Section 1:
Q: We are talking with Gene Raffensperger
today, at his home at 804 39th Street in West
Des Moines. Today is March 19, 2000. Gene,
of course, was senior [out of range on tape].
Gene, I just want to talk to you a little
bit about what you wrote in your biography,
the letter that you sent to me. You joined
the Register in 1955 and you mentioned that
you were schooled with many months of police
and reported duty. I wondered if you could
just talk about the nitty gritty out there.
Was that considered how you paid your dues?
Were you with anybody else?
A: I think, at that time, when I came
aboard, I really was green. I had graduated
from [the University of ] Iowa, of course, in
journalism, but I had gone into the service
for three years and when I came out, I really
didn't know much. And the Register - it
wouldn't have made any difference - the
Register and the Tribune both had a policy in
those days, that when a new reporter came on,
after a period of a couple of weeks - I would
have been twenty-six years old then, or
almost twenty-six. They put me on the police
beat, on what they called the police beat.
Well, the police beat amounted to, in those
days, we went to the police station and
that's where our office was. In other words,
I would go to work at about 5:00 or 5:30 in
the evening and I worked until 2:00 in the
morning. [interrupted by telephone].
Covering the police beat in those days meant
literally covering the police beat. We had
an office, the Register had an office at the
police station. The police reporter worked
out of that office. The theory that the
Register had then, and it's a good one, and
I'm sad to say I don't think they do it
anymore, was that when a new reporter came
aboard, he needed to know, number one,
something about the town, something about Des
Moines. So the way to get that was to put
him on the police beat because every night he
was looking at fire calls and police calls
and one thing and another on the south side,
the west side, the east side, etc. So you
learned a little bit about the town. The
second thing the Register was concerned about
was accuracy. In those days - and maybe it's
still true today - police were not the
greatest spellers in the world. They
frequently mis-spelled individual's names.
They frequently got a wrong address, not
because they were stupid, but they were busy.
And it taught you - the Register police beat
taught you, check, check, check. You checked
names in the city directory, in the phone
book. You checked addresses, cross-checked
them. You learned how to use the cross-check
phone book and when a fire alarm would come
in, you could call the neighbor because we
had a thing. You learned all the gritty
things that reporters need and you just
absolutely became a really strong reporter on
the basics - spelling, accuracy, a general
sense of checking. So that's how I broke in.
The only thing that we ever got was one
night or two, the police reporter ahead of
you would precede you and take you down
there, and introduce you to the shift captain
and show you where the office was and show
you how to phone work and show you how to -
we had a police radio in there. You swam
there by yourself. Some people didn't like
it and didn't make it. I can't say that I
loved it that beat, but I certainly look back
on it with knowledge that I learned a lot.
Q: Do you remember any particular stories
that you were covering about that time? What
was it, for a couple of years or so?
A: It was probably over a year. It was
spread over two different times around. I
had big fires and things but I remember one
in particular that really didn't have
anything to do with any big crime wave or
anything. One night there was an incident
and police were chuckling about it when they
came back in on shift change and they said
there was a guy who got into an argument with
a guy downtown. This man was a pedestrian
and a young kid was driving his car and
blocked the crosswalk. And this man,
possibly affected somewhat by drink, but
angry because of the frustrations of having
cars block his path, instead of going around,
he stomped up on this guy's fender and then
stomped across the top of the hood and down
the other side. I sensed that there was a
really good story here and I said to the
police officer who was chuckling about it, he
said, "I don't know." He said, "We didn't
get they guy's name because no charges were
filed. We told the other guy to file against
him if he wanted to." And he said, "But I
tell you, I think that guy's name's out, down
at . ." There was a little general store or
tavern way down in the south east side of Des
Moines. He said, "I think he hangs out down
there." So though I went to bed at 2:00 in
the morning, the previous night, this thing -
I could just smell this being a good story.
So I went down there the next morning about
9:00 o'clock and I waited around and looked
around and asked questions. And sure enough,
I found this guy and he was a great
interview. He talked about the fact that he
was tired of people blocking his path and he
had done this because he was trying - he just
snapped. Well, he wore big engineer boots
with kind of like spikes on them, which made
it all the worse, you know, for the guy in
the car. So anyhow, I was able to get the
guy up into the office and we took his
picture and then we took a picture of his
boots and then we took a picture of the young
kid. We got his name and he posed for us
with his hands down in the hood of the car
where this guy's engineer boots had made
these big indentations. I was really proud
of myself because I had been able to dig this
guy up. It wasn't any big deal, but we got a
lot of mail on it. I think I kind of alerted
my bosses that this guy was hustling me. I
was hustling - you know, I was working. I
wasn't just laying around down there. --
Section 2:
Q: Also, I wanted to ask you about the
time that you came to the Register. How did
that come about? Where were you working
before?
A: The reason I was able to come to the
Register was because in 1950, when I started
my last two years as an undergraduate student
at the University of Iowa, I became the
Register's - what they called the Campus
Correspondent. Actually it was more than
that. It was an Iowa City correspondent
because we did things on the police beat. We
reported police stories. I even covered a
murder trial for them. But anyhow, I became
their correspondent, so I was dealing with
the Register people on the telephone or by
wire, Western Union, virtually every day. I
was doing stories for them. I was sending
them stuff and they were asking me to do
things. So, my work came to the attention of
people down there, primarily Frank Eyerly,
who was the managing editor at that time, a
legendary managing editor of the Register.
Luckily, he had noticed some things I did and
mentioned it to some of the people on the
desk. So when I went into the service,
Frank, after I was in there nearly ready to
come out, I didn't know for sure what I was
going to do. I thought I might have to start
out at some small paper. Frank wrote me a
letter and asked me if I would like to come
back, to start on the Register. Of course, I
did. So, with that tick - I mean, I had that
background like that, as a correspondent. So
when I came aboard, they knew who I was.
That didn't make me anything other than a raw
rookie, but I did have that coming for me
here.
Q: That connection.
A: Yes, right.
Q: So you had been working at the DI.
A: Yes, I had worked at the DI [Daily
Iowan], yes that's right, exactly. I think I
had some title. I was probably the news
editor or something, I don't know. But, I
had some friends there that went on from
there to do good things. Hoag Duncan was
there then. I think Bucky Turnbull might
have been there. Ozzie Jensen was around
there in those days. The DI was a live-wire
paper. We did a lot of things that we
thought were pretty good.
Q: We're talking about the Daily Iowan,
with the University?
A: The Daily Iowan, right.
Q: My question was, were you working at
the Daily Iowan with a title at the same time
you were a correspondent for the Register?
A: That's right, I was, yes. They didn't
care about that, the Register didn't. --
Section 3:
Q: Then they started opening some news
bureaus. I mean, that opportunity came up
for you when you were at the Register in the
early sixties?
A: That's right, yea.
Q: Talk about the idea - what was the need
to open some bureaus? What were they doing
before?
A: I came to work for the paper in 1955
and I'd been there five years and I was kind
of a general assignment reporter, plus police
beat. I even had some time on the copy desk.
I learned that the Register was about to
embark on a new deal. They were going to
open an Eastern Iowa bureau and they were
going to locate it in Davenport. The reason
that they were going to do this - plus, the
Register had a Washington Bureau. They'd had
one since the Roosevelt era. They'd never
had any other bureau, no state bureaus.
Somebody looked at a map one day and got the
circulation figures out and they discovered
that 60 or 70% of the state circulation lay
east of Des Moines. Well, that was a simple
thing to figure that out. They had
Davenport, Waterloo, Cedar Rapids, Clinton,
Dubuque, Burlington, and on and on. All
those big, potentially big - and they were
big - even without anything - circulation
areas lay over there. So they said, "What we
need to do is open up a news bureau over
there and exploit that circulation that we've
already got, plus try to build it and make it
bigger." Well, they toyed with the idea of
just hiring a correspondent that they had
over there. So I went into see Frank Eyerly
and I told Frank, I said, "Frank, I'm the
man. I've got all this experience here.
I've covered the police, I've covered the
courthouse. I've been on the copy desk.
I've written features." I said, "I'm the
best guy you could put over there." And I
think Frank was aghast! Maybe that's too
strong, but I think he was surprised that
anybody would come to him and say, "I want to
go to Davenport." Well, I did. So, they
sent me to Davenport. We opened that bureau
down there in January of 1961, just about a
week after John Kennedy was inaugurated as
President. Do you want me to talk about
that?
Q: I do want to follow up on this, though.
The Register still - I mean, they had been
around for at least a hundred years, covering
those towns. How were they doing that news?
Every time something happened over there,
would they fly somebody out there?
A: No, the Register has always had - I
shouldn't say always had, but in my time, the
Register always had a string, a network is a
better word, of correspondents, people who
were not working for us full time, but who
were paid as part-time reporters. Actually,
we paid them in the main by the inch. How
much inch of copy they got into the paper.
Not always - some of them were so good that
we had them on retainers. But we had good
correspondents in Waterloo and Cedar Rapids
and Davenport and so forth. What would
happen is, if something big would happen in
one of those towns, our first telephone call
was to our correspondent. Many times, that
correspondent alerted us that there was a
fire or there was a killing or there was an
upheaval coming in the school board. We were
alerted to that fact by these correspondents
and if it was the kind of thing that we
thought we needed to cover, then we'd send a
staffer in there. But until I opened that
bureau, we did not have a steady, full-time
presence in any of those areas. I made it.
I made that presence by that eastern Iowa
bureau. As I told you, we put in Davenport,
but I spread it out. --
Section 4:
Q: Okay, can you give the nuts and bolts
of what you were going to do then. What was
your job description when you went over to
Davenport? What were you supposed to do?
A: Well, we didn't call it the Davenport
Bureau. We called it the Eastern Iowa
Bureau. So, what they said, without spelling
it out, because I wrote the - nothing was
ever written, but whatever was done, I broke
trail on everything. We had never done this
before, so they just let me go, so to speak,
and as long as I was producing, they said,
"Well, that's probably the way we should go."
So what I did was, we rented an office in a
downtown building in Davenport. Eventually I
moved my family down there. I had three
children then. That's all I've ever had, but
I mean, I moved my family which included
three children, down there. We opened this
bureau and I set up and got on the mailing
list for, I think, thirteen eastern Iowa
dailies. I read those papers every single
day of my life when I was down there. I
mean, when I say "read them" I mean, I read
them minutely. What I was looking for was
not necessarily the big stuff, because I
think I'd find that anywhere. I was looking
for these little stories where they didn't
recognize that what they had was a good
story. I'll give you an example of that
later. It has to do with the Amish. But, I
read those papers every day and then I would
decide, okay, here's something coming up in
Dubuque, a school fight or something. I
would drive to Dubuque on Tuesday and write a
story about it and file it on Western Union
or I'd file a story - I'd work on a story in
Waterloo for Sunday. I'd see a feature story
up there that I wanted to do. I built up my
own cadre of correspondents in those towns.
I would deal with these people. They would
call me. I think what I did was, I looked
upon myself kind of like what I thought that
the Time Magazine correspondents would do in
Los Angeles. I kind of felt, if it's a story
that is more than local, that is, if it's a
local story, but people in Des Moines would
like to read it or should read it, I would do
it. And I would do it wherever it was -
Burlington, wherever. And gradually, as my
confidence grew and as my contacts grew and
as I realized how to do it, it just got
bigger and bigger and bigger. I was filing
stories two or three times a week and doing
Sunday stories. I always did Sunday stories.
I mean, I'd plan ahead, as the week came up
and I'd say, "Now this week, I'm going to try
to do a Sunday story out of Burlington." Or,
"This week I'm going to do a Sunday story out
of Waterloo," or, "This is the week that that
trial starts in Waterloo." That's the way I
planned my time.
Q: Were they expecting a certain amount of
stories coming from you?
A: I don't think they were expected
anything when I went over there. But I
turned the thing into such a monster that it
was kind of a joke. It was not a joke for
me, but it got to the place where somebody
told me that the city editor, a fellow, a
good friend of my mine who is dead now, named
John Goog. They said, "Well, if Goog says if
it happens east of Grinnell, don't worry
about it, Ralph will get it." And literally,
that was true, because I would. I would
drive all over and come home in the middle of
the night and get up the next morning and go
out and do it again. I ended up working on
an ulcer and I ended up almost a nervous
wreck, but I really did a big job for them
for six years.
Q: I was going to say, that was quite an
ambitious task. You said that you had
correspondents out there to help you out.
A: Yes.
Q: How did you cover all those cities with
one person?
A: You have to break it down. In other
words, you took the position that you can't
cover every school board meeting in
Davenport. Or you can't cover every city
council meeting in Cedar Rapids, but you
would lay back and watch for them. If you
thought there was an issue coming up in Cedar
Rapids at their city council meeting, that
was of enough interest, that the news angle
on it would work for us, and mind you, the
Cedar Rapids Gazette didn't have a morning
paper. So if I could get into Cedar Rapids
for a council meeting at say, 11:00 o'clock
in the morning and they would decide to buy
something for a shopping center or there
would be some kind of a controversy involving
the police, the Gazette couldn't do it. I
mean, the Gazette's next shot would be the
next afternoon. So I had this jump on them.
I had a jump on all of those. The only
eastern Iowa paper that was in the morning
was in Davenport, the Democrat and the Daily
Iowan. Otherwise, the whole morning field
was open to us. So, even though it was hard
work, if it happened after 12:30, 1:00 in the
afternoon, it was ours. And I capitalized on
that. I can remember running up to Cedar
Rapids - I monitored every radio I could get
my hands on, but I remember that a kid shot a
kid in the shower room of a Cedar Rapids high
school during the noon hour. I jumped in my
car and I went up there and I got that story
all wrapped. Talked to the father of the
victim, talked to the police, talked to the
mayor and whoever I talked to. The Gazette
couldn't touch that story. Not that's they
are not a good paper, not that they didn't
have good reporters, the time was wrong for
them. So I drove the eighty miles from
Davenport. I rented cars from a guy
downtown. I went down there to get a car and
the guy said, "This is a brand new car. It's
only got twelve miles on it." And I said,
"Well, let me tell you something. I'm going
up to Cedar Rapids." And I said, "I'm going
to lay that thing flat out, out on the
interstate. He said, "Don't worry about it."
So, I'd go like 75-80 miles an hour with a
car that had twelve miles on it! --
Section 5:
Q: Like with the story that you're talking
about there, the kid that shot another kid in
the shower - how would you get a photographer
out? Did you have a photographer?
A: We didn't always. Depending on the
situation, if I knew in advance that we were
going to do something either for Sunday or if
we had time, or if it was big enough, I would
talk to the desk in Des Moines and they would
arrange for a photographer. I did much of my
own photography, almost all of it, as a
matter of fact. I carried a camera. If we
go back to the Amish school controversy,
which was one of the big stories that I
covered, which had to do with the struggle
between Amish fathers who wanted their kids
to go to their own schools, being taught by
8th grade educated people, versus the state,
who wanted these kids into a regular school.
If we go back to that story, the Amish did
not want their pictures taken. It was a
religious thing with them and I didn't argue
with them, except that we wanted these
pictures of these little kids. They were
just beautiful kids. They had straw hats and
the little girls had bonnets. What I did
was, one of the first stories that I wrote on
them, and I broke that story. That was one
of those ones where I found a tiny story like
this in the Waterloo Courier that said,
'Officials in Buchanan County were going to
have to decide what to do about these Amish
kids.' That's all it was. And I made that
into a major story. The kids came home from
school a long a gravel road. I had my camera
sitting up on the dashboard of the car and I
practiced it a few times. To trigger it, I
had it set for 50 feet or whatever it was.
So I practiced it a couple of times on fence
posts, driving with the car and triggering
it. I came down the road and here comes
these Amish kids, a beautiful shot, the
little girls with the bonnets and the guys,
and they're carrying a lunch bucket. There
might have even been a pony in there - I
can't remember. All I did, was driving very
slowly on this gravel road, I just swerved
over slightly - not to endanger the kids and
got where I thought I was 50 feet away and
banged one off. It was great picture! It
was shot through the windshield of the car.
It wasn't a Pulitzer prize winner, but it was
a good picture. It was a good picture that
they could use and I felt - I suppose I
violated some - the Amish didn't want their
pictures taken. I felt like - I didn't
identify the children and you couldn't have
picked their faces out in this picture. But
what it did do, is it showed you that these
little kids were the object of this fight
between, they were the center of this fight
between the state and these Amish fathers.
That's what they looked like. They were real
kids. So I felt pretty good about that. But
I did that all the time. I took pictures all
the time. Every week I took pictures.
Q: As for the story itself, was it just a
one-time story or was it a series?
A: That story ran for three years. I
started that story in 1962, with what I told
you. I went out and interviewed the Amish
elders and then I interviewed the school
people. It was a classic confrontation where
they wouldn't give. It finally deteriorated
into weekly arrests of these Amish fathers.
And they would bring these men or these men
would show up at the court house. They would
go through - they had kind of a rope. I
can't say one of the Amish names, now, but
"You're charged with not sending your child
to school. How do you plead?" "Not guilty."
The guy was guilty and off they'd go to
jail. They'd stay in there for three or four
hours. They were jailing these fathers all
the time. It just went on and on. Finally,
it got to the place where Governor Hughes
stepped in and they figured out some way to
end it. I suppose I shouldn't say this, but
if you'll turn around and look up there, do
you see that picture up there?
Q: Sure.
A: That's the picture that finally brought
the thing to a head. The photo shows, what,
about six Amish little boys, running across a
field toward a barb-wire fence to a
cornfield. What led to that picture - that
picture was taken by Tom Defayo and a lot of
people thought that should have been a
Pulitzer picture because of what it is. But
what led to that was, the Independents or the
Buchanan County people brought a yellow
school bus out and parked it front of the
Amish school with an agreement they thought
they had from the Amish fathers, that they
were going to put these kids, these boys and
girls, on this bus and take them into either
Hazelton or Independence or Fairbanks or
wherever their school was. And they were
going to go to school with the other kids.
So they came out. They were in their Amish
school and they came outside. Tommy Defayo,
who took that picture for us, was standing
with me. We were actually right up next to
the bus, waiting for the kids to come out
because he was going to take their picture.
The kids stood there in kind of like a
football huddle with some mothers and some
fathers, and all of the sudden - you know, I
don't speak German but it must have been a
German word. Somebody used the word, "run."
Somebody said, "Run!" And those kids took
off. That's the result - and they ran away
from these school people and into those
fields. That triggered Governor Hughes, who
basically said, "Okay, that's it! That's
enough of that. We're going to get this
settled." So they had one more confrontation
in which they actually went into the school
and tried to get them out. The Amish mothers
cried and sang "Jesus Loves Me." The county
attorney was trying to settle it. It was
just an unbelievable scene, but after those
two incidents, Governor Hughes called a truce
and they worked out a deal. The kids go to
their own schools up there now.
Q: All this time, what was going on with
the other papers?
A: They jumped in, finally, when they
started putting these guys in jail. They
started showing up. The Waterloo Carrier was
there, Cedar Rapids was there. The
television stations from Cedar Rapids were
showing up. Yes, they came in but the first
day, the first Sunday - we broke that story
on a Sunday, that they were actually in this
fight. You know, you could work all that
good stuff in about the clash of cultures and
these bearded men who were the elders and
they would talk to you. But you just
couldn't photograph them. We finally
photographed all the fathers when they
started taking them to jail because they were
bringing them right into where we could get
at them and there was nothing they could do
about it. I remember one guy snapped off a
shot one time and one of these army spotters
turned and looked at him and said, "Brother!
Have thee no shame?"
Q: Did you ever get any negatives,
letters?
A: No, no I don't recall that at all. --
Section 6:
Q: As for the Bureau work itself, did you
have anybody helping you out? Did you have
an office clerk?
A: No. They sent a guy down there with me
for a while, but that didn't work out. They
took him back to Des Moines and they just
left me alone. I think they said, "Well,
you're working too hard so we'll give you
some help." It just didn't work out. The
guy went back to Des Moines and had a real
good career back there. But no, I didn't get
any help. I never asked for any, really,
after that guy was down there and went back.
It didn't make any difference. It was during
that period that I covered, I did features.
There was a guy in Burlington by the name of
Catfish Kelly that I did a story on, that guy
right there. See that guy? That was an old
river rat. That's my picture, too. I took
that picture. I covered - this will age me -
I covered one of the last hangings in Iowa,
at Fort Madison Penitentiary in 1962. Harold
Hughes became governor that year but he
didn't take office until '63. Of course, he
stopped all that. The legislature, finally,
under Hugh's direction, abolished capitol
punishment, I believe, in '63. But in 1962,
there were still two men on death row and I
covered one of those hangings. So there are
not many reporters around, I don't suppose
now. There is still George Mills, he would
be one for sure, that have ever covered an
execution, but I can say that I did cover an
execution.
Q: I don't mean to get gruesome, but tell
me a little bit about this story. The fact
was, you were going to go out and witness the
execution and write about it?
A: Well, that's right. I was there as a
reporter. I was not there as a witness. But
yes, that's right. We went down there. The
hanging was in the summer time and they
hanged people in Iowa at dawn, so the hanging
occurred at whenever sunrise was and it was
inside. They had a body shop where prisoners
- inmates learned how to work on auto body
work. And there was a wall there that was
moveable, anyhow, they could slide this wall
back, curtain. Curtain. Behind that curtain
was a gallows. So, on the day of the
execution, they moved that curtain back and
the gallows was up on there and they brought
the guy into this. We were all inside. We
didn't need to be. They used to conduct
executions outdoors, but this was an indoor
execution. There were a number of reporters.
I wasn't the only one. And there were a
number of witnesses. There hadn't been an
execution in Iowa for about twelve years, I
believe, is how long it had been. Anyhow,
they brought this guy in and marched him up
to the top of those gallows and tied him up
and put a hood on him and the next thing you
know, there was this huge crash when the trap
opened and down he went. Of course, you
could see that it was open, the front the
scaffold was open, and you could see him when
he dropped and they declared him dead in just
a few minutes, although there have been
cases, I guess, where it didn't go quite that
smooth. But that one went, if you can say
anything like that went smoothly, that one
did go smoothly.
Q: It's kind of hard to think now, what's
the story there. Just seeing in deeper
detail of what's happening.
A: You just write a story about what I
just said, that it's in the prison body shop.
You could go into the detail. Actually,
that day, the Tribune, of course, was still
alive then and the Tribune had the news
story, because they had an afternoon paper,
so they - so did any other news story. You
just report all the details. But that
particular day, they had some protests,
pickets outside the prison wall. I think I
used that as my lead because the afternoon
papers would have had - but then you put in
all the details that you can put in on
something like that if you're a witness to
it. It's like anything else.
Q: Well, you're an objective reporter, but
on the other hand, you're human, too. You
must have feelings about, have an aversion to
seeing something like that. What were your
feelings about that?
A: I didn't know what to expect. Frankly,
I did not know how I would react to it. I
was somewhat - I think afterwards, I was
depressed. I don't think I was at the moment
of death, but I think after I was driving
home or back to Davenport or wherever I was
going, I think there was a feeling of
depression that went over me having seen this
man come in and then die right in front of my
eyes. I suspect it finally got to me. I
hadn't had any pre-set - I didn't know
anything about the guy. I didn't know
anything about the crime. I've been in that
prison many other times in which I remember
one case. I was in there when a little boy,
and I mean a little boy - he was fifteen
years old - he was sentenced to life in
prison because he killed his grandfather with
a shotgun. And I don't know the details on
that because it was a western Iowa story,
which I had no part in. But, he apparently
pleaded. His lawyer - this boy was fifteen
and small for fifteen. I mean, he looked
like he was about twelve. Anyhow, he
apparently came in and pleaded guilty to
first degree murder, which left the judge no
leeway. He sentenced this little boy to life
in prison. So they sent this little boy, if
you can believe this, to Fort Madison, where
all these hard cons were. They didn't know
what to do with him down there because they
were afraid for his safety, so they put him
in the hospital. Well, Governor Hughes came
down there and visited. Nobody had ever done
this before. He visited a bunch of lifers
and let them talk to him in terms of they
wanted to have their sentences commuted. And
Governor Hughes gave each one of these guys
fifteen minutes or whatever, which that was
interesting, too. But I wasn't in on that,
because they wouldn't let us in, but when
they said, "Well, Governor, would you like to
see this young boy?" And he said, "Well,
yes, I guess I would." So they let me go
with him, with the governor and we went over
to the hospital. It was just an incredible
scene. I mean, here is this little boy who
doesn't have any idea what he's doing. I
mean, believe it or not, when the Governor
came in, he showed him - the boy had made
some kind of a thing out of Popsicle sticks
by pasting them together like a tinker toy
set and he had made something and he was
showing it to the Governor like any
twelve-year old kid might show something to
his dad. Then the kid said, "Hey," I don't
think he called him Governor. I don't think
he knew who he was. But he knew that he was
some authority figure and he said, "Hey! Can
I go out in the yard?" Meaning out in the
general population. And you know, it stunned
Hughes. And Hughes said something like,
"Well, we'll have to leave that up to the
folks here. You better stay here." Well,
what had happened was, the hard cons that
were out in the yard had sent candy to this
kid. They had gone to the commissary. They
wanted this kid out there, obviously, for the
reasons that you can imagine. And Hughes
recognized that and the prison people
recognized that. But it was a stunning
situation. This little boy and the governor.
And it made a good story. I thought it was
a really good story, really solid story. To
follow that up for you, the little boy was
finally sent to El Dora, where he belonged,
but tragically, he killed himself up there.
The little boy was just terribly screwed up.
As I say, I don't know the background on it,
but I just know that everybody was shaken up
by the fact that - I don't think they do that
anymore. I don't think they'd ever send a
boy like that into Fort Madison. They didn't
keep him there. But they didn't know what to
do with him. And I was just lucky enough to
be there that day.
Q: And as a reporter, you saw this and you
knew you had to write about it.
A: Oh, yes. It was a touching, a very
touching situation.
Q: In your letter, you said it brought
tears to Governor Hughes' eyes.
A: It did. And probably to mine. I don't
remember now.
Q: I don't know. In those cases, you're
watching them carry out an execution and
watching this encounter between the young
boy. Obviously, you're thinking about how
you are going to write this story. What else
are you thinking about? What is a good
reporter thinking about in how to get this
story across?
A: Well, you know, this sounds kind of
silly to answer that question, but the first
thing that comes to your mind is, what are
you going to do with it? I mean, you are
looking at a situation here, not the hanging,
but you're looking at the situation with this
little boy and you want to get in it the
paper and you're saying to yourself, "I'm
inside the prison in Fort Madison and it's
going on, what? Two o'clock or whatever.
Now, I got to get out of here, I got to get
to my typewriter and I got to get to a
Western Union office or (I wouldn't
necessarily have to do that.) I could get to
a telephone and I'd dictate it." But you
have to think about those nitty gritty things
because you just simply, you've got your
hands on what you know is a very powerful
story. And you've got to get it out. You
can't sit around and wait until Sunday to
write that story. You've got to get that
story out right now. So I called the office
and I say, "Hey! This is a huge story. I
mean, this is big, much bigger." Because I
went down there just thinking that this was
going to be Governor Hughes interviewing a
bunch of old lifers. Ah, big deal. It would
make fifteen inches or whatever. I didn't
know they were going to put him next to this
kid. And I don't think he knew that either.
But when I told them that, I said, "You know,
this kid is in for murder," and I gave them
the color, you know, what he did. So
everybody was fired up about it and I got to
get it done, you know, and they're looking
for it. That maybe doesn't sound like you're
weighing all the psychological edge - you're
really worried about the nitty gritty, about
trying to get this baby, because you got your
hands on a big one. And you really want to
get it done and you know you haven't got much
time. You're not going to sit around and
toss leads back and forth in your mind. I
wonder if it would be better if I wrote this
or this? You got to do it. You got to do it
right now. And sometimes, you're writing on
the hood of your car. I mean, I've set my
typewriter up, portable, on the hood of my
car, rolled in some paper and knocked it out.
Or I've done it in the back room of the
Western Union office. Or I've done it - you
know, I've done it a lot of places. But you
got to do it. I couldn't dictate that story
off the top of my head. I'd have to dictate
that - if I didn't send it Western Union, and
I could have. I can't remember what I did.
I would want to get it off of a paper because
I had it. It was a story that I felt I had
captured, and I just wanted to get it out. --
Section 7:
Q: You brought up something that other
people that I've talked to from the Register
have said. They write the story in their
head and then dictate it that way. Tell me
how that works. Because I think more in
terms of writing the thing out in long hand
or typing it out and then reading it over the
phone.
A: It depends on what your situation is.
A guy like George Mills, for example, could,
I think, dictate twenty-five inches without
even clearing his throat. I mean, he just
had that ability. I didn't dictate very many
stories because I was worried that I would
lose my place. If I started out dictating, I
didn't know if I, after I had gone about four
graphs, I didn't know where I was. So, what
you have to do, if you're dictating, I think,
and I've done this a few times, is you take
your regular small notebook that your notes
are in and you just rough out maybe four
words in the first paragraph and maybe
another three words in the second paragraph
and once you get rolling, it's fairly easy.
You only dictate under the gun. You don't
dictate a Sunday feature story or you don't
dictate a story that you've got time to work
on. You dictate when you're looking at your
watch and it's - like Fort Madison, for
example, was what we called a First Edition
Town. They had the earliest deadline of any
of our editions. Well, I knew that if those
guys didn't get that by six o'clock, they'd
just be chomping at the bit. And like I
said, here it is 2:30 and I'm still inside
the prison. So, I did have time to type that
one up, but if you were faced with a
deadline, you just had to do it. You'd
dictate the verdict on a trial, for example.
Guilty. Innocent. You can do that.
Although smart reporters, and I consider
myself to be one, would make what we called A
Matter and that would be if a jury went out
at 9:00 o'clock in the morning - that would
be an unlikely time - say the jury went out
at noon. I would sit down and write what we
called A Matter, which meant that I would
say, "Okay, the guy is going to be found
guilty or he's going to be found innocent."
But at some point in your story, you needed
about eight inches of background, that this
crime occurred and this guy was arrested and
the state witnesses testified. You put all
that in there, so that's ready to go. They
got it in type. Now you're set. Now the
verdict comes in at 6:30, right on your
deadline. Now, all you got to do is give
them the top on it, because they got the A
Matter. That's the way smart reporters did
it. And I consider myself to be smart. I
remember one time, telling a guy, he was
talking to his office and it was a television
guy and they weren't getting what he was
saying, whether it was guilty or not guilty.
And I was typing and I said, "Tell them
ACQUITTED!" Quit using guilty or not guilty,
because some guy is going to drop that up
there on you and you're going to say guilty,
but he's going to come in the other way. I
said, "If he's been freed, ACQUITTED!"
[chuckles].
Q: That guy is going to drop the "not" and
give the wrong verdict.
A: That's right! He's going to say he's
not guilty and some guy is going to say, "I
guess he's guilty." If you use acquitted,
you're not going to make any mistakes. --
Section 8:
Q: In a larger scheme of things, and I
brought this up in my letter when I wrote it
to you, some of the questions that we would
be talking about, what made the Register such
a great paper? Why was it so well renounced
among both journalists and among the general
public, the people, the readership?
A: I think it was because - I think I got
a lucky break there. I came aboard at about,
I would say, the high-water mark for that
time. The Register, I think, was riding high
with winning Pulitzers like Clark Mollenhoff
won a Pulitzer for labor racketeering and
Dick Wilson had won a Pulitzer in there and
Nick Kotz won a Pulitzer for dirty grain or
dirty meat, and Lauren Soath won a Pulitzer
for the Russian visit. I think it was
because the Register was edited by strong
editors. Frank Eyerly was a very strong
editor, a very aggressive editor. Ken
MacDonald was actually the editor. Frank was
the managing editor. But Frank was the guy
you dealt with in the newsroom.
A: But those fellows, they wouldn't go for
anything that wasn't right down the middle.
But I think it was because of the aggressive
editors. I mean aggressive in the sense that
not that they overran people, but they would
go after good stories. That's what I mean by
aggressive. I think it was good people.
They had strong, hard, driving people in
their Washington Bureau and we had a great
desk. We had a strong city desk and a copy
desk that caught these. You couldn't get
anything through our copy desk that was even
faintly questionable, whether it was a
correct thing. These guys were good. They
were older fellows and they had been through.
They knew exactly. You couldn't fool them
on anything, not that you would try to, but I
mean, a lazy reporter would be just nailed by
these guys, because they knew too much about
facts about the state. So I think it was
good editing, I think it was strong desk
work. I think it was good people. I think
that's what made them that way. And I got to
add that other factor - in the state of Iowa
at least, it was because, in my opinion,
because we had license. People expected us
to do what we did, but we were able to do it,
primarily, because there was no opposition
for us out there, except in Davenport. Sioux
City had a morning paper, and of course, the
Daily Iowan. But you could go out there and
do things in the morning, for the morning
publication, and look pretty good and they
were pretty good, whereas today, you'd come
in second best, because the Gazette would
have a better story. Or Dubuque. Or
Waterloo - not Waterloo - they're still
afternoon. Cedar Rapids would. It's just a
lot tougher now and I think in those days,
not that anybody was lazy, but I think we
capitalized on that. And I think people
began to realize, our readership realized,
that if there was a big story, they expected
something kind of special out of the
Register. And most of the time they got it.
Because the Register displayed it right.
They were not afraid to go after it: they
used an airplane to take pictures, to get
people out. We would go out and we always
illustrated. I remember being sent out of
town on a story and the city editor telling
me - this is a way to knock down your ego -
"Don't worry about the story, Gene. Just get
us some head shots of those two kids." Like
there would be four kids killed in graduation
night. Get us the pictures of those kids!
That's what we want. We would aggressively
seek out those pictures. Go into town, try
to find somebody who had a yearbook. Can we
borrow the yearbook? Here, we'll photograph
it. We'll have our photographer take a
picture. We always came back with that kind
of thing. I think that's what people
expected. And I think that has gone away
from us. I don't think the Register does
that. I don't think they are as aggressive
out there now as they used to be. --
Section 9:
Q: Some of the reporters I've talked to
also talk about the thrill of being out there
reporting, just the real thought of it and
beating the competition. I wonder if you
could expand on that? Did you have that
feeling?
A: Oh yes, sure. The Amish story that
I've already mentioned was an example. But,
there are all kinds of cases where you go out
and you do something and you know that you
got it. You got it and they didn't get it or
they weren't there. That's the most
important thing. A lot of times we'd do
something and they weren't there. They
either were fooled - they didn't know about
it, or they were lazy - they didn't cover it
- or they just didn't know it, they didn't
recognize it. And I'm trying to think of an
example. I guess I'm not coming up with one
right now, but I mentioned -
Q: Greg brought up a story that you two
worked on, where he was working on anti...
A: Oh, that's right, yea.
Q: ...and there was this guy who was
coming over from Des Moines and they met out
in a cornfield or something like that?
A: Well, that part of it I didn't have.
But what we got into there, that was in
Davenport and Drake was an expert on that
part of the government coverage. It was a
poverty program and there was a big flap
about it in Davenport and I can't remember
the details on it. In those days, much more
so than now, Davenport was very conservative,
very much a Republican, stand-offish. I
wouldn't necessarily call them right wing,
but they were conservative Republicans. They
didn't dig the poverty program, so there was
a big flap about this particular program.
You're right, Drake said that they brought
this guy in - well, a state guy came in for
that - I don't know that part of it. I can't
remember. But I know that Drake and I
together, got something major on that
Davenport situation and put it in the paper
the next morning. It was a Sunday paper and
the town [laughs], they just went wild! I
mean, they just went nuts trying to figure
out. Not only did the paper get upset, but
the whole town was screwed up. I remember
now another one that we did down there in
Davenport. I did it. I did this one. There
was a guy who left his entire estate to two
little girls. And this guy wasn't anything
big, but he was a guy who didn't have any
family and these two little girls lived next
door to him and always came over and brought
him things and so forth, and he died. He had
a modest estate. That wasn't the point. The
size of the estate was not the point. The
point was that he left it to these two little
girls. Somebody in Des Moines, believe it or
not, said to me, "Why don't you check that?"
So I went over to the Scott County Courthouse
in Davenport, and there it was, just bigger
than anything, right there on the thing. I
remember leaving that day, I think it was on
a Friday - whatever day it was - I remember
when I got out of there that their courthouse
guy was gone for the day. And I knew I had
that baby! So, there was this huge rush of
adrenalin that goes through you when you know
you've got your hands on one that nobody else
has got. Well, that little boy in the
prison. Same thing. It's a huge rush, not
ego - it's just one of those things, where
you say, "That's what I'm here for!" "That's
my job!" And I've gotten it and nobody else
has got this story. It's a thrill you can't
describe unless you've done it. Fortunately,
I did it a few times. --
Section 10:
Q: Didn't you say you were digging up
stories yourself when you had subscriptions
to the paper and you had all your sources and
stuff. Did you ever get any assignments from
Des Moines? Were they saying you need to
cover this story?
A: Yes. Not as often as anybody might
think. After they realized what I was doing
and after they saw the success that we were
having, by allowing me to do just what I
wanted to do, they basically turned it around
and said, "What do you got for us this week?"
The city editor would frequently say, "What
have you got for Sunday?" And I'd tell him.
I always had something. But yes,
occasionally, they would do that. I remember
an incident that had nothing to do with them
assigning - well, they did assign this one.
There was a tragedy in Keokuk. This goes
back to 1965. There was a square dance club
that had a square dance on Thanksgiving eve
in a National Guard Amory in Keokuk. And
there was an explosion, a gas leak in the
basement somehow ignited and it blew up this
armory and eventually, I think, seventeen
people died as a result. But many of them
died that very night. Well, it happened on
Thanksgiving eve, which is the worst possible
thing from a news standpoint because on the
night before the holiday the Register closes
early. So I don't think the Register even
got the story - I didn't even hear about it.
I was in Davenport, of course. But the next
morning, I knew about it because Davenport
got something in their paper, so I
immediately called the paper. I said,
"Okay!" They said, "Well, look. Don't worry
about it." This was right after the Amish
crash and I had been working for about twenty
days in a row on that story. They said,
"Don't worry about it, Gene. Cool it. You
don't have to go. It's Thanksgiving Day."
They said, "We got somebody going down there.
You just take it easy. You've been
working." I said, "Okay." So my wife fixed
Thanksgiving dinner and we had the kids all
there and we were just sitting down when the
phone rang. It was probably about 12:30.
"Gene?" "Yea?" "Gene, we can't go." They
were going to fly somebody down from Des
Moines. "The weather has closed in. We
can't go." I said, "Okay. I'm on my way."
So I got up from my Thanksgiving dinner and
drove down to Keokuk and we were there for
about three days. It was a huge, huge
tragedy. As I said, I think about 17 or 18
people died in this thing. It was because
the nature of it, it was a square dance party
and there were children there and men and
women. There were children who were orphaned
because both of their parents had been killed
in that blast. There were any number of
follow-up stories on that that led us to more
stories later. And of course, a year later,
we had the anniversary story. It was a big,
big story. And I got into it, because - they
said, "No, you don't have to go because
you've been working hard." Well, I did have
to go, because they couldn't fly. If I
didn't go, they wouldn't have covered it.
They could have covered it, but they wouldn't
have had anybody down there. And of course,
that's the thing. --
Section 11:
Q: Readers or lay people look at your job
and think, "That's got to be tough." I mean
when you are going out and covering tragedies
like that. But then, of course, talking to
the survivors, the family. Did you ever have
any well, obviously, reluctance about going
to the family and asking questions. What
kind of questions do you ask and how
difficult is that?
A: It's certainly not one of the pleasant
parts of this job. Going back to what I said
about the police beat, that's one place you
learn that. You learn on the police beat to
deal with people who maybe a child has been
run over by a car and maybe a child drowns or
something of that nature, you learn that you
need to go to the house and do something with
it. Well, the excuse that you would use in a
case like the two I just described, would be,
"We know of your tragic loss and we'd like to
get this thing in the paper. I know you
would like to have a good story about Billy.
Do you have a good picture of him? And do
you have your school picture?" They're
always anxious to do that. And then you'd
like to know, who are his mother and dad?
And who are his brothers and so forth, and
what school was he in. And gradually, after
you are into that, my feeling or my reaction
was - I didn't do it a lot, but I've done it
enough times that I've found this to be true
- if you can get to the parents, if that's
the one you are seeking, and not the warding
off nephews and aunt, if you can get to the
mother or if you can get to the father, they
want to talk to you. It's hard to believe
that, but they do. They really want to tell
you something. What I finally hit on was,
when I would approach a house like that and I
would go up on the porch and knock on the
door - believe it or not, this is the way I'd
handle it - when I went up the steps and on
to the porch, I said, "Okay, Gene. Now
you're just going to leave yourself back
there. What's coming here is just a working
reporter. You're up here to do your job.
Now, you're not going to let anything get in
your way. You're not going to be crude,
you're not going to be rude. You're not
going to be anything, but you're going to
leave your thinking self out there because
this is a tough situation." And gradually,
when you get in there and you talk to those
people, they just want to tell you something.
It's hard to believe, but it's true. I've
found it to be true. I wouldn't want to put
that off on anybody. It's not the best job
in the world.
Q: I imagine you were turned away plenty
of times, too.
A: I've been turned away and I've been
threatened. I never was attacked, but I have
certainly been threatened. And you never
argue with that. I mean, fine. Okay, okay.
You need to sometimes use a little reaction
against being turned away if it's a matter of
talking to a public official, like a county
attorney or a sheriff, and you're asking
questions about a crime or something and he
is rejecting you. Now, that's his job.
That's a little different. You don't
approach that with kid gloves. You go after
that as hard as you can. Sometimes I've run
into situations where you get people who are
involved in a tragedy but they are not family
people. They are neighbors or they are
whatever, and they're protective of these
people. A lot of times what you can do in a
case like that is you ask a question about
how far is it from here to that creek where
that boy? And the guy will say, "I don't
know. It's 100 yards." Well, you just kind
of casually reach into your pocket and pull
out your notebook. Now, he sees what you're
doing but all you're doing, you see, is
writing down 100 yards. Now, you've got the
notebook in your hand. You got your pencil
in your hand. Now, he's not so nervous.
Now, you keep talking and you're still
writing and he doesn't think too much about
it. That's worked for me on a number of
occasions. If that first move you make to
get your notebook out, sometimes that
triggers panic in somebody and they'll either
slam the door in your face or they'll
threaten you or they'll whatever. But they
are used to seeing you pull the thing out if
it's a matter of a figure that you want to
make sure you've got that right. So I've
used that a few times.
