice of the host who oddly enough had begun to smile.

"Now, gentlemen," he said, "we shall see how good you are as reporters.  A waiter will give each of you a pad of paper and a pencil and you shall write out in your own way a record of what you saw just now--or what you thought you saw--and when your stories have been read aloud I shall entertain further suggestions about the improvement of my staff."

As Casey observed: The best brains of Chicago went to work then to prove what any cross-examiner knows about the fallacy of human testimony.  Mr. Strong burned the manuscripts before his guests took their way sheepishly to the terrifying elevator.  One wishes he hadn't."

Get the book if you can find it.  Anyone who enjoys reading about the kind of folks who made The Front Page possible will delight in Such Interesting People by Robert J. Casey.

And now, if you'll excise me, I have a bus to catch and the last chapter of the book to read.

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Bonhomie Bob Cromie....by Bob Sanders

It was while taking the #15 WTA bus to downtown Bellingham the other day that I began thinking about my good fortune to have known Bob Cromie.  Perhaps it was the book I was reading during the ride that reminded me of him.  A classic among journalists, Robert J. Casey's Such  Interesting People is a highly perceptive look at Chicago reporters, writers and editors who, among other things, inspired Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur to write The Front Page.

Cromie, who left us at 90 with six months and change left before the Millennium, was a carry-over from Casey's era.  His book, published in 1943, did not goose me into the field of journalism; rather, it was reportorial efforts on The Heun Gazette, a for-laughs-only publication passed around study halls by restless students at Lakewood High School located in a suburb immediately west of Cleveland, Ohio.  More later about The Gazette, editor Dick Heun and our decidedly bizarre approach to journalism as we created our versions of the first pages of history.

Cromie may be recalled as the host of a nationally syndicated radio show about books plus two TV programs, "Cromie Circle" on Chicago's WGN and "Book Beat," home based at WTTW, the city's public TV channel that fed the shows to PBS stations.  His broadcast triumphs were an adjunct to four decades of reportorial excellence.  He loved words and the people who used them--particularly those who called attention to social injustice, an attitude that characterized every aspect of his work and life.

Successful journalists owe their reputations to many things.  Some dig deeper for stories than their counterparts.  Others, not as persevering, may place greater emphasis on originality while some make effective use of contacts calling upon rolodexes both real and of the mind.  Cromie is the only journalist I ever met who was thoroughly noble and it showed in the way people responded to him.  I never heard him swear and that includes time on the golf course where people are very inclined to do so.

In a business where excessive drinking, more than any other shortcoming, has probably ended more careers, Cromie (to my knowledge) never took a drink.  Whether this was a lifelong consistency or a resolve preceded by a battle with demon rum I know not.  He often sat at John Fischetti's First Amendment celebratory table at Riccardo, joining in and providing hilarity while not imbibing.  Fischetti, a Pulitzer winner for editorial cartooning, was my best friend first at the  Chicago Daily News, then at Sun-Times after the Daily News was folded by Marshall Field V.

Like many outstanding journalists, Cromie was a messy desk person although he was on the neat side compared to sports writer/columnist Bill Gleason of the Sun-Times.  I once made reference to something he had written nine years earlier prompting Gleason to dive into a filing system everyone called Mt. Gleason.  Groping for a moment or two with Herman Cain-like proficiency, he extracted a published piece plus paper-clipped notes and proclaimed: "You mean this?"   

The messy desk possibly continues to be a matter of pride to some contemporary journalists.  I once took wife Janet on a tour of the Chicago Tribune editorial floor during which she met such print paragons as columnist Eric Zorn, critic Gene Siskal (then thumbs-upping it at the movies with TV co-host Roger Ebert) and cartoonist Jeff MacNelly, a three-time Pulitzer winner.  It was in the newsroom that we came upon a remarkable example of clutter whose magnitude suggested it had to have been detritus of an Oklahoma tornado decidedly off course.

"Whose office is this?" asked Jan.

"It's Casey Bukro's,"  I replied knowing what was coming next.

"What does he do?" was the anticipated question.

"Why, he's the Environmental Editor" I giggled in return.  Bukro, responsible for environmental entries, nearly won a Pulitzer for his "Save Our Lake" series.

Born in Detroit and educated at Oberlin College, Cromie joined the Tribunein 1936 and was the newspaper's war correspondent for four years.  Wherever World War II battles raged, whether in Europe or the Pacific, Cromie was there to report--often with a local angle.  His modus operandi nearly always was kicked off by asking if there were any soldiers or Marines from Chicago or Illinois.  Tribune readers had the war "personalized" for them and Cromie was masterful.

Cromie was with the Marines when Guadalcanal was invaded and he put in a lot of miles traveling with Gen. George Patten including coverage of the Battle of the Bulge.  Like Ernie Pyle, he wrote stories about average guys turned into everyday heroes.  Typical of his work was an October 12, 1943 report telling of a raid on Rabaul located, as the dateline proclaimed, SOMEWHERE IN NEW GUINEA.  The writing is rich, spare and aimed at a readership whose heightened interest in the war is in direct contrast to today's indifference.

"As we taxied on the runway," continued Cromie, "I moved into the bomb bay and stood between rows of 1,000 pound bombs.  We had plenty of respect for the 1,000 pounders--Staff Sgt. Fred C. Whitney, 22, Independence, Mo., Staff Sgt. John G. Shaffer of Logan, W. VA, and I.  We didn't return to our comfortable posts in the waist until Bond (Lt. John E. Bond 24 of Scarsdale, N.Y.) had plenty of time to get his plane on an even keel.  Other heavy bombers were all around us.  I could count more than 50 at one time.  We gradually got into formation and headed for Rabaul, soon running into heavy fog which hid the wingtips and sent tiny drops of water running on the windows.  Then into the sun once more.  The morning was all blue and gold and blinding white.  I went forward and stood behind the pilot's seat.  Tech Sgt. H. V. Milarski of 3800 Diversey boulevard, Chicago, was working on the radio.  As he smoked a cigarette he looked as bored as if riding down State street in a street car.  Tech Sgt. Joseph A. Gosseaux, 23, of Grindstone, Pa., the engineer, was busy writing down the names of the personnel.  He did this with ease from long practice, even to putting down each man's serial number from memory--some numbers containing eight digits." 

Cromie's war journalism is something we don't get today because of the military's control explicit in embedding reporters resulting in spoon fed versions far short of what we should be getting.  For that we can thank President George H.W. Bush, Dick Cheney (then Defense Secretary) and other members of the administration who conducted an assault on constitutional freedoms during Operation Desert Storm.  Without question, a strangely passive press also was at fault.

I have two particularly fond memories of Cromie.  One involved attending services for Fischetti who died two weeks after I left Field Enterprises (owner of the Sun-Times).  There were people critical of my leaving for the Tribune but Fischetti was highly supportive during two months of my maneuverings with the marketing and editorial departments of the Boul Mich monolith.

Cromie's eulogy for Fischetti was perfect.  In the company of all who loved the guy, Cromie offered a parting line that recalled a legion of mid-day fun: "I think it's entirely possible that John Fischetti invented the long lunch."

My other indelible memory of the journalist was the result of a question I asked him following a taping of "The Cromie Circle" at WGN.  Of all the authors he had interviewed, with which one would he prefer to spend a lot of time?  Cromie mentioned several but the stickout he decided was Ernest K. Gann.  Gann's many lives were spent as a theatrical manager, film director, painter, writer, pilot and seaman.  Both he and Cromie were man's men for whom laughter was an important ingredient of living.  "He is truly one hell of a guy," was the way he put it.

"'ll tell you something interesting about Gann," observed Cromie.  "His was the only interview I ever conducted in which the subject would not tell me where he lived.  I asked him why and Gann replied: "If I tell you, you'll ask me what it's like and I'll tell you how wonderful it is.  Members of your audience will then get interested in the place and they'll buy property and build homes and the place won't be the same.  That's why."

Our conversation took place in 1985 shortly before Cromie retired.  When more than four years later Jan and I moved to San Juan Island in the Pacific Northwest, we discovered that one of its better-know residents was Gann, author of 25 novels about aviation and the sea.  Among the best known: Fate is the Hunter, The High and the Mighty and Blaze of Noon. 

We met Ernie and spunky wife Dodie (an inductee into the National Ski Hall of Fame, she captained the 1948 Olympics team) at a party a couple of weeks after our January, 1990 arrival in Friday Harbor.  He recalled the conversation with Cromie and thought our meeting indicative of pronounced prescience on Cromie's part.  Among the many joys of our island life were the sensational views offered from our home including the Olympic and Cascade Mountains, the waters of Puget Sound, the Strait of Juan de Fuca and much of Ernie and Dodie's 760-acre Red Mill Farm in the San Juan Valley below.

The farm and its assured future gave further evidence of Ganns' staunch attitude regarding the heaven on earth he had referenced in his conversation with Cromie.  Shortly after donating a conservation easement to the San Juan Preservation Trust thus denying development, Gann told me: "We have to do something to save this land, not only for our children but for ourselves.  People need to stop thinking of money all the time, or the land won't be here." 

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Breaks of the Game....by Bob Sanders

 

In writing recently about some strange adventures involved in a Chicago Tribune public relations program suddenly dumped in my lap as the 1980s were winding down, I promised additional commentary about the guy who played dumper to my dumpee.

Dickey was one of three executives brought to theTribune in 1984 from the Orlando Sentinel, a sister publication where highly favorable marketing conditions made it almost impossible to do anything other than succeed.  Suddenly, publisher Charles Brumbach, editor-in-chief Jim Squires and Dickey were calling the shots.

It was shortly after my wife, Mickey, began chemotherapy treatments that I became aware my employment at the Trib was on shaky ground.  In retrospect, it still seems bizarre that my bosses could criticize my not coming to work for three days after Mickey's funeral services.  True, I had achieved bad paper status by leaving work at 2 p.m. each Thursday to take her home following treatments.  On the other hand, I always made up the time.  My work at the Trib was probably the best of my career and I won a number of major national awards including one for the White Sox send-up detailed earlier in "Pale Hose Humbuggery."

Because of my editorial background and news sense, I enjoyed excellent working relations with reporters and editors.  They trusted me thanks to word first put out by managing editor Bill Jones and others.  I doubt that any marketing employee at a major newspaper in this country at that time had my accessibility.  It was highly unusual and, in truth, I took a great deal of pride in being more a part of the editorial department than marketing.  Such a setup can invite problems.

A clue to my uneasy employment occurred about the time I won a national award from the American Newspaper Marketing Association for effectively positioning the Tribune in the White Sox craziness that included a threatened team move to Tampa-St. Petersburg.  I bailed Dickey out of a mess by giving focus and structure to his germ of a badly mounted idea.  Ironically, the project was deemed good enough for second prize in a monthly Tribune marketing department competition run by Dickey.  I had just turned 62, an event that prompted the usual birthday cake and singing of "Happy Birthday" followed by Dickey's comment that I was the oldest person in the department and almost 20 years senior to his marketing eminence.  His comment was a textbook lesson in how not to handle what might be proved as age discrimination.

In all honesty, I probably committed one of the biggest no no's of the workplace: killing the job.  Brought aboard to, among other things, give prominence to Tribune reporters and editors, I had booked a total of 1,500 broadcast appearances the first year eventually hitting 5,000 the last years of a highly effective run.  Obviously, I didn't have time to make all those bookings; rather, a snowball effect evolved with the paper gaining a tremendous lead over the Sun-Times whose circulation was concentrated in the city.  The Trib had become an even more significant regional newspaper with stories and editorial personnel appearing on those radio and TV stations whose signals helped enlarge the paper's circulation area.  Bureaus were created in the hinterlands, a sharp contrast to today's continuing pullback.  Like my work at Playboy whose circulation peaked during my tenure, so it was at theTribune during, as today's developments suggest, what was arguably the last golden yeaers of print journalism.   

Giving a lot of thought to hiring a lawyer and suing the paper for age discrimination, I decided I didn't want to go through 10 or 15 years of legal hell that dominates such pursuit, then took retirement in January, 1989.  Having married elegant and fun-loving Jan Quinn the prior year, we had discovered the San Juan Islands during a four-week look at some of this country's national parks.  The Pacific Northwest move would not have been possible had I been working for the Tribune.  Jan and I took up residence on the island in Washington State where we moved in January, 1990 having bought a home in a very elevated spot with glorious views of water plus the Olympic and Cascade mountain ranges.  Being corporate toast, however, rankled.  Something very wrong had happened and I knew a second shoe had to drop; when it did, I was astonished at what a thud it made in addition to a lot of sense.

Six months after moving to the island, the mail started bringing us clippings about Dickey.  The stories told of his being charged with bilking the Tribune out of about $890,000 over the course of three years.  Early published pieces, obviously controlled by the Tribune, about the executive's scam were somewhat lacking in detail although one report did mention his having been arrested in 1986 for stealing fishing lures from a shop in suburban Skokie.  Dickey pleaded he was a kleptomaniac, a problem described by his attorney as "diminished mental capacity."  One theory about the fishing lure theft suggested he had created an excuse in the event he was caught at his much grander larceny.  Cooperating with the newspaper, Dickey made restitution of $720,000--some of it realized from the sale of a home in swanky Kenilworth.   

In its June 22, 1991 issue, Advertising Age reported Dickey's biggest misappropriation was a false billing for a total of $748,352 in American Eagle gold coins.  Federal prosecutors said Dickey altered several of the invoices for the coins so that the "AE" appearing on the bill from a "Waukegan, Illlinois coin dealer suggested references to a Tribune employee rewards program know as "Advertising Excellence."  Dickey later sold the coins for cash and there is no record of any marketing department staffers (or anyone else, for that matter) winning the gold.  Perhaps one of those coins was "earmarked" for your faithful scribe's contest excellence although my second place finish probably wouldn't have qualified me.

Those American Eagle coins, hawked enthusiastically on Fox News and Fox Financial Channels, must remind Dickey of what might have been--particularly considering the price of gold ($1,765.50) as this is written.  Averaging around $400 an ounce during those halcyon years of thievery, Dickey's take would now be worth more than $3 million.  Had he not been caught, Dickey would likely be a fervent follower of Glenn Beck whose messages of fear helped drive the price of gold up to a record $1,917.90 early in August.  

During Dickey's profligate pilfering, he had the authority to approve payment of any promotional expense up to $50,000, according to charges.  About $140,000 in fraudulent goods and services invoices enabled him to convert to his personal use.  Included was $31,493 for landscaping, $7,844 for carpentry work and $2,071 for painting at his home.  Hey, living the good life isn't cheap.  Another payment went to a furniture business indicating the purchases would be used on the USS Chicago anchored at Navy Pier.

Whatever budgetary linkage there was between the purchase of coins and the costs of my work, salary and expenses (a yearly total of around $225,000 including staff appearances at $35 a pop) is anyone's guess.  I was not replaced.  Ah, irreplaceable me.

A rather odd series of visits to San Juan Island by Tribune staffers occurred during those early years of my retirement.  Two were by editorial department personnel and one from marketing.  Only one of the three, foreign news editor Michael McGuire, was anyone I had spent any time with while the other two hardly qualified as pals with the marketing department emloyee someone I had spoken to less than a half dozen times during about five years of her employment.  I'm certain all three took back stories that I was happy in my retirement and fully aware of how the Dickey drama had played out.  

The greatest satirical writers could not possibly come up with what happened to Tribune Company during the past four years.  The highly toxic Zell, who bought the firm in 2007, has done what corporate monsters do so effectively: mess up a good thing by not understanding, in this case the communications industry, and by making stupid decisions.  Among them: turning the firm over to Randy Michaels, a former shock jock (think Howard Stern) whose only media experience was with radio giant Clear Channel Communications.  Possessing no knowledge of print journalism, he was in vivid contrast to Col. Robert R. McCormick, the highly conservative and controversial editor/publisher who ran his fiefdom (1910-1955) much as an army battalion.  In a very short time, Michaels turned Tribune Tower into what one observer called a "sexist frat house atmosphere" where sexual behavior after hours became commonplace.  Some of the shenanigans took place in McCormick's old office.  In a deep financial hole, Michaels and his playmates managed to give themselves $57.3 million in bonuses while slashing 4,200 jobs in a wicked display of American greed.

Tribune Company is so screwed up that a guy I knew when he was working on the Trib's sports desk, Owen Youngman, is being sued for $328,049.  The money, received in the form of a check, was stock-based compensation he had accululated during 37 years at the newspapee.  Now a professor at Northwest University's Medill School of Journalism, he is one of 200 former excutives who find themselves targets of legal action in a Delaware bankruptcy court dealing with the company' s disastrous leveraged buyout.  Youngman didn't even work directly for Tribune Company.  All his 37 years were with Chicago Tribune, a fact being dismissed by a committee of unsecured creditors who want to claw back about $180 million in compensation.

I took a satisfactory chunk of money with me upon retirement in 1989 thanks to the then soaring value of company stock I accumulated and matched by the  newspaper.  My selling of the stock couldn't have been better timed.

Sometimes, while meandering down life's not always merry yellow brick road, we incur problems suggesting unfortunate consequences.  Thoes situations often turn out to be lucky breaks, but we don't know it at the time.  Every once in a while, Jan and I hoist a toast to Bob Dickey, 44, at the time of his arrest and a year older when releasd from prison.  We never would have wound up in the Fourth Corner for what has been nearly 22 terrific years had it not been for the thievery of Bob Dickey.

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