Section 1:
Q: You said about 1966, you were getting
tired and confused and frustrated. What was
happening?
A: [laughter] Too bad my wife isn't here
to tell you about that. I was working these
5 1/2 - 6 day weeks, traveling from Dubuque
to Keokuk and never taking any days off or
never taking any time off. I just made some
friends over at the John Deere company and
they were impressed with some of the work I
had done, and they offered me a job over
there and my ulcer was working on me. I was
running out of gas, so I gave in and I took
that job. It was a good job but it wasn't
for me. I was there a year and then I went
back to the Register, I went back to Des
Moines.
Q: What were your frustrations?
A: Well, I think just that I just didn't
see that I was ever going to be - well, not
ever - but I just felt that I had built up
such a thing that they were expecting that
all the time. In other words, if I hadn't
gone at it so hard, they wouldn't have
expected one man to do this. I think I
mentioned to you after I left, they put five
bureaus over there. They put five men in
jobs. They had one in Dubuque, one in
Davenport, one in Iowa City, one in Cedar
Rapids, and one in Waterloo. Now, you could
argue that they were doing a lot different
stuff. But nonetheless, that's five guys in
a territory that I was doing all by myself.
I think that's kind of a tribute to what I
was doing over there. But it's my fault. It
wasn't their fault. I had just cut myself
too wide a swath there and I just finally was
unable to continue. If I would have just
stopped, thought about it, gone into Des
Moines, and said, "Hey, boys! I'm doing this
too hard. I got to slow down. You've got to
give me a break here." I'm sure they would
have said, "Fine. Take a month off," or
whatever. But I didn't do that and I should
have.
Q: Was there any thoughts of bringing
another person in or opening another bureau
so they could help cover the territory?
A: Well, they did after I left.
Q: After you left, but I mean at the time
when there was -
A: I don't think so, no. I don't think
they realized how tough a situation I was in. --
Section 2:
Q: And then you returned. How did it end
up that you became the city editor? How did
you end up in Des Moines? Was that your
choice?
A: I think that was the only opening I
had. There was nothing for me down there.
They had a guy down there. They had these
five bureaus running then. I was back in Des
Moines for a year. I came back in early
1968, January or February of 1968, and a year
later I was city editor. I think it was
because of my record with them. I think they
thought I was a good reporter and I might be
a good city editor. I don't think the two go
together. I think a good reporter doesn't -
I don't think George Mills would be a great
city editor but he was a great reporter.
Still is. But they were making a change on
the city desk and I was there. So they said,
"You do it." And I probably shouldn't have.
I was only there two years. But I think the
same thing happened when I went into sports.
I think that was much later. That was in
1976. But I think the same thing was true
there. The sports editor was retiring. They
had three really qualified men. Morrie
White, Buck Turnbull and Ron Maly, who had
all been there in excess of 25 years. Morey
maybe 40, I don't know. And they just
couldn't make a choice between those three.
So they reached over to the city desk and
brought me over. I say city, I mean city
side. It was all right. It was a tough go,
though, because sports was just an impossible
situation and it's getting worse all the time
because of demands. I've told people this.
When I was on the news side, I discovered
that people generally were upset and unhappy
with you for what you put in the paper. They
didn't want you to write about their school
board fight. They didn't want you to write
about some - whatever else - they didn't want
that in the paper. When I got into sports,
the bitch was always, why ISN'T it in the
paper? Why CAN'T we get our wrestling team
scores in there? Why DON'T you come out and
cover Cala city basketball? Why don't? Why
don't? Why don't? I mean it must have taken
me six months to figure that out. I came
from an atmosphere in which it seemed like we
had to fight a lot of times to get stuff in,
to an atmosphere where we were fighting them
off because we weren't putting it in. You
know, it's still true but sports is just
gigantic! I mean, they have women and girls
and things - you go back to the Register's
original great heritage as a sports paper,
with Sec Taylor and Bert McGrain and those
guys. Why, they didn't have anything like
what these guys got to cover now. There was
no such thing as a women's NCAA tournament.
There was no such thing as anything like
girls' softball. I'm talking about back in
those days. There was girls' basketball, of
course, six-girl. It's incredible,
absolutely incredible.
Q: I'm gathering that you were fine with
it, but being city editor was not your cup of
tea, or was it?
A: No, it wasn't. I didn't like it,
because I didn't like constantly dealing -
it's a harangue all the time, I found it to
be, with your own people. By the time you
get them sorted out where they wanted to be
and a lot of them didn't want to be where you
wanted them to be - in assignments, I mean.
And it was a constant battle to keep people
working on the desk as your assistants. I
mean, you got to have people there until 2:00
o'clock in the morning. And you've got to
have people there that can handle things that
are important. If something big comes up,
you can't have some - and this is no offense
- but you can't have a high school kid
sitting there answering the phone, at 11:30
at night. You've got to have an experienced
newsperson sitting there. It's just harder
and harder to get people that want to work
until 1:00 o'clock in the morning for the pay
that journalism pays. It was just a constant
harangue and a battle. And a tough labor
situation when jobs are hard to get and
papers are closing down and other jobs aren't
available. Then you don't have any trouble.
But in a good job market, you have a hard
time filling those jobs. I don't know what
they do down there now. I don't think they
close nearly as late as we did. I can tell
from looking at the paper that they don't do
that now. And that's okay, if you can get
away with it. They don't do a lot of things.
We used to make special trips for papers.
Like tonight, for example, when there was a
girls or boys basketball tournament, you'd
have some little school like Newell up here
in far western Iowa playing a game that
didn't start until 7:30 or 8:30, maybe even
8:30. We could go to our circulation people,
our traffic people, and say, "Ralph" (that
was the guy's name), "Ralph, we've got a
problem. We've got this Newell game. They
might win the state championship eventually,
but these people up there are going to expect
to see something. After all, we ARE the
Register." And by golly, he'd figure it out.
We'd put a special edition of the paper, by
special truck, into that little town.
Because that's what they expected. I don't
think they do that anymore. If Iowa played
football on the West Coast at night, we'd
send a special city edition truck to Iowa
City with that game story in there. They
don't do that anymore. --
Section 3:
Q: Any comments about Frank Eyerly? We
talked about [inaudible].
A: I think Frank was the single most
influential person that I ever was around,
simply because Frank was, at once, I think,
was feared and respected in the Register
newsroom. When I say feared, I mean that the
man was a commanding presence who could just
absolutely freeze people. Unfortunately, he
had a way of belittling and tearing down
people in front of other people. I think
nobody in command should do that. But Frank
did that. Not to his reporters, but to his
desk people. Frank had a little trick that
he would leave the office and after checking
with his desk about what will be on the
cover, what will be your line story, what's
the city desk doing, and so forth. He knew
what was going on when he left. They'd
pretty well hashed that out. Then he'd go
home and he'd sit around and have a couple of
drinks, and then he'd call about 8:30, just
about the time first edition came up, and
he'd say, "Send me out the paper." So we'd
get two of them together with a cab slip and
send them out to his address, out there on
42nd Street, and then we'd sit there and wait
and wait and wait until Frank looked through
the paper. And you know, most of the time,
Frank didn't find anything really important.
He'd find some obscure little story back on
page 18 or something that he was upset with
and he'd call in and just raise hell with the
guys on the desk. But I mean, it was a
terrifying period of time because you're
waiting for this other shoe to fall, this
terrible thing that is going to happen to
you. But the guy was a terrific editor,
there is no question about it. He had the
ability to pounce on a story. Frank Eyerly
is personally responsible for there not being
a dove season in Iowa. He wouldn't let them.
Frank just said to the guys covering the
statehouse, don't let them put a dove bill
through. We don't have the dove money, you
know. He hated long trucks because George
Mills hated long trucks. So, double-bottom
trucks didn't come in as long as Frank was
the managing editor. Frank loved bosom
shots. He would run these pictures of women
with this cleavage down to their ___, knowing
that he would get these stormy letters from
people, Sunday School teachers and everybody,
and he loved it! That's just the way Frank
was. He was an amazing man, a fearsome man.
But I think everybody respected him. Not
very many people liked him, but I think
everybody respected him.
Q: Well, with what you said, how did he
have that authority to influence what...?
A: What I mean is, I don't think anybody
over there knew him. Those guys, like George
Mills, everybody liked George Mills, the
Register would write these terrible, fierce
editorials about killing doves. For God's
sakes, don't let them kill doves! When a
dove bill would be introduced, he would have
Mills and Cy Clifton and those guys covering
the legislature in those days, they'd just
pound and pound and pound on that story. And
they'd get people to comment on it. Audubon
clubs, people who were anti-gun, that type of
thing. And these legislators would just
finally throw up their hands and say, "We
can't do it." And the same with long trucks,
double-bottom trucks. He'd just pound and
pound and pound on that. Mills was just
deadly on trucks. I don't think Frank paid
much attention to trucks because Frank didn't
drive, but Mills had the theory that they
were breaking up the roads and every time a
double-bottom thing was introduced, Mills
would marshal all his forces. Those are two
issues I know Frank was involved with. I
doubt if very many people outside the
newsroom really knew Frank Eyerly. A lot of
people knew Ken MacDonald in the community.
But I bet when Frank was the managing editor,
a lot of people didn't even know him. He
considered himself an art buff and so forth.
Frank didn't fly, he always rode the train.
He didn't drive a car. He always rode cabs
or somebody would give him a ride home.
[interruption as someone enters the room]
Q: I was going to say, in those two cases
that you just brought up, you said he
harangue the reporters to get them to write
about this stuff. Would he ever go to the
editorial page department?
A: I don't know if he did or whether
MacDonald did or whether it became part of
the whole deal. I'm not sure about that.
See, when I came back from Davenport in 1969,
Frank left. In other words, Frank left while
I was city editor. But I'd only been city
editor for about three or four months when
Frank retired. So I don't know - a lot of
his power showed up when I was in Davenport.
But I would imagine that he had great clout
with the editorial. I imagine they talked
about it all the time. --
Section 4:
Q: And also, I wanted to take you back a
little bit to the time when you first started
there in the fifties. Give us the climate of
that newsroom. Was it kind of the Hollywood
version that you would see where you got
editors chomping on cigars and harried
reporters and everybody running around,
throwing copy around?
A: Of course, that was my first experience
when I came there. It was my first
experience in that kind of an atmosphere. I
would say no, I don't think it was - of
course, everybody smoked. The newsroom was
full of smoke all the time. We used manual
typewriters, so as the afternoon wore on, on
the Register side, there was a great deal of
clatter, but I don't think there was - I
didn't hear anybody shouting, "Give me
rewrite!" I never heard anybody say, "Stop
the Presses!" either, although one night, I
heard - you can draw your own conclusions
here as to this mistake - but there was a
famous figure in the news, this might have
been in the fifties, his name was Klaus
Fuchs. He was involved in some kind of a
scandal involving atomic energy,
spy-something. I'm not sure what he was.
But his name was spelled F-U-C-H-S. That's
the way he spelled his name. So, one night
they ran a half column cut of Klaus Fuchs in
a story and the H didn't get in there. We
got a K in it. You follow what the name
ended up? So anyhow, it ran and let's see, a
guy down in the press room, I think, or down
in the composing room, the presses were
coming off, papers were coming off and he saw
that. And he called up to the news editor, a
guy named George Hanrahan was the news editor
that night. I was sitting just to his right,
because I was running the picture desk that
night. I heard George say - no, the guy on
the copy desk saw it. George reached over
and picked up the phone and he dialed the
press room and he said, "Bill, I want you to
stop them. We've got kind of a bad one on
3." That's the closest I ever saw. He
didn't jump up out of his chair and say "Stop
the Presses" but he very quietly said to this
guy, "Bill, I want you to stop them. We've
got kind of a bad one on page 3." [laughter]
Q: Was that a headline then?
A: No, it was a line under his picture.
We used to call it - a half column cut meant
the copy was cut and the man's picture was
in. And under his picture it would say,
"Raffensperger" if it was me. Or it would
say, "Jones." Whatever. It said Fuchs only
they didn't get the H in there. And somebody
caught it. It was a typo, was all it was. --
Section 5:
Q: Also, tell the story about Bob
Armstrong [fades to inaudible]
A: That occurred in the fifties when I
first came to work at the paper. There was a
situation in Cedar Rapids which I think
illustrated the difference between the
Register and other newspapers, the way we
handled situations. Bob Armstrong was the
president of the main department store in
Cedar Rapids and there was a black doctor in
Cedar Rapids by the name of Percy Harris, a
man who I knew personally because I went to
high school with Percy in Waterloo. Percy
was the county medical examiner in addition
to having his own private practice. He
wanted to build a house in a nice
neighborhood in Cedar Rapids and no realtor
or no builder would talk to him because he
was black. Now mind you, this was in the
fifties. So Bob Armstrong had an empty lot
next to his place in a very exclusive part of
Cedar Rapids. And he told Harris he would
sell him this lot and he could build there.
And Armstrong told his church and it escapes
me now, but it was one of the main-line,
big-time churches in Cedar Rapids. He told
them that he was going to do this and he
said, "I'm going to give you the money. I'm
going to give the church the money that Dr.
Harris gives me for this lot." And he wasn't
discounting it. So, they had to have a big
meeting on this. And they did, they had a
big meeting in this church. But the story
was brewing for weeks in Cedar Rapids,
because everybody knew what was going on.
But the Gazette - this is not meant to be any
kind of an indictment against them now, I'm
talking about forty years ago - the Gazette
laid off that story totally. They did not
touch that story. They would not write that
story. The night of the meeting in the
church, when this climatic thing was coming
together and they were going to vote on
whether this black doctor could have this
lot, George Mills went in there. We got wind
of it and George Mills went in there and the
next morning, in the Gazette, for those who
didn't know about the story, the Register had
a huge, huge take-out written by Mills which
spelled out this whole thing about what had
happened, quoted many of the people at the
meeting. One guy got up and said, "Some of
my best friends are black people," the usual
homilies that come and so forth. It had to
be one of the most embarrassing moments in
the Cedar Rapids Gazette history. And I felt
sorry for them. I guess everybody else did,
too. But I know that today, that would never
happen. The Gazette is an aggressive, strong
newspaper. They just let that one go and it
opened up the door for us and Mills went in
there and just absolutely demolished them.
That's the only way to describe it. He
demolished them. --
Section 6:
Q: To wrap up here, Gene, what do you
think of the paper today? The Des Moines
Register?
A: Well, I'm still loyal to them, of
course. I'm unhappy that, I don't think
they're carrying out the mission that we had
when I came to the paper. And I can
understand some of it, because I think I've
mentioned, when Cedar Rapids and Dubuque and
Mason City and Burlington and on and on, when
they go morning it makes it a lot tougher for
you. But I think that they have just kind of
given up on things that we used to count on
for them. I don't think they are as
aggressive as they were and I think that's
the influence of Gannett. I think Gannett
came in and Gannett said - I was there when
Gannett came in - and I think Gannett said,
"Look, you guys do anything you want to.
We're not going to bother you, we're not
going to do anything, we're not going to tell
you how to run it." And they were right,
they didn't. BUT, I think what they did do
was they said, "Here's the bottom line. And
you deliver on this bottom line." There was
worry. I remember Arnie Garson, who was the
managing editor then, said, "Gosh, I wonder
if they'll let us keep our Washington
bureau." Gannett don't care if you keep the
Washington bureau. They don't care if you
put fifty guys out there. Here's what we
want, right here, the bottom line. And I
think gradually, that has taken over. You
know, they've got a beautiful paper now. My
goodness, you can't see a better newspaper.
I mean, physically the paper looks beautiful
now and they're doing it. Content-wise, I
get the feeling that nobody is proofreading
down there, no editor is double checking. I
see things in there, they run corrections on
things which are just appalling. Things that
a simple phone check or a simple looking at
your copy after you finish would show you
that there is probably an error there. And
nobody is questioning that. This was the
break I got when I came to work in 1955, as a
green kid. They had a strong copy desk. And
when you'd write something dumb, I mean, it
would be awkward or it would be something
that maybe looked a little bit suspect as far
as whether that could really be or spelling
or grammar or a street address or the
spelling of a street. You never got any of
that through. That got your attention. You
became a much stronger and better reporter
because you learned that if you didn't do it,
they were on you. They came over and said,
"What about this?" And you'd say, "Oh. I
guess I goofed on that." Well, that's the
way you learn. And I'm afraid they're not
learning now. But that's from a guy who has
been out seven years and I'm not down there,
so I don't know. I hope it doesn't sound
like sour grapes, but I suppose it does.
Q: Well, those are the questions I had. I
appreciate you talking with me. Thanks very
much.
A: You bet.
