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The Aging Newspapermen's Creed
"A newsman knows everything. He is aware not only of
what goes on in the world today, but his brain is a repository of the
accumulated wisdom of the ages. He is not only handsome, but has the physical
strength which enables him to perform great feats of energy."
"He can
go for nights without sleep. He dresses well and he talks with charm. Men
admire him, women adore him, tycoons and statesmen are willing to share their
secrets with him. "
"He hates lies and meanness and sham, but he keeps
his temper. He is loyal to his paper . . . "
". . . and when he dies a
lot of people are sorry, and some of them remember him for several days."
- Stanley Walker, 1898-to-1962, city editor, New York Herald Tribune
...click on pic...
Michael Olesker at
Enrico's / October, 2009
Photo Credit: JIM BURGER
Joe Nawrozki and Michael Olesker,
once
rookies at the Baltimore News American
James H. Bready,
Evening Sun, retired
The
Stories of Jim Bready
Eli Siegel's system lives
Books of the region: Paine, Poe, batboys
James H. Bready,
the Calvert Street Whirlwind
As Others See Us
Lunch with the Aging Newspapermen’s Club
Rafael Alvarez
Morning Sun city desk [1981
through 2001] at Roman's Place with
Michael Naver
Evening Sun reporter, mid-1950s
through late 1960s.
Michael Naver: "I started with the
Evening Sun in 1958 as a [police] district man, as did most beginners. A few
months later I was promoted to general assignment, then later to rewrite man,
where I wrote the big blizzards and big homicides. They were often page one
stories but I never had a byline.
When Dick Frank left the City Hall beat and went to work
for Mayor [Theodore] McKeldin in 1963, I replaced him at CIty Hall. It was a
dream job. Frank was not the press officer, but McKeldin's chief aide. He
leaked everything to me. Thanks to Dick, I regularly beat the Morning Sun and
News American on major stories,
"One anecdote concerns not me but Dick Pollak, a fellow
Evening Sun reporter who later went on to a
career in magazines. It marked the day our crusty city editor, Paul Broderick,
discovered he had a new breed of reporter on his hands.
"Pollak went to Broderick a few weeks after joining the
paper and asked for the afternoon off. When Broderick asked why, Pollak
replied:
"I need to get my tennis racket restrung." Needless to
say, he didn't get his wish.
"Then came the [Newspaper] Guild strike of 1965.
I walked the picket line for 46 days, with time off for a marriage and European
honeymoon. I needled my fellow strikers with a postcard from Italy saying how
much I missed them.
"After the strike the paper promoted me to assistant
city editor. I stood it for two years, then quit. I preferred writing and
reporting. So I got a job in the public affairs shop at Social Security, where
I worked for 31 years , mostly as a manager and not a writer, before retiring
in 1999.
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