John Hawks Schmidt interview about journalism career, Des Moines, Iowa, June 12, 1999

Section 1: Q: I'm talking to John Hawks Schmidt of Des Moines [IA] on Saturday, June 12, 1999, at his address. And again that's... A: 2425 Terrace Road. Q: John, you told this story a little bit in the letter to me but maybe you could again talk about how you happened to come to the Register in 1948? A: Well, because I was looking for a job and it seemed like a better opportunity than some of the others that came along. I had a job offer from Watertown, South Dakota, as a telegraph editor. And I thought, "Oh, that's pretty good." But then, Howard Taylor who was on the Chicago Tribune and also on the Medill faculty seemed to have taken a liking to me and he was a friend of Frank Eyerly and he said, "Why don't you apply to the Register and I'll send you a recommendation?" And so I did and got an invitation to come out for an interview early in March, 1948. Q: And you applied as a copyreader, is that right? A: That is correct. I did not apply as a reporter because I knew I would have made a lousy one. I'm rather bashful and don't like to call people up and pester them, so I knew I was not made to be a reporter. And I certainly like writing and editing and that sort of thing. Q: At the time what did you see as your future, is that what you wanted to do is copyreading? A: Well, I saw that as the way of advancing to a higher editorial position. I wasn't sure that I would go any higher in the Register. I thought maybe that would lead me to be managing editor in Hastings, Nebraska, or something like that. Q: That's your cup of tea? A: Editing would be my cup of tea, yes. Editing and writing. Q: Talk a little bit about Frank Eyerly, too. You had, I guess the ups and downs that everybody did at the Register during his tenure. What was it starting out and then how did that develop and evolve? A: Frank was the one that asked me to come out there, but as it turned out he was out of town the day I was interviewed so Ken MacDonald hired me. I always felt that Frank thought I was worth keeping because during those rather turbulent two years on the Tribune he kept giving me the raises he promised me. So I thought, "Well, maybe I can't be all that bad." And then when the time came that I just felt I couldn't stay any longer, he moved me to the Register copy desk. I don't know whether I'd hinted something to him that I was ready to leave or what, maybe the people on the Tribune, Parker Mize and Russ Schoch, maybe they said they'd like to see me out of there. I don't know. But anyhow, he told me I could transfer to the Register which was something not very often done, I was told. A transfer from the Tribune to the Register. And even going to the same job, it was considered a promotion. It was also five dollars a week better for night work. In those days five dollars a week was worth something. My starting salary was $42.50 and I calculated that to be $300 in today's money and that isn't even the poverty level for a family of four. (laughs) Q: You said that for the first 25 years that you were at the Register and the Tribune you were always worried about making ends meet. A: I was, yes. Q: Did you feel that you were getting a fair wage? A: Oh I think I was, yes. As I mentioned during that manuscript when Howard Taylor called me from the Tribune, the Chicago Tribune, and said he had a $100 a week job for me and I told him I was making $80, he said don't bother to come because the cost of living and commuting would eat that all up and if they are paying you that much, they must think you're all right. So I guess I was making a fair wage. Q: I'm going to check my tape while I let you answer this question, but go ahead and answer the question and I'll just be working here. Was there any talk about unionization or working as a guild at that time? A: Not at that time, but there was in the, I guess, early 1970s. In fact there were two guild elections which they lost both times. The first time I actually thought of joining a guild and then the second time I had second thoughts about it and voted against it. I think it went down by maybe five votes or something like that. (laughs) Q: What was your apprehension? Why did vote against it the second time? A: Oh, I guess I had a feeling that maybe it was not something that the editorial page people should be involved in. It was more for the reporters and copyreaders and that sort of thing. Q: And what was the distinction? A: What? Q: What was the distinction? Why would a reporter be more wanting to be in a guild than an editorialist? Why would it be more appropriate? A: Possibly because there were more of them and it was a more, jobs had more turnovers and that sort of thing. I think the editorial writers were paid more on average than reporters were. Q: Was there a problem or did you see there being an issue about working conditions there for the reporters or in the newsroom? A: I think maybe I saw a problem the first time around. Several of them kind of convinced me that things were not as good as they ought to be. But I was not too closely involved in that. No. Q: What did you hear specifically? A: I really don't remember what the specific problem was--wages and hours. -- <br><br> Section 2: Q: And you also talked about the turbulent two years that you were at the Tribune. Maybe you could expand on that? A: Well, I apparently just didn't seem to get along with the people who were directly over me and they didn't along with me. Maybe I had too high expectations. I don't know. As I said I was kind of poor at taking criticism and they were kind of good at handing it out. And it just seemed to me that they never gave me any good stories to handle and always saying that this headline is no good. That changed on the Register, changed totally and I can't believe that I changed that much overnight so it must have been a personality conflict of some kind. Q: Can you remember any instances where there was that point where you thought there were some criticisms were perhaps unjustified or nitpicking and that kind of thing? A: I thought there was a lot of nitpicking, yes. No doubt about that. Especially in the headline writing. But I also objected to the fact that somebody else got all the good stories to handle and I didn't. Q: You talked about the story where Frank Eyerly would call up on a regular basis at 10:00 and read you the riot act, I don't what the terms were that you used, but it was the usual 10:00 chewing out. (laughs) What was that all about? A: Well, he got the first edition of the paper delivered by taxi cab, had about a half an hour to look it over and then he would call up and give us about 45 minutes to make changes for the second edition. He usually had some criticisms to make no matter who was running the paper that night. Sometimes they were very trivial and sometimes they were worthwhile. Q: It was hard taking that kind of criticism? A: Oh, I didn't mind it so much from him, I guess. Well, he was managing editor of the paper. Q: The issue being criticism from others, huh? A: I guess so, yes. I'll agree with that. Q: People who weren't your supervisor? A: Yes. Q: And also the story about Frank Eyerly, I've heard this from another reporter that he had the first edition delivered to his house by taxi. A: That's correct, yes. Q: What's that all about? A: Well, he liked to be able to read it, at least glance through it and see what we had done with it. I think probably before he left in the afternoon he had rough idea what the big stories of the day were going to, be but he certainly didn't know the details. Q: That was, of course, the morning paper. A: Yes. Q: Why wouldn't that have been delivered to him by a paperboy? A: Well, because he had to make changes in it before the city edition came out. Q: You point out that during your entire career you were one of the more invisible people at the Register. What do you mean by that? A: Well, I wasn't a name; I didn't have bylines like the reporters do. Certainly I wasn't a columnist. So I mean copy desk people and news desk are invisible. They still are. Nobody knows who they are. Q: Did that bother you when you had that position? A: Not particularly, no. I expected it would be that way. -- <br><br> Section 3: Q: And going back to the late '40s and early '50s. I wonder if you could describe what that newsroom looked like with the separation of the departments and the various news desks, where they were and such? The women, the society page people. A: Each paper had a semi-circular copy desk. And I would locate the one at the Register as about one-third of the way down from the north end of the room and the Tribune one about one-third of the way from the south end of the room. And each one of those had a news editor's desk attached to it and a city editor's desk attached to it. And departments like sports, well they were just scattered here and there. There would be three or four desks for sports, three or four desks for society over there and I guess the farm editor had a desk and the state editor had a desk and that sort of thing. The business editor. They didn't do much with business in those days. Probably one person did it all, maybe two. Q: Reporters shared typewriters? A: Shared typewriters and desk. They did not, as I recall, have individual desks. There were a few desks for the reporters to use and that was it. Q: And I guess at the time Harvey Ingham was still there? Was he or was in his last year? A: It was just his last year of life. He was 90 years old and had retired. He used to wander through the place, not every day, very frequently so I saw him and met him but I never had any dealings with him. Q: How about Mike Cowles? Did you see him at all? A: Very seldom. He was in New York [NY] dealing with Look Magazine most of the time, I think. Q: Other people ever come to mind? George Yates? I think he was there at about the time you were. A: Oh, yes. He was still there. Was he chief photographer? I don't know, but oh, yes, he definitely was there. Q: He had quite a personality too, I've heard. A: He did. He was a British guy. Looked and talked it. (laughs) Q: Can you remember anything more about him or some of the other personalities around the newsroom? A: Oh, not particularly. No. Q: How about some of the people that you mentioned in your text? Bud Mize, Ogden Dwight, Russell Schoch. A: Bud Mize was a southerner. And I don't know how he came to the Register or how long he'd been there, but he was news editor of the Tribune. Q: You worked pretty closely with him then? A: Definitely, yes. He did the day-by-day operation is what he did. And chose the stories and where they were going to go and that sort of thing. Q: Did you socialize with some of these people outside of work? A: Not those two that I mentioned. But when I mentioned Otto Knauth for example who I didn't necessarily work directly with. And Jim Cary who's telegraph editor of the Tribune. We, Ingrid and I, socialized with him and Marge for a couple of years. Joe Patrick who was a copyreader on the Tribune at the time, we socialized quite a bit in the early years. Q: And there was a point in some of your text where you said Eyerly ordered you never to sit on the "slot" again. What was that about? A: That I never knew. I guess he just was dissatisfied with my work as telegraph editor and assistant news editor. Q: With the Tribune. A: With the Register. I was going along I thought pretty good at the Register and so that turned out to be quite a surprise. Q: It came out of left field then. A: It really did, yes. I think I mentioned in my manuscript, he and MacDonald both asked if I would like to go the editorial pages and I said sure. And as a matter of fact, I had wanted to be an editorial writer from the beginning, but I never applied for the job because in 1948 you got to be an editorial writer by having been an editor or reporter for many years. They told me, Eyerly and MacDonald, "Why, two years ago we offered you a position on the editorial pages and you turned it down." And I had no memory of that, so all I can say is that there must have been some terrible miscommunication. They didn't understand me and I didn't understand them. Q: Did you suspect they weren't being honest with you or was it just like you say, the communication? A: I think it was miscommunication. Yes. -- <br><br> Section 4: Q: When you were sending out resumes to the Register or sending out resumes when you got out of school, did you have any idea of how well renowned the paper was in journalistic circles and nationally? A: I think I did, yes. It wasn't until later that I realized that it came up on everybody's list of the top ten for a while. But yes, I knew it was good. Another paper that I knew was good was the Milwaukee Journal. I applied there and I got an offer from them after I came out here. But as I mentioned, most of the papers I applied to were smaller, ordinary kinds that I thought I had a chance of getting a job with. (laughs) Q: And of course your perspective changed after you had been hired. A: Yes. Q: When you started finding out more and more about the Register. A: Yes. Q: Any clues as to what you think it was that made the Register so outstanding. I mean, a Midwest paper out here in the middle of seemingly nowhere compared to the New York Times and the Post and such? A: Well, of course they had a good Washington bureau and they definitely made a point of covering national news and world news. I mean they did a lot more of that in those days but then everybody did. And I came to think that the editorial pages had a lot to do with it. Coincidentally, just this morning I was reading in the paper something about Harvey Ingham and he thought that the editorial pages had a lot to do with growth of the Register. I used to tell people you read through the list of towns where the Register has circulation; they got 15 readers here in this little town of 400 and that sort of thing. And I'll bet you a dime that they are the 15 most important people in that town and a lot of them read it because of the opinion pages because they can get the news out of the Mason City [IA] paper or Ottumwa [IA] or whatever circulates in their area. And so I guess Harvey Ingham's view sort of confirms what I was saying all these years. I do think we had good editorial and opinion pages. That's why I was real glad to be associated with them for so long. Q: What makes an editorial page or opinion page something better than the other? I mean, what made it so good? A: I suppose the selection of materials that goes on of the columnists and the other people that write for it. And naturally the editorials. I mean you hire good people; they tend to write better stuff than people who weren't so good. Q: How about giving, I mean you wrote over 5,000 editorials yourself, how about giving me an example of some of the ones that really standout in your mind. Ones that, stories that you worked on and opinions that you professed in your editorials. A: Well, for several years I specialized in doing the foreign things so when, like the Soviet Union was breaking up for example, I did a lot of that. I also did quite a few on business and that sort of thing. Is there any one standout in 5,000? No. Q: As an editorial writer you are rather anonymous back there. A: Exactly. Except when you do an op-ed piece. Q: (laughs) Talk about that, too. I imagine the readers who were getting the Register... A: Yes. Q: ...essentially you, some feedback. Can you remember any feedback you got, negative, positive of things that you may have written? Specific... A: Oh, I'm sure I did. I recall one time when I wrote an editorial approving a tax on insurance companies and some insurance company withdrew their advertising for a while and it cost the Register $9,000, but I wasn't rebuked or reprimanded for it. Q: I was going to ask you something about that. Can you remember any other things that may have sparked some concern for would have been people from the business department and people from the editorial department? You know, being at odds with one another? A: Well, at sometime there were editorials that offended Younkers and they pulled their advertising for a short period of time and that cost a lot of money. I wasn't involved in that and I don't really know what the situation was. Q: With your own experience, writing about the tax on insurance companies, was there anything, did you feel the impact in any other way from your supervisors? A: No, I felt that we had very substantial freedom to write what we wanted to. Q: Were there other issues of conflict of interest that you can remember, things that you may have written about that the Register people weren't happy with? A: Not that I'm aware of. Of course, all of the editorials were discussed at the editorial conference every morning. Q: I was going to ask you about that. What was the process of how the editorials were chosen and who would end up writing them? A: Well, we all gathered 9:00 every morning and the editorial page editor went around the table and asked each person what he thought he'd like to write about that day. We were kind of expected to have two suggestions, but if you didn't have any that was OK. And sometimes he would say right away, "OK, do that one" or he would say, "I don't think we need that one." And then everybody was free to discuss what was proposed. If I had proposed an editorial on Gorbachev for example... Q: What? Oh. Gorbachev? A: Mikhail Gorbachev, yes. Other people would chime in. There was a lot of input; everybody was allowed to say what they thought about everything. And so we went around the table that way and usually got more editorials than we needed. Occasionally the editor would have an idea, something that should be written, that nobody suggested. Then he would say, "John, why don't you write about this today," and that's generally the way it was done. Q: And each had a specialization too? A: Well, yes. One or several specializations but we weren't confined to that by any means. Q: What was your territory besides international relations? A: Oh, I would say business, probably business and international, yes. Q: I imagine too there was a lot of research that went into it. Talking with the reporter and phone calls to sources and such? A: Oh yes, there was. Q: Could you talk a little about that? What that entails? It was a reporting job in that sense. A: Well, in that sense it was. Of course if you did any national editorials you didn't have to talk to many reporters (laughs). But on any local editorial you'd have to check with reporter to find out if he knew any more about it than had been written and that sort of thing. Sometime he'd say, the reporter would be able to say, " Well, there was this that we didn't think was appropriate to put in the news story but..." Q: To what extent was the reporter involved? Merely with regard to the research or was their opinion considered about the issue? A: Oh, it would be the research, I think. Yes. -- <br><br> Section 5: Q: As an editorial writer you are rather anonymous back there. A: Exactly. Except when you do an op-ed piece. Q: (laughs) Talk about that, too. I imagine the readers who were getting the Register... A: Yes. Q: ...essentially you, some feedback. Can you remember any feedback you got, negative, positive of things that you may have written? Specific... A: Oh, I'm sure I did. I recall one time when I wrote an editorial approving a tax on insurance companies and some insurance company withdrew their advertising for a while and it cost the Register $9,000, but I wasn't rebuked or reprimanded for it. Q: I was going to ask you something about that. Can you remember any other things that may have sparked some concern for would have been people from the business department and people from the editorial department? You know, being at odds with one another? A: Well, at sometime there were editorials that offended Younkers and they pulled their advertising for a short period of time and that cost a lot of money. I wasn't involved in that and I don't really know what the situation was. Q: With your own experience, writing about the tax on insurance companies, was there anything, did you feel the impact in any other way from your supervisors? A: No, I felt that we had very substantial freedom to write what we wanted to. Q: Were there other issues of conflict of interest that you can remember, things that you may have written about that the Register people weren't happy with? A: Not that I'm aware of. Of course, all of the editorials were discussed at the editorial conference every morning. Q: I was going to ask you about that. What was the process of how the editorials were chosen and who would end up writing them? A: Well, we all gathered 9:00 every morning and the editorial page editor went around the table and asked each person what he thought he'd like to write about that day. We were kind of expected to have two suggestions, but if you didn't have any that was OK. And sometimes he would say right away, "OK, do that one" or he would say, "I don't think we need that one." And then everybody was free to discuss what was proposed. If I had proposed an editorial on Gorbachev for example... Q: What? Oh. Gorbachev? A: Mikhail Gorbachev, yes. Other people would chime in. There was a lot of input; everybody was allowed to say what they thought about everything. And so we went around the table that way and usually got more editorials than we needed. Occasionally the editor would have an idea, something that should be written, that nobody suggested. Then he would say, "John, why don't you write about this today," and that's generally the way it was done. Q: And each had a specialization too? A: Well, yes. One or several specializations but we weren't confined to that by any means. Q: What was your territory besides international relations? A: Oh, I would say business, probably business and international, yes. Q: I imagine too there was a lot of research that went into it. Talking with the reporter and phone calls to sources and such? A: Oh yes, there was. Q: Could you talk a little about that? What that entails? It was a reporting job in that sense. A: Well, in that sense it was. Of course if you did any national editorials you didn't have to talk to many reporters (laughs). But on any local editorial you'd have to check with reporter to find out if he knew any more about it than had been written and that sort of thing. Sometime he'd say, the reporter would be able to say, " Well, there was this that we didn't think was appropriate to put in the news story but..." Q: To what extent was the reporter involved? Merely with regard to the research or was their opinion considered about the issue? A: Oh, it would be the research, I think. Yes. -- <br><br> Section 6: Q: And also you said before we started the tape that you had some liberal leanings too. Would it be that some of the editorials you wrote, they chose you to write these from the liberal side? A: I think that's possible yes. Although I think most of the writers tended to be on the liberal side in those days. Q: Were you more liberal than others or were you pretty much mainstream liberal? (laughs) A: I think I was on the liberal side of liberal. (laughs) Q: Is there a possibility that that may have been the reason why you didn't advance at the Tribune, not at the Tribune but at the Register where I guess it was Flansburg that was... A: Oh, you mean as the editorial page editor, yes. Oh, that is a possibility. I also think that I was too old at the time to really be considered for it. Q: You think politics were considered when deciding on sort of a supervisory manager? A: Certainly they were. I know that Jim Gannon had Flansburg in mind from the beginning and invited applications knowing that Flansburg was going to be chosen. And Geneva Overholser knew that, too. And guess what happened with Flansburg about six months after she became editor of the newspaper. (laughs) He retired and became a columnist. Q: Any opinion on that kind of decision making? I mean those types of considerations going into the decision making process? A: Don't they go through it in every business? Q: You saw the changes in your department when the new ownership took over. What were those changes and how do you think they affected the look of the paper? A: When the new ownership took over I didn't notice any changes in that. The changes were when the Tribune was abandoned in 1982. Because for a few years after Gannett took over, they didn't make any changes at all. They kind of said to us, "You can run any kind of newspaper that you want, good or bad, as long as it makes money." (laughs) And they did not interfere. Q: One editor said that they got kind of a ten-year free ride there. What does that mean? A: Well, that they didn't insist on any changes. It wasn't until they thought that the profits were too low that the managers cut back. Q: So in fact there was a point where did, there was something... A: That's been about the last five years or so, I'd say. Since that time, you have seen an awful lot of Register people going somewhere else. Q: What do you think of the paper today? Compared to what it was? A: I don't think it is as good as it was. Maybe that's unavoidable. People don't have time to read anymore. All that stuff that I used to slave over, columns and columns about the Joseph McCarthy hearings. Even the New York Times wouldn't publish stuff like that today because nobody has time to read it. Q: What else do you think is lacking in the presentation of the paper today? A: Well, state news. They really cut back on that. It just wasn't profitable to send 15 Registers out to this little town. Q: And in fact they have closed some bureaus. A: They closed some bureaus. Yes they have. Q: What's wrong with that? I mean do you think that's just the nature of the times where we have to live with it? A: I suppose it is. There just isn't that much interest in news any more and of course even on television news, there isn't interest in the real news. Q: Although the Times is still one of the best read papers... A: Of course it is, yes it is. And it was one of the best. The Times and Washington Post. I love the two weeks I spend visiting my sister in Washington reading the Post everyday. -- <br><br> Section 7: Q: What do you think suffers when there are fewer people writing editorials and there is more advertising and less time spent putting the paper together? The editorial page specifically. A: There are more mistakes for one thing. Sometimes just silly little mistakes. I think there definitely is not so much research going into it. And the fact that they only have six people now and one of them has to spend about three-quarters of their time doing what the composing room used to do. That means they can only have two editorials a day if they're lucky. Sometimes three. Q: Whereas before you had? A: Always had four. Maybe three if they were longer ones, yes. Q: And talk about the concerns that you had of having advertising on the Nation/World/Opinion section. A: Well that's the one thing I guess I'll never forgive them for. I think most of the good newspapers now still have a Sunday Opinion section as such for the front page and an investigating piece. That sort of thing. At least the ones I see have that. So when two years ago or thereabouts, why, they sold the bottom 40% of the page to Younkers and then filled the top of the page with what I consider, second-rate general news-section stuff. I thought that was unforgivable. As a matter of fact, I wrote a letter to the editor on the subject and Dennis Ryerson called me and said we couldn't use it for obvious reasons but he kind of agreed with me. Q: Dennis Ryerson agreed with you? A: That was when he was editorial page editor. (laughs) Q: I wonder if he'd agree with you now. (laughs) A: Maybe not. I don't know. (laughs) Q: It may seem obvious to some of us, but why is it that that is unforgivable? I mean, it's a business. A: Well, they don't have ads on the front page. They don't have ads, I guess, on the front page of any section do they now, except the opinion? Well, I guess they don't have anything that big on the front page of any section. That just seems to be downgrading it, burying the opinion section; it's not worth displaying. Q: Perhaps the separation of advertising and editorial concept needs to be more distinctive? A: Well, I guess so. I guess I wouldn't have minded their putting the ad entirely in the section somewhere. I believe the New York Times Op-Ed page still has ads on it because we used to brag about ours that did not have ads and the New York Times did. So I wouldn't object to seeing an ad on each of the inside pages. Q: It made me kind of wonder whether the readers really care, you know, if they notice something like this. Maybe it's just the professionals like yourself that see it. A: That's quite possible, yes. Q: I think I touched on this, but again maybe you can expand it. Was there ever any pressure from either the previous or the current ownership, the Gannett folks to present an editorial differently, perhaps a different position that would otherwise not rile an advertiser? Did you ever see that when you where there? A: I was never aware of anything like that. Sometimes, obviously sometimes, Ken MacDonald didn't like our viewpoint and wondered if we should modify it a bit. It was more general; it didn't have anything to do with advertising pressure, that I'm aware of. -- <br><br> Section 8: Q: We know back in the days when there were more people who were keeping a close eye on this paper and what it looked like, the management was a stickler for accuracy. How was that conveyed to you when were a copyreader and a copy editor in the early days? A: Well, we got rebuked for mistakes, certainly. I don't believe they published any corrections though. Now they publish a correction every day for a misspelling. I can't recall that in the olden days they corrected anything unless it was really a gross and terrible error. Q: Can you recall any stories yourself about glaring mistakes or a close call on your part when you were on the copy desk? A: Not specifically, but I know there were plenty. I have kept a diary for all my life and as I read through those pages I find a number of times when I pulled a boner on this. (laughs) Q: Or anybody else on the desk, an anecdote that you can remember that stands out where somebody really screwed up? A: Not specifically, no. Q: OK. Tell us about the job too of what the telegraph operator did. A: Telegraph editor. Q: Telegraph editor. We don't know. A: You don't have one. Well,.... Q: Stuff like that. A: Well, he was the slot man. He sat in the middle of the center circle and he distributed the stories to the copy editors on the rim. He sorted them out and decided. Well, of course, the news editor decided mainly which main stories we were going to use, but the telegraph editor took the other stuff. He took it off the Teletype machines, you know. That's what they had in those days. It came in over the wire. Q: Because we have Teletype machines today you know. It churns out the copy. Is that the way it looked? A: Yes. Q: AP. A: Yes. It was brought over to the desk and the telegraph editor decided who was going to get which. And then he checked the headlines and sent the copy down. Q: That probably goes for national and international stories then, right? A: Yes, because, of course, the city editor sent over the city stories but they passed through the telegraph editor and he assigned them to different people to edit and again check the headlines and that sort of thing. Q: They passed through him by telephone? I mean he would get a phone call? A: No, they were written on a typewriter. The editing was all done on the city desk and then they always passed over by hand. Q: Although there were times when some of the news was so urgent that a call had to be made into the newsroom. A: Oh yes, definitely. Yes. Q: What kind of stories would those be? A: I suppose the great flood of '49 and that sort of thing. Q: Do you remember that? A: That was a great flood. I think it was '52, as a matter of fact, that we thought Nick Lamberto was lost in Omaha because he went over to cover the flood and nobody had ever heard of him for many, many hours and there was a real stir. But of course it turned out that he was safe. (laughs) Q: And he got his story, right? (laughs) A: He got his story. (laughs) Right. -- <br><br> Section 9: Q: And tell the story about Eyerly's order to kill the story about the VW. A: Oh, yes. A funny little short about a Volkswagen Beetle that ran over a jackrabbit and that caused the Beetle to turn over in the ditch. And since Eyerly owned one of the few Beetles that were around in those days, he ordered the story be killed. Eyerly incidentally didn't drive. I don't think he got a license. It was Jeanette that did all the driving. Q: So, Jeanette, his wife owned the VW? A: No. Whoever owned it. She drove it anyhow. (laughs) Q: Any other significant or insignificant anecdotes that you can remember about Eyerly and the way he...? A: No. He was a good bird watcher and several times a year the local bird club naturally went out and had its bird count. And he made sure we got that into the Register the next morning about that. Agate, 26 sparrows, 31 orioles and that sort of stuff. (laughs) Q: The bird count? A: Yes, the bird count. Q: Oh OK. That's unique. I don't think I have ever read anything like that in the paper. A: I don't think you would. But that was one of his particular interests. He was very interested in arts and culture and made sure that we covered that real well. I recall one day when I was not on the job, I read the paper and saw a little story about this long [indicates with finger about 1 inch] about the death of, I can't remember his name, but he was some rather famous contemporary American artist. And I thought "Oh poor, Paul Carman. He should have known to do more about that." (laughs) An inch of type--he's going to catch hell from Eyerly. Q: And did he? A: I think he probably did, yes. Q: And Paul Carman was who? A: Paul Carman was the telegraph editor on the Register. Q: And, of course, the Register was one of the few papers in the United States that was starting to publish stories about arts and culture. A: Oh yes, they were. Q: And the choice was, that came...You think that was the influence of Frank Eyerly? A: He certainly helped it along, yes. Q: I wonder why that was other than Frank who was used to think the culture here in Des Moines that needs to be covered? A: I think Des Moines had considerably good culture. Arts and music and theater. Q: Compared to other cities, it's not the first thing you would think about in Des Moines. A: No, you wouldn't, but once you're here, you realize it. I know when Ingrid and I came out here from Chicago we were just amazed at the quality of the plays at the playhouse. For a couple of years what we were seeing at the playhouse was reruns of what we had already seen in Chicago and they were just as good here as they were in Chicago. Q: Do you think the Register may have had something to do with the flourishing of the arts and culture here? Do you think it had something to it? A: Possibly, yes. I mean they were careful to review things. Our art center, we've always thought was a great asset to Des Moines. As a matter of fact, three or four days after we were married and came out to Des Moines, we said let's go down to the art center. And we didn't realize that was the first day of the art center. (laughs) It was the grand opening. And last year we went down to the art center on our anniversary and it was the 50th anniversary of the art center, too. (laughs) -- <br><br> Section 10: Q: We talked a little about the preeminence of the Des Moines Register nationwide. How much do you think the management had to do with that? The ethics of Gardner Cowles? Harvey Ingham? Their work ethic? A: Oh, it had to have an influence. Quality comes from the top as well as from the bottom. They brought in good people and they maintained high standards. No doubt about that. Q: You also talked about one of the people hired on the copy desk being black, African American. A: Yes. Q: He didn't work out. Could you tell that story? A: Yes. I don't know that I should name him because he's probably still alive and working somewhere. In fact, I think he did eventually get a fairly decent job some place. This would have been, obviously, in the 1950s since there was the Register copy desk. Q: We're fine. A: OK. Q: And go ahead. A: So he came on as a copyreader and I don't think he was there more than a few months and we all tried to help him, but the fact is that he just didn't have what it took. We had probably ten or twelve people run through the Register copy desk in the decade I was there. People who stayed less than a year and then were encouraged to leave and he was one of them. So I don't think there is anything racial about it. I think we all were plugging for him and wanted him to make it, but the fact is that he just couldn't. And some white guys couldn't, either. Q: The problem being that they were not catching the mistakes. A: That's right, you know. He just couldn't edit a story well. Couldn't write a headline. That sort of thing. Q: Talk about in general, the minorities in the newsroom back in the days of the late '40s and '50s. Did you see many minorities? A: What minorities? (laughs) Q: Hispanics or African-Americans? A: I think this guy was the first African-American in the newsroom at all. I can't recall any others. Q: No black reporters for example? A: No. I can't think of any. Q: How about women reporters? A: They came on slowly. As I mentioned, on the Tribune copy desk, two of the five copyreaders were women in the late '40s but they were just holdovers from World War II. Q: They weren't replaced then with other women when they left? A: No they weren't. And did we have a Register woman copyreader ever? While I was there? I can't remember her if we did. Q: I think... A: There were several reporters, of course, Jane Boulware and Lulu Mae Coe and a couple of others. Yes, they were pioneer women reporters in the '50s. Q: With the Register. A: With the Register and with the Tribune. Q: And, of course, there were a lot of women on the society page. A: Oh yes, definitely yes. Yes. And on the editorial page women began to move in there more for editing and make-up than for writing, but then in the last two years we've had a rush of them. Of course, what is it, two of the six now are women. Q: Yes. A: And the deputy editor is a woman. -- <br><br> Section 11: Q: And you mentioned the in-house competition, too, among copyreaders who were going for those editing positions. A: Oh yes, I can't imagine it would be otherwise. I mean, so-and-so is promoted to assistant telegraph editor and you think, "Why didn't I get it?" or sometimes you think, "There were other fellows that really should have had it. Why did they give it to him?" At least I felt that way. I don't know if other people did too. Q: Would it ever be a point where somebody could go from the copy desk to being a reporter or was the natural step into....? A: I think it was mainly just into other editing positions, yes. And if you reached the point where you realized you weren't going to get any higher, why then you started looking for some other newspaper. Q: And in this case there were several times when you did start looking for other newspapers. A: Exactly. Yes. Q: What provoked that? A: Well, when they reduced me from telegraph editor to copyreader again, and before they offered me the editorial page job, yes, I wrote some of my old friends and mentors and they both encouraged me to stay. Q: Was it always the case when you were there that anyone and everyone worked for both the Register and the Tribune? A: On the editorial pages, yes. Of course the reporters were Register... -- <br><br> Section 12: A: Two years ago we decided the stock market is going to crash so we took $40,000 out of our profits out of that and paid cash for a VW Passat, which is the top of the line, and enjoyed it. Q: You've been happy with it. A: And the market didn't crash. It just kept going up. Q: Speaking of money, you made a killing with Gannett, I guess on some stock... A: The Register, of course, was owned almost solely by the Cowles family. They owned virtually all the stock, but they had a small block of it that they made available to certain employees. I don't know how privileged you had to be to get it. But they offered me the chance about 1958 to buy some stock and I certainly couldn't afford to buy anything like that but I did manage to scrape up about $2,000. Yes, when Gannett bought the Register out, those 50 shares or whatever they were, were worth $80,000. So I made a killing on that. Q: Any idea on how it was that they chose the employees who had been offered that? A: That was always a mystery. I don't know how many there were but MacDonald called me into the office one day and said I'd been chosen to have a chance to buy some stock. Of course, it wasn't entirely mine because I had to sell it back to the Register if I ever left the Register. I couldn't sell it to anybody else. As a matter of fact, I couldn't even use it as security for a loan that I was trying to get, except that the Register had an arrangement with what was then the Iowa-Des Moines National Bank, that they would take Register stock as security for a loan and then sell it back to the Register if necessary. So I got a couple of loans on that. (laughs) Q: And what would your position have been at the Register in '58? A: Oh, I guess assistant telegraph editor/assistant news editor. So it probably was a very minor editorial position, probably just one rank up from private. (laughs) Q: And you don't even speculate on what the reason was that you were chosen, you can't imagine why? A: No, unless they took, it may have gone with job or might have been that they decided...to some extent I think that was it. They decided they wanted, certain people they wanted to keep so they encouraged them to stay by offering to sell them stock. Q: You've had some real ups and downs with that company in the sense that... A: Definitely yes. Q: That at one time they weren't happy with your work and then you saw that they were. A: That's right. Q: Giving you clues that they liked to keep you. And that brings me to my next question. You wrote that Eyerly always seemed to retain confidence in you all the way back, early on. What were the clues that told you he wanted to keep you around? A: Well I guess just the fact that he kept me. When I said I wanted to get out, why he got me out to the Register, away from the Tribune. And when he decided in 1960, I guess it was, that I was going to be a copyreader again, he brought me onto the editorial pages. So I think he wanted to keep me. As a matter of fact, the change was not entirely involuntary. I mean ten years of night work with a family was getting to be an awful strain. We were having some problems. Q: Financially? A: Not financially no. Emotionally. And so I was not really too saddened, but then, of course, I did have to be a copyreader for a few months till an opening came on the editorial pages. I think my old friend Howard Taylor was right when he told me in 1960, "Don't leave there because they'll find something for you." And they did. Q: And going back all the way to Howard Taylor and even before you were into journalism, what made you decide on a career in journalism? A: The opportunity to write. That is a strange thing to say when I didn't want to be a reporter. I used to dream of being a fiction writer and making a living that way. But, of course, that was only an impossible dream. And I guess I just gravitated into journalism. I didn't really decide until my final months at Medill whether I was going to go into magazine or newspaper journalism. But then I found myself writing all my resumes for newspapers instead of magazines. Q: And you had it in your mind, too, what you wanted to do which was copy editing. A: Yes. Q: How did that decision come about? A: Because I thought it was something I could do. Q: Oh, OK. A: And I thought it would lead to better editing positions. Q: Do you write freelance at all or have you written other materials not connected with the paper? A: No, I really haven't. In the first couple of years I tried but didn't have any success. So I figured OK, that isn't my line of business, after all. But I do enjoy writing and I was much more comfortable writing the material I gave you then I am talking about it because I was more coherent. -- <br><br> Section 13: Q: Can you name any of your mentors who may have been at the Register or anywhere else? A: Apart from Howard Taylor, there's one professor at Medill, Jacob Scher that I remember favorably. Q: What was the experience with him? A: Well, he just encouraged me to go into the editing line of business. He conducted classes in news editing. No, I don't seem to recall any mentors at the Register. Maybe Ray Wright, who was news editor at the Register for several years that I worked over there. Then he went to Denver [CO] after that. Q: Clearly you were a great person to have on the copy desk. (laughs) One way or another. A: They seemed to think I was or they certainly would have sent me packing before they did. (laughs) Q: Obviously personality conflicts on occasion but on the other hand they kept you around. Were there other people that stood out in your mind there that you worked with that were good copy editors? A: Well of course from the Tribune Joe Patrick was very good. On the Register, Ole Hellie, Paul Carman. Can't think of any others that really stand out. Q: For those of us not in the know, maybe you can expand on what makes a good copy editor? A: You have to be able to get the gist of the story because almost invariably it means trimming it. And you have to know how to trim and make some sense of it. I guess that's the main thing. Getting the idea of the story and knowing what you are going to do with it and then trying to condense it into a six-word headline. Q: And then, of course, I would guess the basics too. Sentence structure. A: Oh yes, that sort of thing. You would have to know grammar. I still get offended when I see grammatical boners and the use of wrong words. Q: Did you ever get any flak from reporters who you did some things to their stories? A: I used to get flak from Flansburg when I edited his column before he became editor of the editorial pages. (laughs) Q: I guess it varies. A: It varies with the person. Q: What kind of flak would you get? What would his problems be with what you did? Trimming it too much or what? A: Basically trimming it. "You shouldn't have left that out. It was the most important thing in the column." As a matter of fact, after Lauren Soth retired as editor of the pages, he used to write occasionally and several times he would tell me, "Why did you take out that sentence? That was the most important." (laughs) He couldn't have meant that it was the most important. (laughs) Q: So was there ever the back and forth where perhaps you'd say, maybe you're right or did you pretty much ...? A: I got along quite well with Lauren. As a matter of fact, I'm told that he recommended me to be the editor of the editorial pages in 1982. That just might have worked out. I really had a proposal for Jim Gannon, "I'm 60 years old, I'll retire in five years. Here's this very talented young woman Geneva Overholser. Make her deputy editor for five years and she'll stay, knowing she can become editor five years from now." He didn't go for that and she went to New York. Q: This was before she came back? A: Yes. When she applied for the position of editorial page editor just like I did, she shortly left for the New York Times to be an editorial writer there. And then after a couple of years, why, Gannett hired her back because they were very big on getting women into prominent positions. They hired her back as editor of the newspaper. Q: Back to the process of editing a story or a column, how would you respond to somebody that said, hey you took that out, that was the most important part of the story? (laughs) A: I guess I would just have to be friendly about it and say, "Well, opinions differ. I just felt it was something we couldn't keep." I mean, I would not argue with them. Q: How did you get along with people like George Mills, a very aggressive reporter out there? And obviously you would be editing some of his copy, too. A: I never had any problems with George. No. We maintained a social relationship right down to the present. Q: So you socialized with him outside of the Register? A: Yes. Q: And also you talked about the fact that they were calling you back after you had retired and you were doing some part-time things with the Register? A: With the editorial page, yes. Q: What were the sorts of things where that was happening? A: Usually it was when somebody left and it took them a couple of months to find them a replacement. For example when Ryerson left as editorial page editor and went out to Great Falls [MT] to be editor of the paper out there, why, it took a couple of months and they just needed somebody, not to be editor because we had a deputy editor at that time who did that work. But they just needed a live body to write editorials and select material and edit the stuff. In other words, all the things I used to do. And that happened on four occasions, I think it was.