Section 1: Q: So what's the argument for laying out the
paper like that, clearly...?
A: Attraction. Attract the reader. And I
think they've gone overboard. I think it's
like everything else. I think eventually the
pendulum will swing back. I remember the art
director saying, "Tom, you don't want to do
that. You have too many elements on a page.
You're confusing." And they call that circus
make-up. So this is my biggest concern and,
of course, when you are looking at a story,
you want a story to never end on the bottom
with a period. You want to be able to take a
line over to keep the reader going around
instead of stopping. And now those rules are
being ignored. I think they are being ignored
because they have people that don't care and
the pressure is too much, I mean, they have a
lot of pressure to get these stories in on
time. Page make-up. But I really enjoyed
that. Making-up. On the other hand, I really
enjoyed the writing. I got into some ideal
situations. --
Section 2: Q: I have some questions about that. How did
you get the name "Cold Front Kollings?"
A: (laughs) Where did you see that? You must
have seen that somewhere.
Q: Larry Stone.
A: Oh yes, it seemed like every time I went
fishing, there's nothing that turns fish off
faster than the cold front. And it seemed
like every time I would go fishing or
hunting, I'd come into the lousiest cold
weather. I went up to Spirit Lake one time on
opening and my buddies said, "I don't know
whether we want you to come up because the
weather is going to turn lousy." And they
started calling me "Cold Front Kollings"
because every time I'd come up
somewhere...the weather when we went out that
one night and the season opened at midnight.
We went out in a boat and it was raining and
it was so cold and windy and the waves were
washing in the boat and freezing in the boat.
And we had a boat full of ice and you
couldn't walk around the boat, you'd fall. We
stuck it out for three hours, I think; we
caught fish. But nobody else was fishing. And
we went out fishing in it and you know, that
made a story too. It was kind of an adventure
piece.
Q: How many stories were you expected to
write per week towards the end before you
retired?
A: Three, two. Sometimes three. Sometimes
less. When I was writing in the middle and
towards the end, I was writing 90 stories a
year. And that's not quite three a week. But
you know I would write one or two for the
sports section, then I would write another
one for the travel section and maybe do a
book review for the editorial department. And
I kept, eventually; I ended up writing
everything for every department. At one time,
for the business section I would have a story
in there about maybe down by Bedford [IA]
where somebody was raising bait fish such as
minnows and all, as a business, and I did a
story about that. So I was all the time
writing not only for sports but they were all
outdoor related.
Q: How were the assignments made? Were these
your ideas?
A: All my own. A guy called me, called Larry
Lehmer who was in charge of, working as an
editor as a go-between the writers and the
editors. He was an editor. And somebody
called him and said, "We need Kollings down
here." What it amounted to was that they were
going to give me an award over by Tama [IA],
Coon Hunters Association, if you can believe
it. They said, "We need Kollings over here.
Why don't you give him an assignment." And
Larry said, "I can't tell Kollings where to
go. He goes wherever he wants to go." And
Larry said, "Ask him if he won't do this."
And they called me and I said, "I'm tied up.
I can't make it over there." And Larry never
told me, but I went over a week later and
they said, "Well, we were going to give you
the award but you should have been here when
we were giving out the rest of them." So I
was on my own, all my own assignments. I
would say that at the news meeting. I was
told by several people...you know they have
these Sunday news meetings to discuss what
they are going to run in the Sunday paper.
The editor, Geneva Overholzer, told me, you
ought to have an editor following you around
doing a story on your adventures. (laughs)
Because they always turned into an adventure.
They were always pretty good stories.
Q: Did the story idea come up before you were
out there or possibly after you had been out?
A: Well, I'd find a situation or an
individual somewhere and then the way I
structured it-- I had the story pretty well
in mind. I would interview the guy either
before or after but never during. I never
carried a pen or pencil in the boat or out in
the field. I would have a pretty good idea
about how the story would go, but it may
change depending on the situation. If the
situation turned into something different,
then I would reorganize my thoughts and work
it from there. So, no, I would find a person.
The really, the neat ones that came up,
sometimes you didn't know they were going to
be that way. I went on a duck hunt up at
Clear Lake and we had push boats. I had never
been in a push boat before and this was a
canoe type boat that you used a pole to push
it. If you push on one side, the back end
goes this way, so you have to know how to
push these boats. I went out with this other
guy and we had two push boats. I had one and
he had the other. Small. And I had a heck of
time so finally he just roped them together
and pushed us out to the spot in the weeds.
And he said, "By the way, bring a fishing
rod." He said, "The perch are biting." And
this is during duck hunting. It started
raining and the ducks weren't flying. We were
in water that was only about four or five
foot deep and brush. We had our fishing poles
and we started catching perch and a whole new
twist on the story, you know. What happened
was we ended up fishing and catching perch.
Our limit of perch, as a matter of fact,
between the both of us, instead of shooting a
duck. Which was kind of a neat twist.
Q: It turned into a different story.
A: Yes, so it turned into kind of a different
story and I think I was telling you about
this airboat thing.
Q: I was just going to ask you. --
Section 3: A: I've done two stories on airboats. One was
a bait owner and this was "Catfish Charlie,"
I think it is, the name of the particular
bait that's manufactured down in southern
Iowa. I got a hold of this guy and he had an
airboat so I went out with him in an air
boat. I went out with him and his wife, a
very safe outing. We went up the river, we'd
go to a sandbar, get out of the air boat,
fish a hole for catfish, then get back in and
then go and fish a hole. We took our lunches
and got out of the airboat and sat in the
water in these chairs and ate our lunch. It
was really a neat experience.
This other one I got in with this guy, he was
teacher I think out in Saylorville [IA]. He
was a teacher in physics and chemistry. The
only reason he was still employed as a
teacher because he was so good. They told me
that everybody that went through his class
automatically went to college and got in. I
mean he was just a dynamo, but he used foul
language in class and they threatened to
throw him out several times because of
harassment and everything else. But he was so
good those students; every one of them had no
trouble getting into college in that
particular field because of the way he taught
physics or chemistry. So they kept him on.
Spent his time working through college as a
dynamiter out in Northwest Territories. I
think he was in demolition in the war, Second
World War. He was kind of a kook. I mean, he
was a definite character. I got the name of
this guy through a person at the Register
whose son had gone through his course, and
what kind of character he was. Well, he was a
character. He ended up, when I met him at the
boat ramp with his airboat, he had camouflage
clothes on and he had a '45 strapped
underneath his airboat and a big engine. I
don't know, it was probably a Volkswagon
engine with a great big propeller that was
all screened in. He wore earmuffs because it
was so loud. The first thing, I got in the
airboat and he didn't know that I was a
fisherman evidently. When you go with
somebody I don't ever push my intelligence as
far as hunting and fishing. It's better to
come on a little bit dumb than too smart.
People open up a little better if they don't
think you are quite as knowledgeable as they
are. So I didn't force the fact that I was a
lifelong hunter and fisherman. I got in the
boat and he was yelling at the people on the
shore, those river rats you know, "Look what
I got here! I got a reporter from the
Register out here and I'm going to show him
how to catch catfish." Well we were setting
ditty poles. Ditty poles are poles that you
stick in the bank with a cord hanging down
with the bait on it in holes. And you set
them in the evening time and you run them all
night long.
We ran out and went over to Greenwood Park
here in Des Moines and with a little minnow
trap, wire trap where you put meat on the
inside and the fish go in and they can't come
out. We had a whole bunch of small fish; they
weren't minnows but a type of blue gill. We
were going to fish for flathead catfish which
eat only living things. They eat live bait.
They don't eat any of the stuff like a
channel cat does. We gathered all that up and
he was giving me a bad time about that and
got on the ramp and he was giving me a bunch
of junk on that. When we got on the river, he
was on my case about how I was sticking my
poles in the bank, you know, and setting the
hook, how I was putting the hook in the fish.
Just ruder than hell. It was really getting
to me. I kept saying to myself, "This is
going to be a good story, put up with it,
Don't say anything. Put up with it. Put up
with it." And that's what I did. We ran that
airboat and we got going down the river, and
these things really fly. The first guy I went
with was really pretty careful. But this guy
was crazy. You have a throttle, you have a
stick on it that makes it go sideways. It's
got the tail on it goes back and forth. You
have the stick that makes it go sideways and
a foot pedal as an accelerator. He was just
winging us down the, I think it was the Coon
River, we were going over sandbars. You can
go over shallow sandbars. If there was just a
little bit of moisture on them, you can zip
right over. Then he tapped me on the shoulder
and pointed down in the stick and let loose
of it. And I grabbed it like that you know.
Just scared the liver out of it. I mean, he
had the accelerator and wouldn't let up it.
First I overcompensated. I'd go one way and
go the other way, and I just about flipped it
before he left off. And he thought that was
the funniest thing that ever happened.
We went that night, to make this long story a
little shorter; we got our fish. Big flathead
catfish. It's really kind of a kick. When you
go in at night and put a light on it and some
of those lines are set from willow trees that
are hanging over the water, you tie this cord
on and put it down in shallow water. The bait
is just below the surface. When you go up to
this tree that has a cord on it and you see
the limb going like this, you don't know what
you have. You might have a great big old
snapping turtle on there or a catfish or a
flathead or whatever. So there's quite a bit
of a kick to that. But we got our fish anyhow
and took them home and that was on a
Wednesday. The reason I know it's Wednesday
because I had a column in on bass fishing on
Thursday. We got home to his place with the
fish and he went in and he, and I don't know
where the time, but he had read that column
in the paper about the bass fishing and found
out I was a knowledgeable fisherman and he
came out and apologized all over the place
and wanted to know about bass fishing, which
kind of took a lot of the edge off it. He
was really embarrassed. He took me down to
his basement to show me, he put on fireworks
displays for the Firestone Company. He had a
permit to do that. He took me down to his
basement and you had an aisle to walk through
and the rest of it was all these high
explosives fireworks. And he was smoking a
cigarette. This was the kind of person he
was. I said, "Boy, what happens if this goes
up?" And he said, "If this goes up, we take
out a block. Don't worry about it."
Q: (laughs) The entire block. --
Section 4: A: These coon hunts were always interesting,
too. I think I went on several coon hunts and
one was on a jumping mule. I have a picture
of it as a matter of fact. (Gets picture) Am
I still on?
Q: You sure are.
A: This almost gives you the feel of a coon
hunt on a mule. (laughs) That was a real
kick. Can you see it?
Q: Oh sure.
A: Riding a mule you know is a little
different than riding a horse. I've been on a
horse too before on coon hunts. A mule will
go down a hill and if there is a little creek
there, the mule will feel the depth. He won't
go across if he thinks it is unsafe. A horse
will just go right on across. That was
interesting because it was mules and riding
rather than walking. I went out with a woman
from Boone [IA], a woman coon hunter. It was
raining. When you get it [the trail], you
turn the dogs loose and follow the dogs. And
she had $15,000 coon dogs and she was field
trialer. A good-looking tough gal. I mean she
was really an outdoor person. And we followed
these dogs all over and I was going down in
creeks and walking and stepping in holes,
getting hit with branches. When I came back I
had blood all over my face. I looked a mess.
She says, "Well, it looks like you had a good
time." (laughs) The coon dogs will tree them
and then you would shine a light on them. In
one case when I went with them, they just
moved on. But when I was with her they shot
them and dropped them out of the tree.
Q: This is a story that ended up in the
Register?
A: Yes. And, I don't know how I came on her
name. I inquired in on it. The same thing on
this. I did a story that was really
interesting on the Peregrine falcons and
red-tail hawks. I went out on a situation
where these guys took out these Peregrine
falcons. They were licensed Peregrine
falcons. We took them out in the field and
hunted with them. I took a photographer along
this time. What they did was, they had these
pheasants.
Q: You can just hold that up.
A: That's a red-tail hawk. Of course somebody
had to write something on there. (laughs) I
don't know if that's something you want...
Q: Edited out. (laughs)
A: Yes, edited out.
Q: No, we'll be all right.
A: They had these pheasants planted and they
took a dog out and we kicked these pheasants
up and that Peregrine falcon would be way up
there circling. I mean they would release it
and it would be way up there and they'd see
that pheasant and it would just drop like a
stone. 150 miles an hour. Hit that pheasant
(claps), knock it right out of the sky and
get down and get on it. When we came to pick
up the Peregrine falcon, you didn't want him
to eat it because he wouldn't hunt anymore.
You go to take it and he would bring out his
wings like this you know. Very protective
because he had that pheasant. Extremely
interesting.
Q: I want to get back a little more to the
Register.
A: Yes, I kind of got carried away here on
these things. --
Section 5: : No, those are good stories because, of
course, you were writing those for the
Register. You talked a little bit about the
layout and what it looks like today, but are
there other things that you noticed that are
different about the paper as it is today,
different than what it used to be?
A: Well I'll tell you, you probably heard it
from other editors for one thing, but in the
old days, even before my time, there was a
writer there and he was a new writer, he
didn't get a byline. You had to earn a
byline. And now you get a person that's an
intern and he writes a story and they put him
on the cover and give him a byline. I suppose
that is for incentive's sake, to get him a
job to get him going. But when you start that
way, you only have one place to go. And that
isn't up, that's down.
Q: What was that all about though, the fact
that you had to earn a byline? How did you
earn a byline? What were the...?
A: By doing really good stories and just
newcomers weren't entitled to it. That's all.
It was kind of a sacred thing to get a
byline. That was almost before my time, too.
But not everybody got bylines because it was
something that was earned through time and
story content.
Q: You have also talked about some of the
people there that were your mentors at the R
& T, one being the copy editor that helped
you along when you started becoming a writer.
Who were some of your other mentors or people
that you remember?
A: Randy Witke, who was a brother of Dave
Witke, helped me often an awful lot. Steve
Peglow who was a person in the art
department. Lyle Boone probably, a real good
friend now, was the art director. Still the
art director, I think he's still the art
director up there. Very knowledgeable on art
and layout. As far as the writing, there's
Lyle Boone and they are the ones that were
instrumental in some ways to get me writing.
There's this one guy like I was saying
earlier that had a TV fishing show that was
almost the founder of TV fishing shows. His
name was Virgil Ward from Missouri. I said,
"You know it would be really neat if I could
get an interview with him." They said, "All
you can do, why don't you write him? Call
him?" So I called him and he was all for it
and he said, "Lets go up on the Mississippi."
Well that's great, it's in Iowa. So we set it
up for Mississippi fish and I took a
photographer with me and I did a cover
layout. From then on, he was a friend for
life. I fished with him every year and most
of those years he had me on as a guest on his
TV program, which was really kind of neat,
too.
Q: You talked about bringing a photographer
with you too, you'd always be making a pitch
for a camera allowance, wouldn't you?
A: (laughs) Yes. That was always a sore point
and it turned to almost a joke up there
because I was on everybody's case about this
camera allowance. They're not normally going
to take a person on assignment and put him in
a boat, duck boat, all day long. When they
can make four or five different assignments
for a photographer. It's just a waste of
time. So the outdoor writers have to shoot
most of the time, their own art. This can be
a problem. There's a lot, I tell you. The
photography, as far my stories, was harder to
do than any of the stories. As I became more
knowledgeable about photography, I found out
how little knew I about it. And it isn't like
taking pictures, it isn't like taking
pictures for Christmas gathering, for a photo
album. You have to take the right kind of
pictures that show action and show faces and
they are not posed. You are supposed to take
them as it happens. It's extremely difficult
for me because I had the content. Like I say,
when I worked with the art director that used
to give me art and says, "This art is good
because of this, and this art is no good
because of this. Now look, you can't see his
face, his face is shadowed or there's no
movement. This looks like a posed shot that
you can get anyplace." So I had that in mind
when I was shooting my own pictures. And then
you have to be mindful of the sun, where the
sun is. It was just extremely, as far as I'm
concerned to be a good photographer; it's a
passion of its own. It's almost impossible to
be a good writer and a good photographer at
the same time.
Q: Did you ever get the camera allowance?
A: Never got it. I had about $2,000 or $3,000
worth of camera equipment. (laughs) I never
got it and I'm still bugging them about it
when I go up there to visit. When I take my
art in now, it's the only time I walk in the
place. Towards the end when I was up there, I
had my own home computer so I was filing my
stories from home so actually I was only
going into the plant two days a week. I was
home. But go ahead, I'm taking up a lot of
your time here.
Q: That's quite all right. When you talk
about art, you're talking about photos and
artwork.
A: Pictures. --
Section 6: Q: Give me an example of some of the feedback
that you would get from readers, positive or
negative.
A: Well, I used to call a person after a
story ran and say, "What did you think?" I
soon learned that other people didn't ever
call anybody because you're asking for a
compliment. And usually it turns out that
they'd say, "It's a good story, but..." And
so you quit doing that. I got a lot of
letters that I'm pretty proud of on a lot of
the stuff that I did. I think the reason is
that there's a lot of people out there when I
first started that were pretty hungry for the
type of stories I was doing. I got an awful
lot of compliments on it. Once in a while, I
tell you what, the main thing on writing a
story is that you have to feel...a person
only gets their name in the paper three times
in their lifetime. When they are born, when
they get married and when they die. So you
make dog-gone sure that every time you write
their name, its spelled correctly. That's a
major, major error. I have very, very few
errors over my period of writing if I had any
errors at all over that period of time. I
wasn't ashamed to call people back and ask
them if this quote is correct or if they said
that or how do you spell your name again. I
just forgo embarrassment because I figure it
would be better to be embarrassed with one
person than with maybe 250,000 readers.
Q: And also you talked about the fact that
people were hungry for this type of story
although there was the guy who was writing
outdoor stories before you. Reese?
A: Reese Tuttle was before Larry Stone and I
both. Larry Stone, lets see, it was Reese
Tuttle, when he retired Larry Stone took his
job and then I came in. Larry Stone and I
worked as a team. Larry Stone is a super,
super person. Still is. We worked as a team
and he did more of the soft core stuff and I
did a lot of the hard core, although we would
cross lines a lot of times. I would call him
and say, "What do you think Larry, I'm a
little short of stories, any ideas?" And he'd
say, "What about this Tom?" And I said,
"That's sounds like." And I'd call him, and
he'd say, "You got any ideas?" And I'd say,
"They're building a new lake over there, what
do you think about that?" So we worked real
close together and we complimented on another
more than anything else.
Q: As for that kind of writing, the outdoor
writing, Reese Tuttle who I guess started
it...?
A: Now Reese Tuttle, he was in a different
situation. Reese Tuttle was in a time era
where people accepted guns and hunting more
than they do now. They were no PETA
organizations or such and the ethical...
Q: The ethical treatment of animals.
A: Yes, right. And there were no...the
ethical standards in the Register were pretty
loose at that time. Larry Stone and I could
never accept anything free or we couldn't go
on a trip and have a tab picked up. Reese
Tuttle was there. He'd go any place in the
country and somebody would say, "Come on
down, Reese, and we'll pay your way." So he'd
go. It compromises you a little bit when you
do that because if you run into a bad
situation, how are you going to write about
it if they are paying your way? That type of
standard I think is good for a newspaper.
Nobody could pay. They would say, "Well, if
the paper won't send you, they can't afford
to send you, we'll pay your way." And I'd
say, "I can't do that." And they'd say, "How
do you get your stories?" And I said, "I
can't afford to take it myself because it is
too far to go and the paper won't pay me
because it is too expensive so I'm just going
to have to forget the story." And that's OK.
I went to one place over in Valentine,
Nebraska. They said, when I walked through
the door and went up to pay my fee, they
said, "Well, we're going to comp you for
this." In other words they were going to
knock off a big chunk of my stay there. And I
said, "You're not going to comp it, you can't
do that." And his face lit up because he got
so tired of paying writers to come down to
his place. Here was somebody that was willing
to pay his own way and I got better service
out of that guy and service in that resort
than any of them I can remember.
Q: You touched on something I wanted to
expand on. Ethical questions. Perhaps not
when people are paying your for your trips
but the way you're writing the stories and
the way that you get information. Talk about
some of those decisions that you made in
covering a story when you were perhaps using
a source that had a special interest as a
commercial enterprise.
A: The only time, and this is the paper's
standard. Say if I'm going fishing and I'm
using somebody's particular lure, like a
Berkley lure or something. Or anything else.
If there is a real need to mention a brand
name in the paper, you can name it. But if
you are putting a plug in for that particular
lure to satisfy a manufacturer, it doesn't go
in the paper. Whether it's a type of shotgun,
instead of saying a Baretta or Browning, a
semi-automatic shotgun, you say
semi-automatic. You leave off the brand name.
Unless there is a real need and there's a
reason for it. If there is a reason for it,
then you can do it.
Q: And the copy editor made that decision?
A: If you don't do it yourself, the copy
editor is going to do it for you.
Q: If you had problems making that decision
in putting a brand name on it or not.
A: I had no problems and to tell you the
truth, the manufactures know this. Like I
said, I'm going to an outdoor conference and
this is in the bylaws of our organization
OWAA [Outdoor Writers Association of America]
that we don't promise anybody anything when
it comes to products.
Q: Tom, we're going to wrap this up here
pretty soon, I just want to ask you one
question about your career as a reporter
actually. Larry Lehmer says that you had an
affinity for the beat. What do you think
about that, what was your experience as a
reporter?
A: I thoroughly enjoyed everything except,
and there's a situation where I had to go up
the to state house to cover something that
was on the agenda as far as a bill being
passed that had to do with outdoors, like a
duck hunting bill or something. And I had to
deal with the politicians; it was the
dirtiest job I could imagine. I just hate to
talk to politicians.
Q: Why?
A: Because you can never get an answer out of
them. And they lie to you. I mean, to be
brutally frank, I couldn't ever be a
political reporter because I don't like
people telling me one thing when they don't
believe it. What they see in me is what they
get and that is what I want from them. And it
isn't that way in the real world with the
politicians. So I hate it and I did several
of those where I sit in on meetings and tried
to get an answer out of them after the
meeting and talk to them and they would beat
around the bush so bad and it would make me
almost sick.
Is there anything else Brian? I don't know if
I have overdone my situation.
Q: No, that's a great interview. Thank you
very much.
A: Thank you. I appreciate it Brian.
