Society of the Silurians LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD BANQUET The Players Club 16 Gramercy Park South Thursday, November 14, 2013 In Honor of SEYMOUR TOPPING Drinks: 6 p.m. Dinner: 7:15 p.m. Meet old friends Published by The Society of The Silurians, Inc., an organization Reservations: (212) 532-0887 of veteran journalists founded in 1924 Members and One Guest $100 Each Non-Members $120 NOVEMBER 2013 For Seymour Topping, the Beat Goes On BY WARREN HOGE and much of the with the So- eymour Topping — known uni- viet Union. versally and aptly as “Top” — is He was a close-up observer and ana- Sreceiving the Silurians’ Lifetime lyst, interviewing commanders in high-risk Achievement Award on Nov. 14, and combat zones and exchanging observa- what a lifetime it has been — and con- tions with local officials, diplomats and tinues to be. specialists in the field and becoming an Nimble of mind and body, elegantly expert himself. In 1951, John F. Kennedy, white-maned, and just a month shy of turn- then a young congressman on a fact-find- ing 92, Top is still lecturing at universities ing visit to Saigon, sought out Top for a here and in China and participating in eve- briefing. nings at foreign affairs venues around Significantly, Top’s view in these highly New York. Just last month, he enthralled contested situations was always an inde- a roomful of listeners at an Overseas pendent one, fact-based, multiple-sourced Press Club gathering with tales from his and disinterested. Commenting on Top’s days as a war correspondent in China in 2010 memoir “On the Front Lines of the the 1940’s, vividly recalling experiences Cold War,” Henry F. Graff, professor as if he had lived them only last week. emeritus of history at Columbia and edi- The anecdotes ranged from alarming tor of The Presidents: A Reference His- moments like learning about the dropping tory, noted this aspect, saying, “As the of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima while preeminent foreign affairs journalist of the he was a soldier on a troop ship headed last half of the 20th century, he shows us for Pacific combat to amusing ones like not only what happened but also where the night he and his wife, Audrey, discov- the United States often misunderstood ered their pillow talk was being tapped what was going on and in consequence by the Soviets when the bugged lighting misperformed.” fixture above their bed in ex- Top was born on Dec. 11, 1921 on ploded. 117th Street in , the son of Rus- Long before he became one of the sian Jewish immigrant parents, Anna and great editors in the history of The New Joseph Topolsky. The family legally York Times, he had become a war corre- changed its name to Topping when Top spondent in the classic mold, on the scene, was in high school. no matter how remote or dangerous, pro- Top knew he wanted to be a journalist viding eyewitness accounts. from the time he was the 16-year-old edi- Through more than a half century of tor of his school newspaper at Evander journalism both as a correspondent and Childs in . editor, Top was to cover nearly every Obviously a precocious youth, he didn’t major event that shaped post-World War want to be just another city room general II history. That included the Chinese civil The Silurians 2013 Lifetime Achievement Winner assignment hack, he wanted to be a for- war, French Indochina War, , SEYMOUR TOPPING Continued on Page 6 Four Minutes in Dallas BY MICKEY CARROLL Impulsively, you could almost say acciden- t 11:17 a.m. on Nov. 24, 1963, tally, Ruby had murdered the assassin. In four Jack Ruby was in a Western minutes, he had stepped across the street and AUnion office, waiting patiently to send been transformed from a placid Western Union a money order to Little Lynn, a strip-tease customer into a character in the story of the dancer in his club. assassination of a President. Across the street in Dallas police headquar- And ever since, the world has suffered un- ters, WNEW reporter Ike Pappas and I had der a torrent of “conspiracy” stories. Ruby gone up to the fifth floor to shout a few words had “silenced” the assassin, it was said. The at Lee Harvey Oswald as the police led him to shooting was the final step in a plot by the the elevator. We knew the elevator was mafia, the Russians, the Cubans, homosexu- creaky and slow and we could run down to the als, Lyndon Johnson – pick your villain. For basement before it got there. 50 years, you’ve read that sort of thing. The basement garage had been emptied It’s all nonsense. The Warren Commission except for the car that was to take Oswald to report on the assassination — 488 ponderous the County Jail. I stepped back against the pages – has all the facts. But it’s so ineptly wall as Oswald and his police guards walked put together, so badly written, so lacking any by. Ike held out his microphone and said, “Lee, sort of narrative thread that polls show that do you have anything to say … ?” most Americans still believe some sort of con- When Ike played his tape for me later dur- spiracy story. ing Ruby’s murder trial, the next thing you heard Assigned at the Trib to keep an eye on this was an innocent “pop” –- the sound of Ruby’s stuff – and later called on to work at The Times gun — then Oswald’s groan. on a reassessment that found the Warren Com- Later, it was determined that the time was mission was right – I had fumed for years over The cover of Mickey Carroll’s book, “Accidental Assassin,” showing 11:21. Continued on Page 3 the moment that Jack Ruby shoots Lee Harvey Oswald. PAGE 2 SILURIAN NEWS NOVEMBER 2013 Learning Journalism Since the Age of 8 BY HERBERT HADAD outsize characters like any Silurians know Mort David Dubinsky of the Sheinman as the energetic, ILGWU; Abe Schrader, M congenial and slightly raff- who when asked if he was ish former president of our Society and a millionaire (when that as its membership chairman. Fewer are word still meant some- aware of his stellar career in New York thing), answered with a journalism for over half a century. shrug, ‘A poor one. Two . Let Mort, now 80, tell you himself of . three’; David Schwartz, his introduction to newspapers and his first whose mouth regularly lesson in our trade: spewed obscenities, but “I’ve been hooked on newspapers whose company (Jonathan since I was a boy. Got my first journalism Logan) became the first lesson on Dec. 7, 1941, when I was 8. A garment firm on the New kid I knew told me we were at war, that York Stock Exchange, some place named Pearl Harbor was and, more important as far bombed. I went upstairs to our apartment as I was concerned, who in the East Bronx. My parents were always came to the phone; huddled around the telephone, talking to and Fred Pomerantz, the relatives. I opened a copy of the Sunday founder of Leslie Fay, News on the foyer floor and began turn- whose formal education ing pages. My father asked what I was ended when he was a doing. I said, ‘Trying to find news about young teenager, but who the war and Pearl Harbor.’ He explained got his name on a building to me that if it happened today, it won’t at Brandeis and at the be in the paper until tomorrow. Aha! Fashion Institute of Tech- Today’s paper has yesterday’s news. nology and who rode Among the celebrities Mort Sheinman interviewed for Women’s Wear Daily was Sid Caesar. Good to know. My father should only know how times have changed.” (Herblock) Block, freelance travel writer, Mort had his ad- In junior high school, Mort learned Peter Max, ventures. He wrote the copy and provided another important lesson. His class Yousuf Karsh and the photographs for a 13-day trek in Nepal; started a mimeographed newspaper. His David Douglas an 11-day camel trek across the Sahara; first article was called “Why I Am a Yan- Duncan; and a volcano climbing in Hawaii; hiking through kee Fan.” His friend Marvin was a rabid miscellany of three mountain ranges in Spain as well as New York Giants fan and wanted des- characters that in- the Vale of Kashmir; putt-putting around perately to write about that. Someone else cluded John Lind- Southeast Alaska on a reconverted fire- had already been chosen, so Marvin — say while he was boat; reporting on two international moun- who was also desperate to get a byline mayor; Ramsey taineering camps in the former Soviet — wrote “Why I Am a Dodger Fan.” Clark and Roy Union, one in the Pamir Mountains, home “That’s when I learned not to trust ev- Cohn; Margaret to the nation’s two highest hills, Peak erything I read in a newspaper,” Mort Mead and Marga- Lenin and Peak Communism, the other in said. ret Truman; the Caucasus (home to Mount Elbrus, the He wrote for newspapers in high Marques Haynes highest peak in Europe). school, and the school paper was the cen- of the Harlem Upon retirement Mort taught an “In- ter of his extracurricular life when he was Globetrotters, af- troduction to Journalism” class at F.I.T.; at CCNY. His first editor was Marvin ter he went to contributed articles to a revised edition Kalb. In December 1956, after two years work at his of The Encyclopaedia Judaica; wrote a in the Army, Mort found work at The sister’s knitwear monthly newsletter for the Flatiron/23rd Daily News, first as a copy boy, then as a business on Sev- Street Partnership that included feature “tabulator” in the sports department, enth Avenue, and stories about the neighborhood; and con- where “I excelled at compiling box Leo Durocher; tinues to do freelance book editing and scores.” The hours were terrible, so was Chris Bonington, a write advance obits for Women’s Wear the pay, he said, and his newspaper des- British explorer Daily. tiny awaited elsewhere. “I left the News and Mount Oh, yes, his Silurian service. He be- and took a job at a trade magazine by the Everest climber, came a member in 2003 and joined the mellifluous moniker of Hosiery & Under- and Phillipe Petit, board in 2005. He lives across Gramercy wear Review,’’ he said. ‘’It was one of the “man on wire” Park from the Players Club. “I think that’s those publications that ran puff pieces who walked be- the primary reason I was asked to be on about its advertisers. It also introduced tween the Twin the board,” he said. me to Women’s Wear Daily, a trade news- Towers. He served as president from 2008 to 2010: Mort Sheinman on the Rio Grande Bridge in New Mexico paper that had an impenetrable wall be- during a photography workshop. The photograph was taken by “Perhaps the 2010, treasurer from 2010 until this year, tween advertising and editorial. Louis Harvey Stein, the workshop’s instructor. strangest inter- and has continued in the demanding task Fairchild, the publisher, backed up his re- view was with of membership chairman since 2005. Joe porters. Later, so did his son John.” around town in a maroon Rolls-Royce that two Japanese men named Mitsuo Fuchida Vecchione, Web editor for the Silurians And there his professional career be- was ‘a gift’ from his own employees.” and Minoru Genda — the lead pilot on the and a former sports editor of The New gan in earnest. He planned to stay at Eventually, Mort became an editor raid on Pearl Harbor, and the man who York Times, summed up Mort’s contribu- WWD for two years. “My interest in and then managing editor, overseeing the conceived the attack strategy. They had tions thusly: “He’s the glue.” Linda women’s fashion was nil, but it looked like editorial department in New York as well come to New York to help promote the Amster, the Silurians secretary and a a fun place to work,’’ he said. ‘’The as the bureaus here and abroad and was movie ‘Tora! Tora! Tora!’ and when I in- former New York Times research direc- newsroom was right out of ‘The Front an author of “The WWD Style Book,” a terviewed them, I found out that there is tor, added: “He’s shy. He doesn’t use up Page’ – noisy, raffish, raucous, cluttered, manual of style and usage that set writ- no phrase in Japanese meaning ‘sneak all the oxygen when he enters a room.” all beneath a fog of cigarette smoke and ing guidelines for the paper. He also wrote attack.’” Mort did depart from his modest mien. punctuated by the clacking of typewrit- most of the heads for page one stories, Asked who were the most impressive He is proud of his entry into the City Col- ers, the chatter of telegraph machines and, line edited key articles and mentored a celebrities he encountered, he said he liked lege Communications Alumni Hall of of course, the jangling of telephones. I lot of the youngsters who came to work Alistair Coke and Zero Mostel, who would Fame. The initial inductees included such loved it and wound up staying for 40 there. seem to come from separate planets, and journalistic giants as A.M. Rosenthal, Carl years.” “But — and this is key — I never the least impressive was Margaret Mead. Spielvogel, Dan Schorr, Marvin Kalb, Ben He said he stayed primarily because stopped writing,’’ he said. “My specialty “Very full of herself; also a sexist,” he said. Grauer, Mike Oreskes, Arthur Gelb and shortly after he was hired, the paper ex- was the one-on-one interview and I had When Howard Kissel, chief movie and A.H. Raskin. panded the scope of its coverage way the opportunity to meet and write about theater critic, was recovering from an Mort was inducted in 2003, and said beyond the garment center. It covered the journalists and writers whose work I ad- automobile accident, Mort reviewed mov- he was happy to join fellow Silurians things that affect the fashion industry: mired (Alistair Cooke, William L. Shirer, ies. One of them was “Deep Throat,” then Clyde Haberman, Steve Shepard, Sandy changes in the culture, politics, sports, the Gay Talese, John McPhee, Tom Wolfe, considered the film to see “by the social- Socolow, Marvin Kitman, Selwyn Raab, arts, travel. For several years, he was a Clifton Daniel, Studs Terkel, Chet Hunt- ites who devoured our paper and wanted Ben Patrusky, Joe Berger, Jerry Eskenazi, reporter, covering all aspects of the busi- ley, Tom Wicker, Richard Condon, Rob- to act naughty.” Ralph Blumenthal, Stewart Kampel, Stan ness of Seventh Avenue. ert Ludlum); some of the legendary com- In addition to interviews and reviews, Brooks, and the late Maury Allen and Vic Mort described the people and the era: ics of the last century (George Burns, Sid he wrote a series of adventure travel Ziegel. “It was still a time when the garment in- Caesar, Phil Silvers, Zero Mostel); art- pieces for WWD and W magazine, and “You can understand how honored I dustry was peopled by a cast of colorful, ists such as Jules Feiffer, Herbert was W’s first managing editor. As a feel to be part of that group,” said Mort. NOVEMBER 2013 SILURIAN NEWS PAGE 3 A TV Rookie in Georgia BY TONY GUIDA man I have yet to meet. Harben was n the ornate conference room of tall and reed-thin with a sallow ob- Savannah’s City Hall, the Chatham long face. On his head sat a slab of ICounty Commission plowed through curiously inky black hair. His voice a crowded agenda. Zoning changes, was shrill, a thin nasal whine. Color easements, capital improvements; the was not yet widespread in TV pro- nickels and dimes of municipal gover- gramming and nonexistent in nance would produce no riveting head- Harben’s wardrobe. Every day he lines. It was going to be another slow wore a black suit, white shirt, black news day. Then a secretary burst into the tie and black shoes. His walk was a room. flurry of long strides that might have “The President…” her voice cracked. appeared purposeful except for his There were tears in her eyes. slouched shoulders and eyes that fo- “The President has been shot.” cused downward as if he was search- Seven Commissioners, a clerk, a ste- ing the ground for loose change. Not nographer and three reporters sat that he would have spent it if he found stunned. The President? Shot? any; Harben tossed dollars around like I ran to a phone in an outer office to DeSotos. call my boss. Friday, Nov. 22, 1963, was His worldview was equally the third week of my first job as a re- pinched. Harben spoke contemptu- porter for WSAV-TV Savannah. I had ously of every ethnic group. About no idea what to do next. blacks he didn’t speak at all; they Ralph Price knew. If he hadn’t be- were Invisible Men. WSAV was an come a news director Ralph would have affiliate of the NBC network. In made a fine sheriff. Lean as jerky and 1965, NBC made television history just as tough. Resolute as a bullet. There airing the drama “I Spy,” starring was steel beneath his skin. Robert Culp and Bill Cosby. It was “Meet me at Bull and Broughton. I’ll the first American TV program with be there in 20 minutes with the Auricon.” an African-American actor in a lead- The Auricon was the station’s only film ing role. Though “I Spy” was wildly camera capable of recording sound. It popular and Cosby won three con- was antiquated, cumbersome to operate secutive Emmy Awards, and often unreliable. We deployed it only Savannahians never saw it. No black for extraordinary events. The intersec- man was going to enjoy primetime, tion of Bull and Broughton Streets is or any other time, on Harben Daniel’s Savannah’s Times Square. We were go- TV station. ing to interview Savannahians about the The Civil Rights movement was assassination of John F. Kennedy. ablaze in many parts of the South in Like baseball’s instructional league, the early 1960’s, but its impassioned WSAV in the 1960’s was a place for TV cries for freedom echoed only faintly reporters to learn the game. No experi- on WSAV. Harben issued no direc- ence necessary. What was required was tive to avoid the issue, but his feel- a willingness to work six days a week for ings on the subject were clear. Our Dateline Savannah: Tony Guida, circa 1963, reporting the news at WSAV-TV. Georgia peanuts ($75 in my case). coverage, consequently, was spotty. In return, management dubbed you a Savannah had its share of protest There was precious little time to cover any- for me to leave the room. The straw hat reporter and suffered patiently the thou- marches, many led by a fiery minis- thing. WSAV’s principal news block, 7:00 to filed no charges and Ralph never spoke sand natural shocks that TV rookies are ter named Hosea Williams (later to 7:30 Monday through Saturday evenings, was, of the incident again. Harben threatened heir to; you could commit every gaffe join Martin Luther King’s inner like Gaul, divided into three parts. Bowing to to fire Ralph. Instead, he docked him short of dropping your pants on camera circle). Some we covered, some we Savannah’s reliance on tourism, the half hour three days pay. without losing the job. did not. Savannah’s public facilities opened with a weather report. “Captain I never imagined my WSAV years WSAV was owned by a wealthy were fully desegregated late in 1963. Sandy’s Weather,” resembled a children’s would be grist for the national television émigré from Nashville. He paid cash for The first black man graduated from puppet show. Its cast included “Wilbur the mill. But Tom Snyder did. Snyder’s ca- the station, buying a rung high on Armstrong State University in 1964. Weather Bird,” “Calamity Clam” and “Sandy” reer had also begun at WSAV. In 1979, Savannah’s social ladder in the bargain. I have no recollection that we cov- decked out as a yachtsman. “Dateline Sa- NBC named me news anchor of the To- Harben Daniel was his name. A stranger ered either story. vannah,” the newscast, came next, followed day show. At the time Snyder was host by “Candid Opinion,” the news director’s in- of the network’s Tomorrow program. He terview with a guest. Deducting commercial called me. time, each segment lasted roughly eight min- “Come on the show tonight. We’ll pro- Four Minutes in Dallas utes. mote your new gig and have some laughs Continued from Page 1 stay out of news stories, I’m repeat- Constrained by time and handicapped with talking about Harben.” the way the myth overpowered the real- ing it for you. just one balky sound camera, the newscast You couldn’t miss with anecdotes ity. Even after Gerald Posner’s nicely But let me tell you, my fellow re- consisted mostly of spot stories – house fires, about Harben. done book “Case Closed” took each of porters, the embarrassing aftermath. car crashes, boating accidents and the like. A couple of months into my employ- the conspiracy claims and methodically Months earlier, when I was an edi- Events illustrated on silent film or with ment, I told Tom, Harben summoned me demolished them, the stuff still wouldn’t tor, a submarine sank off Nantucket Polaroids. No investigations. No exposés. to his office. die. Then came 9-11, a much more com- and Buddy assigned a brilliantly pro- There was little danger that “Dateline Savan- “Toneee,” he squealed, “we been plicated event, followed by a report that fessional package – the crew, the nah” would sweep the Peabody Awards. overpayin’ y’all.” told, neatly yet compellingly, what had hap- scene, past sinkings, the whole she- The crowd that gathered around our cam- I didn’t see how that was possible at pened. bang. And then, at the 9 o’clock dead- era that fateful Friday afternoon was eager to $75 dollars a week. It could be done. The contract be- line, we realized he’d assigned every- comment on the events in Dallas. Ralph was “I been lookin’ at the books,” Harben tween the two reports was startling. So thing but a lead story. We scrambled operating the Auricon; I was asking the ques- continued, “and, sure enough, we made I wrote a book – for my kids and news to fix it. tions. One well-dressed man wearing a straw this here mistake. Now son, I’m gonna people like my friends in the Silurians – It was déjà vu all over again that hat and holding an attaché began a venomous have to ask you for that money back.” to tell the assassination story simply, to Sunday. They had my eyewitness assault on Kennedy. Instantly, Ralph was out Harben was not smiling. He rarely clarify the historical record. If you’re in- story, Bob Bird’s piece on Ruby, some from behind the camera. He grabbed the man’s smiled, especially when the subject was terested in reading it, it’s self-published other stuff, a nice package. lapels, pulled him thisclose and seethed, “You money. by Xlibris. The title is “Accidental As- And – suddenly they realized – no ignorant Cracker son of a bitch.” He curled his “How much are we talking about, sassin: Jack Ruby and 4 minutes in overall story. right hand into a fist, hesitated, then tossed the Harben?” Dallas.” To keep the narrative moving, Fred Shapiro was on rewrite and, man aside like a tissue. “Eighteen cents.” it’s a bit of a memoir. But essentially, he told me when I got back to New “Let’s go,” he growled. “Eighteen cents! You’re kidding me.” it’s about the events, not about me. York the next week, Buddy had As we drove to the station I wondered what “I’d be lyin’ if I said I was.” After Ruby shot Oswald, I called handed him my copy and said, “Quick, fires were banked in this taciturn man. Ralph I pulled a quarter from my pocket and Buddy Weiss, the Trib’s metro editor, and turn this into a lead.” offered no clues. I didn’t ask for any. In his handed it to him. Harben began fumbling he said, “Give me an eyewitness story.” A good pro, Freddie did what he office Ralph lit a cigarette. Smoke clouds for change. And I argued, “Buddy what matters is could. But there was a Page One floated toward the ceiling. “Not to worry, Harben,” I said. “Keep it.” what happened, not that I happened to be lead with “I” all over it. “Puerile,” “Never,” Ralph said, finally breaking the As I left the stage, Snyder’s next guest, there.” But he insisted and, trying to keep someone wrote in a letter-to-the-edi- silence. “Never lose control like that. It’s Tom Wolfe said, “Amazing story.” the “I” to a minimum, I did the assign- tor criticism, and I have to agree. unprofessional.” His tone suggested he didn’t believe it. ment. Now, still believing that “I” should You could look it up. He stubbed out the cigarette and motioned Snyder and I smiled. PAGE 4 SILURIAN NEWS NOVEMBER 2013 Recollections Linda Ellerbee, Of Watergate Forever Young And Germany At Heart Linda Ellerbee delivered an iconoclas- The editor at The Washington Post who tic, free-ranging talk about TV news, her worked most closely with Woodward and rollicking career in general, and how she Bernstein on their Watergate series, the became a major figure in the industry in now-84-year-old Harry Rosenfeld, was “43 years of committing journalism for a a dramatic and informative opening living.” speaker at the Silurians’ new season. Speaking at the Oct. 15 luncheon at He had resisted writing about the Players Club, and wearing faded jeans Watergate for decades, he said, until faced and sneakers, Ellerbee passionately spoke what he described as “a looming dead- of the importance of imparting news to line.” He was 80 when he decided to write Mort Sheinman youngsters. She has done this as the long- Mort Sheinman his memoir, “From Kristallnacht to Harry Rosenfeld spoke to the Silurians on time host of “Nick News With Linda Linda Ellerbee at the Oct. 15 luncheon. Sept. 19. Watergate: A Memoir of a Newspaper- Ellerbee” on the Nickelodeon network, fired, she said, when she inadvertently sent man.” Mr. Rosenfeld was the metropoli- Could it be done today? he was asked. targeting pre-teens. a letter about her bosses over the tan editor at the Post during Watergate He reflected only for a moment. He said “Innocence today is sort of impossible,” newswire). and he later became the editor of The that now “the challenges are magnified,” she said, and “what they know is going to That brought her some notoriety, Times-Union of Albany. because there are so many different ways be immensely important. We respect though, and a series of high-profile televi- In an emotional retelling of his coming that news gets out - and gets out so quickly. them. We don’t talk down to them. We sion network jobs, including anchor roles to America from Nazi Germany at age 9, But, he added, “content is always more tell them the story of nations—not how at CBS, NBC and ABC. he explained how the impact of what he important than format.” crayons are made.” She also survived breast cancer, wrote and his family had gone through played a He pointed out that the various portals The show has captured 10 Emmys, and the best-selling “And So It Goes” and role in how he directed much of the in reporting the news have cut back on tackles serious children’s issues such as raised two children while going through Watergate reporting. “A free press has to editors, that “layers of second-guessing being the child of an alcoholic parent. But two marriages. She remains restless, and hold to account the accountable,” he told have evaporated.” But what about 10 as serious as the subjects often are, says she still is after “a nation of rowdy the full house at the Players Club on Sept. years from now, he was asked. Will there Ellerbee is able to laugh at herself and citizens who know something.” 19. He was proud that the three branches still be newspapers? her improbable path. The 69-year-old from Allan Dodds Frank, the Silurians presi- of government were “goaded into action” “Of course there will be,” he said Houston said she was a college dropout, dent who has known her for her entire because of the thorough and accurate firmly. and talked her way into a job with The career, called her “the Edward R. Murrow reports that the Post kept coming up with. - Gerald Eskenazi (from where she was for children.” - Gerald Eskenazi

Society of the Silurians The Art of One-Upsmanship, à la Koch Officers 2013-2014 President BY STEVEN MARCUS Alcatraz, which did not allow prisoners to never got out. He died in jail.” ALLAN DODDS FRANK First Vice-President he many obituaries and reminis- keep birds or any other pets. Capeman My triumph lasted perhaps two sec- BETSY ASHTON cences of Edward I. Koch, New was Salvador Agron, who in 1959, when onds, if that. Second Vice-President TYork’s 105th mayor, did a fine he was 16, stabbed to death two teenag- Koch gave one of his patented, theat- JOE VECCHIONE job of summing up his outsized personality, ers he had mistaken for members of a ri- rical shrugs, shoulders hunched up nearly Treasurer his triumphs and disappointments, and his val gang. Agron, who wore a black cape to his ears, arms spread wide. “So?” he KAREN BEDROSIAN- abiding love of the city. But one aspect of with a red lining during gang fights, was said. “If he had lived, he would have RICHARDSON Secretary his personality seems to have been over- sentenced to die in the electric chair. gotten out. Eventually, they all get out.” LINDA AMSTER looked: his penchant for always having the (As a historical aside, “The Birdman of My colleagues in the press corps laughed; Board of Governors last word, no matter what the topic. Alcatraz,” a 1962 film starring Burt and, with a rueful smile, I joined in. IRA BERKOW That trait always galled me. As a New Lancaster, was nominated for several Touché, Mr. Mayor. JACK DEACY BILL DIEHL York Post reporter assigned to cover City Academy Awards and can still be seen GERALD ESKENAZI Hall during Koch’s first term in office, I occasionally on cable TV. “The Capeman,” RICKI FULMAN TONY GUIDA had suffered the embarrassment of occa- a musical co-written by Paul Simon, opened New Members LINDA GOETZ HOLMES sionally being one-upped by him during his on Broadway in 1998, got poor reviews Elizabeth (Libby) Bassett, reporter, photographer, BERNARD KIRSCH almost daily give-and-takes with the City and closed after 68 performances.) broadcaster who became the first woman overnight ENID NEMY Hall press corps. The most embarrassing I had a hunch about the two murderers, city editor at the AP and reported from Africa for the BEN PATRUSKY AP, ABC Radio and ABC-TV, Newsday, Newsweek, and ANNE ROIPHE MORT SHEINMAN incident occurred when he was the guest so at the end of the day I went back to the the Voice of America before working for environmental, on a Sunday morning TV news show and Post to do some research. A call to the economic development and human rights organizations. Governors Emeritus I was one of the panelists. I asked whether paper’s morgue produced several thick GARY PAUL GATES Sharon Gamsin, former president of the Financial Writ- HERBERT HADAD his proposal to help balance his budget by packages of clips on Birdman and ers’ Association and reporter for the Journal of Com- ROBERT McFADDEN raising fees for a variety of city permits, Capeman. In just a few minutes, I found merce, The Trib, the Oil Daily and Petroleum Informa- including the tennis permit, would really be the information I was looking for. tion International. Later head of the press office of the Committee Chairpersons New York Stock Exchange. Advisory effective. “You don’t like it because you A couple of days later, Koch held an- MYRON KANDEL Mort Gordon, former reporter and editor at Fairchild play tennis,” he said. “That has nothing to other news conference at City Hall. I Dinner do with it.” I sputtered, but it was obvious waited patiently until the conference was Publications. BILL DIEHL I had lost the argument. about to end, and then raised my hand. Robert Grossman, freelance illustrator and cartoonist Legal So I vowed to find a way to get even. “Mr. Mayor,” I said after he acknowl- since 1961 whose pictures have appeared on more KEN FISHER than 500 magazine covers and publications. His earliest My opportunity came some time later, edged me with a nod, “I’d like to follow Membership comic strips featured Captain Melanin, one of the first MORT SHEINMAN when the mayor, at a news conference in up on an issue you raised at your last news black superheroes, and Richard M. Nightcrawler, an in- Nominating City Hall’s Blue Room, returned to a conference – your assertion that even sect with henchmen named Haldebug and Ehrlichbug. BEN PATRUSKY variation of one of the themes of his first criminals convicted of murder eventually Les Guthman, TV producer and writer, award-winning Silurian Contingency Fund Trustees mayoral election: cracking down on get out of jail.” He nodded again, so I film producer, focusing on expedition, environmental LARRY FRIEDMAN, CHAIR crime. This time, Koch, who favored the and adventure documentaries. NAT BRANDT proceeded. JOY COOK death penalty in certain cases, inveighed To be sure I was on firm ground, I Magee Hickey, a television news reporter on virtually MARK LIEBERMAN against the fact that criminals who had began by saying, “Mr. Mayor you referred all of the local channels since 1983. MARTIN J. STEADMAN been convicted of murder and other seri- at one point to “Birdman” and at another Silurian News Mitchel Levitas, who has been with The New York BERNARD KIRSCH, EDITOR ous crimes eventually got out of jail, even point to “Capeman.” Were you using those Times since 1965. He has served in a variety of roles, if they had been given life sentences. names interchangeably, or were you were including metro editor, book review editor, op-ed page “Eventually, they all get out,” he said, put- referring to both men?” editor, and editorial director of the Times’s book devel- opment program. He is now an executive associate in ting heavy emphasis on “all.” “Both.” that program. In Memoriam As examples, he cited “Birdman” and I have him, I thought. Martin Arnold, 84, former New York “Capeman.” He did not elaborate, but the “Mr. Mayor, it’s true that Capeman Times reporter, died in June. references to two of the more notorious did get out of jail. But it was only after he Society of the Silurians Warren Berry, 79, former Newsday criminals of the 20th century were obvi- had served 20 years and after his death editor, in June. ous: Birdman was Robert Franklin Stroud, sentence had been commuted to life in PO Box 1195 Madison Square Station Bruce Dunning, 73, former CBS News a brutal murderer called “the Birdman of prison by Governor Rockefeller, follow- foreign correspondent, in August. Alcatraz” because he raised and kept birds New York, NY 10159 ing a plea for clemency from Eleanor Marilyn Annan, 80, a former longtime while at Leavenworth federal penitentiary. Roosevelt and other prominent citizens. 212.532.0887 www.silurians.org librarian at The Times, in October. He was subsequently transferred to “As for the Birdman of Alacatraz, he NOVEMBER 2013 SILURIAN NEWS PAGE 5 Reflections on a 40-Year-Old Story BY ANNE ROIPHE spiritual contamination and they dressed in amden Connecticut, the early long skirts and would not look her in the seventies: I’m talking to the eye for fear of her witch powers. Hmother of two Barnard sisters It was a perfect story about the way it who had joined a religious cult and were was in America that year, a restless search- no longer speaking to their parents. The ing for meaning stirring the most appar- girls had already disappeared in Bolivia ently normal of homes, a determination to to a secret, address unknown, farming live deeper, truer, lives which required a commune the group owned and operated. kind of revolution, personal, hard to bear, The worship in this religious group included dangerous, and deadly serious. speaking in tongues, and a good deal of The mother offers to let me read a let- talk about Hell. The girls had said that ter written by her younger daughter to a they considered their parents in league male friend. The boy, on learning of the with the Devil, and they did not mean this family trouble, sent the letter to the mother, as a metaphor. The parents, an assistant hoping to help her understand what had high school principal and an engineer, were happened. The letter had been posted a considering hiring a deprogrammer. They few days before the girl had joined the were anxious and guilty and heartbroken. cult. I read the letter and saw that the I am assigned a story on the parents young woman had very clearly expressed and the cult by her discontent, her anxiety, her need for a Magazine. Yes, it was the early seven- firm and dependable world, her need for ties. The country was afire with rebel- a religion that would remove all the trou- lious children, with religious search, with bling questions she had. acid dropped at family movie night and This letter would be a major part of the runaways found dead of overdoses. article I would write. This letter was the Hamden was a quiet town, white clap- article. But it was private and was not mine board houses, neat gardens, bird feed- to publish. I said to the mother, “Your daugh- ers hanging from the lower branches of ter writes so well, shouldn’t we let every- large elms that shaded the yards and high one see how intelligent she is and what is steeples of local churches, speaking of happening to her.” “May I publish this let- dignity, control, order and New England ter?” I asked. My voice was quiet as if I restraint. were asking for another glass of ice tea. The New York Times itself had an edi- The mother said yes. I took the letter to a tor who was a prominent member of this copying place in town and returned it within intense Christian group that I couldn’t re- 20 minutes to the mother so she, still pos- ally describe because they refused to talk sessing the original, wouldn’t be quite so Anne Roiphe’s article, “Struggle Over Two Sisters,” about two young women to me for the story. But I could talk to the clearly aware that she had given it to me. who joined a religious cult, was published in the June 3, 1973 issue of The New parents. The mother offered me coffee, It was published in my story. York Times Magazine. Left below, photographs of the family that appeared in showed me photos of her daughters at bet- I knew, I knew very well, that I was the magazine. ter times, playing on swings, swimming at invading this girl’s privacy. I did not think one. Of course this moral command is im- posed to the fallout of the published word. the local pond, dressed for a prom, smiling this was moral journalism. I did think it possible to follow in a democracy. We need In time the writer of the letter escaped into the camera lens. She then told me that was journalism, maybe good journalism. I to protect our systems by exposing wrong- from the cult. She broke her arm on the the girls would not touch her for fear of thought I was responsible to my piece, doers, corruption, political and person mis- farm and the leaders would not let her go responsible to do what was deeds. If we could not do so we would soon to the hospital and her illusions were shat- ever necessary to aid in the be living under tyranny. Communism and tered and she came home and I met her discovery of what was tak- Fascism flourish by silencing the journalists some years later living on my block. She ing place in this chaotic and their many tales of darkness. Also when asked me, How could you publish my pri- world we all shared. I took facts, important or not, that might humiliate vate letter? I apologized. I was ashamed. seriously the importance of another person are repressed we are all left Still I might do it again, or something like telling the truth and this let- in the dark about the reality of our lives, our it. I don’t really believe in greater goods. ter was a fragment, albeit a secrets become shames and fear of shame They usually result in gulags or gag or- tiny one, of truth. becomes the Lord High Executioner, de- ders. And yet I do believe that just as it And here, before Janet stroying our hopes for a better world. takes a thousand ants to make a hill, so it Malcolm named it, was the But then again I have wondered over might take a thousand ruthless journalists ruthlessness of the journal- the years if I might have told the story of to find a small truth that will matter, the ist, justified or not accord- the two girls in a religious cult without vio- way one grain of sand matters to the hill ing to different loyalties. At lating their private communications. I and its community of constantly swarm- the time I thought the story know that I am not so innocent or pure as ing creatures. was my first obligation. Per- I would have once hoped or pretended to This tension between the value of tell- haps so, perhaps not. be. As if I were married to my story, I did ing all and the importance of privacy and In the Jewish tradition not betray my vows, even to spare dignity of real people stays with us and as one of the great sins is someone’s feelings when it might have journalists and writers we confront the Lashon hara. That means been possible. issue as we make our way across the bringing a blush to Like other professions with honor culture and through our lives. I have come someone’s face, embar- codes, sometimes things go wrong and to feel less sure of my answers and more rassing them in public. The instant and hard choices have to be made uncertain about the value of the piece I blush equals blood and blood and it isn’t always possible to attend to write as I get older. On the other hand I spilled marks a murder and both ethics and the demands of the story. have not and never will lose my faith in so it becomes a kind of sym- And most certainly it is not possible to avoid the worth of the writer’s effort to bring bolic murder to shame some- hurting subjects, bystanders, others ex- the hidden to the surface.

Members in the News IRA BERKOW has produced another pensation policies for Nazi victims. “Chal- tim,” the basis for compensation claims ing for journalists and served as its ex- book, his second this year and 21st over- lenging Wiedergutmachung, The Slave in the 1950’s. In the late 1990’s, Ameri- ecutive director for 25 years. Upon retir- all. “Autumns in the Garden, The Coach Labor Negotiation of 1998-2001” was pub- can class-action lawyers, Eastern Euro- ing in September, he was accorded the of Camelot & Other Knicks Stories” (Tri- lished with the Institute for International pean countries and victims organizations title of Director Emeritus and continues umph Books, $14.95), is a collection of Relations in Prague, a think tank associ- challenged these definitions and de- to serve CASW in a consulting role. The columns and articles about Manhattan’s ated with the Czech foreign ministry, and manded a new, more just accounting. The first Patrusky lecture, on Nov. 3, was basketball team. It is the third in a se- is based on Mink´s reporting for Aufbau, a book explains the issue in a wider con- delivered by Harvard University chemist ries of similar books about the Yankees, journal founded by German-Jewish refu- text and also traces the evolution of George M. Whitesides, a celebrated and “Summers in the Bronx,” and the Mets, gees in 1934. It contains interviews with Wiedergutmachung to the present. prolific scientist and winner of dozens of “Summers at Shea.” Can winter be far key participants of the negotiations, inter- prestigious science prizes, including the behind? And if you have not determined nal documents, and pertinent literature, BEN PATRUSKY has been honored by the U.S. National Medal of Science and the who the coach of Camelot was, his which, until now, was almost completely nonprofit Council for the Advancement of Kyoto Prize for Advanced Technology. Knick-name was Red. in German. The book explains how Science Writing, which has established a Dr. Whitesides’ audience included the “Wiedergutmachung,” the technical term lectureship honoring him. Patrusky, a 300 to 400 science writers who gathered ANDREAS MINK has published a short, for reparations in German, created a rather science writer, for 30 years organized the at the University of Florida in Gainesville English language book on German com- artificial, unhistoric definition of “Nazi vic- council’s New Horizons in Science brief- for the 51st annual New Horizons. PAGE 6 SILURIAN NEWS NOVEMBER 2013 For Seymour Topping, the Beat Goes On

Continued from Page 1 eign correspondent, and he even knew where - China. He had been inspired by Edgar Snow’s “Red Star Over China,” the book that brought the beginning of the Chinese Communist move- ment to world attention. Snow had briefly attended the University of Missouri’s School of Journalism prior to his years of reporting in China, and the school had been the breeding ground for some other correspondents then working in Asia. So that’s where Top went, though his time there was cut short when his ROTC class was called up for duty sev- eral months before graduation in 1943. (He had completed his credits and eventually re- ceived his degree in the mail). By 1946, Top had served for three years as an Army infantry officer and was in the Philippines, and while most of his fellow officers were re- turning home, Top began po- sitioning himself for the ca- reer in Asia he had dreamt of. The New York Times In , he fell in with November 1964: Traveling by jeep through the Cambodian jungle, Seymour Topping, then the chief Southeast Asia correspondent some journalists, and soon he for The Times, paused for an interview with local militiamen. His wife, Audrey Ronning Topping, took this picture. had a stringer’s gig for the International News Service in Peking and INS for the Associated Press. In Nanking woman who would become his wife, the breed,” it reported, “the well–rounded, shortly found himself covering the brutal in 1949, he scored a world beat in report- mother of their five daughters and, as an fully-packed newsman who is also an able war in North China and Manchuria be- ing the fall of the city to the People’s Lib- accomplished photojournalist and author, administrator.” tween the armies of Chiang Kai-shek’s eration Army and the departure of Chiang his career-long professional partner. Fully packed? His triumphs had in- Nationalists and Mao Tse-tung’s Commu- Kai-shek, headed for Taiwan. Audrey Ronning was the daughter of cluded everything from breaking the story nists. As important as that was for a young the Canadian diplomat and China special- of the onset of the Chinese Cultural Revo- The next year he transferred to correspondent, he notched a more lasting ist Chester Ronning, and she was attend- lution in 1966 to having introduced Gra- Nanking, the Nationalist capital, and left bond in Nanking, meeting the beguiling ing Nanking University. She was also an ham Greene to opium in a back alley anchor at the U.S. Armed Forces Radio fumerie in Hanoi in 1951. Station when a meeting at a dinner party He also left his mark on foreign corre- at the American military officers’ club – spondence as an editor. He restructured as emblematic an image of the budding the Foreign Desk (redubbed last month of a wartime romance imaginable – lit the the International Desk in line with the glo- spark. The next morning, Audrey relates balization of The Times brand) and issued in her just published family memoir China a lengthy memorandum entitled “Foreign Mission, a coolie arrived with a rickshaw Desk Guidelines.” It preached moving the full of red roses and a scribbled note from report away from the daily official rheto- Top asking for a date. ric and political announcements in capi- During the decades following their 1949 tals towards the social, cultural, intellec- marriage in Canada, the Toppings can- tual, scientific and technological revolu- vassed the globe together on assignment. tions that were transforming societies The birthplaces of their daughters reflect around the world and directly affecting the peripatetic pace of their life together the way people of different backgrounds and the varied places where Top was as- and nationalities lived and interacted. signed – one born in Saigon, two in Lon- Those instructions endured and were still don, one in Berlin and one in Scarsdale, guiding our thinking when I became The N.Y., where the family has lived since Times’s Foreign Editor in 1983. 1966. In 1969, Top was promoted to Assis- In February 1950, Top had opened the tant Managing Editor and then, in 1977, AP bureau in Saigon for coverage of the to Managing Editor, the No. 2 position to French Indochina war, and after two years Abe Rosenthal, the Executive Editor. there, he went to London as diplomatic He was to spend 10 years in the job, at correspondent and then on to divided Ber- a critical time when The Times was be- lin in 1956 as bureau chief. coming a four-section paper and broad- In 1959, he returned to the United ening its news coverage to include ana- States and went to work for The Times. lytical and explanatory writing and sub- A year later, The Times sent him to Mos- jects once disparaged as too “soft” for cow as chief correspondent, where he the pages of the newspaper of record. reported on the first space shots, de- He worked in collaboration with Stalinization and the Cuban Missile Cri- Rosenthal and Rosenthal’s longtime con- sis. The Times sent him back to Asia in fidant, Arthur Gelb, the chief Assistant 1963 as chief correspondent for South- Managing Editor. Top had ended up with east Asia where, though based in Hong the job after a brutal public succession Kong, he spent most of his time covering battle at The Times involving Rosenthal, the wars in Indochina. Gelb, and two other notable Times men, With 20 years experience as a foreign James Reston and Anthony Lewis. correspondent, Top came back to New Here’s how Rosenthal himself remem- York in 1966 as The Times’s Foreign Edi- bered it, speaking in 2002 to Reston’s bi- Courtesy Carl Mydans personal collection tor. In the in-house publication Times ographer, John Stacks: “I passed over 1950: Topping, far right, traveled with a Foreign Legion convoy to the Vietnam- Talk’s account of his promotion, there was Arthur Gelb, a very close friend, because China frontier. He is at a French Army post with, from left, Wilson Fielder of a hint of what the paper had in mind for we were both emotional and excitable. I Time; a French officer; and Carl Mydans of Life. him. “Top is among the rare ones of our Continued on Page 7 NOVEMBER 2013 SILURIAN NEWS PAGE 7 An Easy Move From Journalist to Actor

BY MARVIN CHATINOVER ment. An audience preview showed a t may have been an almost natural desire for a tighter confrontation between outcome for a native Southern Cali- Plummer and Jack Nicholson, and so I Ifornian with a youthful penchant for was left out of the final version. I wrote public affairs and competitive speech and Mike that as a former journalist I under- debate activities to combine those skills stood the experience of having my into a career in both journalism and act- work cut. He sent me a nice note of ap- ing, but it took a while for that to happen. preciation. Luckily, I was only 50 when it did. I worked on the stage as well in the I attended Yale both before and after 80’s, in “God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater,” serving as a Naval hospital corpsman at “The Man in the Glass Booth” and “Isn’t the tail end of World War II. Following It Romantic,” among other productions. a master’s degree from the UCLA My lifelong practice of speed and Graduate School of Journalism, I was brevity was excellent training for TV and hired as a reporter by The Wall Street radio commercials and print advertising. Journal in New York. Because I had been Clientele ran the gamut from Federal in the Navy, I was assigned to cover the Express, Colgate, IBM and AT&T to shipping industry. Little did they know that Burger King and GEICO. There were most of my service took place at St. many industrial films, including a humor- Albans Naval Hospital in . ous short for Scott Paper. A full-page ad In addition to reporting, I indulged that for Automatic Data Processing made me latent itch for self-expression possibly the only ex-Wall Street Journal by performing in the annual Financial Fol- reporter to have his photograph printed lies spoof of business and government big- in the paper. wigs put on by the New York Financial In 1983, Marvin Chatinover was a glandular diagnosis doctor TV appearances ranged from golden Writers’ Association. It was a collegial in the Woody Allen film “Zelig.” oldies such as “All My Children” and group in which I developed many long- “The Guiding Light” to “Law & Order” term relationships with fellow news trist in “New York Stories.” I also By now I had left corporate life, though and “Late Night With Conan O’Brien.” people. attended to the medical needs of Elaine I continued to be a freelance writer But the culmination — and steadiest — My 22 years of performing in the Fol- Stritch and Elaine May in “Small Time throughout the 80’s and 90’s. I wrote an- of my thespian endeavors was playing Dr. lies stimulated a growing desire to take a Crooks.” I appeared in a number of nual reports and legislative testimony, and Jerome for four seasons of “Ed” on NBC. shot at professional acting. In the 1960’s, Woody’s movies, and ended up on the I edited the Investor Relations Newslet- It was a great gig and garnered heart- as assistant editor of Exchange Magazine cutting room floor in a couple of others. ter and later, The Corporate Value Strat- warming fan loyalty and contacts. The published by the New York Stock Ex- One I really regret, considering my egist. Acting gigs were too sporadic to fan base even paid for an ad in Variety to change, I did a broad survey of the finan- career as a financial journalist, was when depend on completely to make a living. plea for extending the show when plans cial aspects of the movie industry. An I played an editor talking at Elaine’s with Other motion picture work included were announced to close it. excellent source was Alan J. Pakula, Kenneth Branagh, who asked me how “The Flamingo Kid,” directed by Garry But I like to think my biggest fan is a college acquaintance who was a rising things were going. Marshall, and “Wolf,” by Mike Nichols. Miriam, my enduring spouse of 62 years, film director. When I told him about my “Great,” I said. “See my article in The latter, involving a scene with Chris- with whom I enjoy life in Great Neck — long-term objective, he advised me to build the April issue of Paris Review. I evis- topher Plummer, was another disappoint- less than 45 minutes from Broadway. personal financial strength and obtain pro- cerated Greenspan.” Alas, that scene, in fessional training. In the early 70’s, when the film “Celebrity,” was dropped in the I was head of a small public relations firm, final editing. I began taking Saturday acting classes But working with Woody was terrific. For Seymour Topping, the Beat Goes On given by the Academy of Dramatic Arts. He was very plain-spoken and nice to deal Continued from Page 6 , in recognition of the fact I continued this training when I joined with. In addition to his cinema talent, he chose Topping. There were things I was that at a time when increasing numbers of Moore McCormack as director of corpo- was a good financial manager. All his very good at, and things I wasn’t good at. our readers lived in the suburbs, our jour- rate relations, and I performed in Noel movies came in at or under budget. He Topping was very good. You didn’t fuck nalism there was not competitive. Coward’s “Hayfever” in summer stock. believed in having a few off-camera read- around with Topping. He did not invite Over drinks in his back office, I told I now had a merchandisable acting credit, ings and so when actual filming began, he arguments. There was a quality of orga- Abe that my real interest lay in becoming and the company agreed that I could take usually needed only three or four takes. nization that he had. I thought we would a writer at The Times, not in being a boss vacation days for any acting engagement, be a very good team.” again, and I emerged from the conversa- unless my corporate presence was abso- TV & Film Credits In 1987, Top became editorial director tion confident that I had explained my rea- lutely required. I also took training in TV of the Times’s 32 regional papers, and in soning so respectfully and sympathetically and radio commercials and found that 2008 The Naked Brothers Band 1992 he retired from the paper to become (TV Series) 2008 that Abe would understand. such work was plentiful and remunera- Grandpa Pillot, in The Bar Mitzvah administrator of the Pulitzer Prizes at Co- The next morning, one senior editor tive. And my communications background lumbia University’s School of Journalism. passed by my desk and muttered under had honed my skill at speed, clarity and The Knights of Prosperity During his nine years as administrator, he his breath, “What you did last night is very concision. (TV Series) (2007) also originated and taught a course on “Cov- grave.” Another came up to me and said, I was then able to acquire member- Walter Floyd - Operation: Romanocorp ering Regional and Ethnic Conflict.” In “You told the Executive Editor to go fuck ship in the American Federation of Tele- 1992-93, he served as president of the himself, and no one can do that and still vision and Radio Artists and once I had 2000-2004 Ed (TV Series) American Society of Newspaper Editors. work here.” an actual AFTRA job, I could acquire the Dr. Walter R. Jerome For those of us who worked for Top, I was to learn later that after I had coveted Screen Actors Guild affiliation. in 16 Episodes his great value was in bringing calm and left his office, Abe had summoned the If I could then obtain Guild work, I could discipline to the creative but combustible masthead editors and, in a red-faced join Actor’s Equity. To meet that chal- Small Time Crooks (Film) (2000) mixture that was Rosenthal and Gelb. Ge- Dr. Henske rant, told them of my turning down the lenge I joined a group that convinced cast- niuses that they were, they were also, as job and said he was now questioning ing agents to listen to short monologues Deconstructing Harry (Film) (1997) Abe acknowledged, volatile, and the rest whether I was “Times material” after from would-be thespians. One gig on a Professor Cole of us sometimes needed protection to avoid all. He then ordered them not to speak daytime soap opera would enable me to becoming collateral damage. to me, saying that the only way I could buy a SAG card. I was able to acquire all Law & Order (TV Series) Lots of us have Topping-to-the-rescue save my Times career would be if I ad- my acting-union cards just before my 50th Housing Judge - The Torrents of Greed: stories, and here’s mine. Though I was to mitted my error myself and asked for the birthday, and the time had come to move Part 2 (1991) become a great admirer and close friend job I had rejected. more aggressively. of Abe, my first professional encounter Well, this was the kind of moment Thanks to the late Albert da Silva, a New York Stories (Film) (1989) with him was almost my last. I had joined where the only person in high places we noted theatrical lawyer who had Neil Psychiatrist The Times in 1976 after having been the underlings could count on was Top. (segment “Oedipus Wrecks”) Simon and Larry Gelbart among his cli- City Editor of The New York Post, and Characteristically, he disobeyed the or- ents, I obtained a role in the 1979 movie The Flamingo Kid (Film) (1984) one of the reasons I had made the move der to shun me, took me aside to counsel “Boardwalk,” playing a judge who per- Dr. Gold (as Martin Chatinover) was to get out of managing and back into me that there was a “good Abe” and a formed a marriage ceremony involving writing. “bad Abe” and that I had inadvertently Janet Leigh and witnessed by acting sa- Zelig (Film) (1983) Abe had other ideas, and one evening stirred the latter. He advised me to apolo- vant Lee Strasberg. At last, a real flick. Glandular Diagnosis Doctor five weeks into my Times life, he called gize and take the job. I contacted Alan Pakula again and this me into his office to offer me the new job So, Top, in addition to offering up my time he cast me in “Rollover,” with Jane Rollover (Film) (1981) of Regional Editor. I was to be responsible congratulations on your richly deserved Fonda and Kris Kristofferson. His cast- Henry Lipscomb for several new suburban bureaus and award, let me add my personal thanks ing director was Juliet Taylor, who also more than a dozen correspondents who for enabling me to spend the 32 years worked for Woody Allen. Woody cast me Boardwalk (Film) (1979) would be newly assigned to the suburbs, following that conversation in a reward- Judge as a doctor in “Zelig” and as his psychia- all in a push ordered up by the Publisher, ing career at The New York Times. President’s Letter PAGE 8 SILURIAN NEWS NOVEMBER 2013 BY ALLAN DODDS FRANK he Society of Silurians is stron- ger than ever, thanks in large part Don’t Take Us Sportswriters Too Lightly Tto the Indefatigables: former Presidents Myron Kandel and Mort Sheinman, whose tireless efforts have helped propel the club’s membership and treasury to unparalleled heights. I must also praise the dedication of our Board of Governors and other members who have worked hard to reinvigorate the Silurian Awards and promote attendance for our terrific programs. For those who have not logged on recently to http:// www.silurians.org, I urge you to look at the greatly improved Web site that has been worked on by second vice-president Joe Vecchione and Fred Herzog, and to savor the souped-up Silurian News that Bernard Kirsch now expertly edits. First vice-president Betsy Ashton and Treasurer Karen Bedrosian Richardson have quickly grasped the intricacies of running the luncheons as smoothly as Mort previously did, while Bill Diehl gra- ciously has picked up Mort’s mantle as dinner chairman. Finally, if anyone ever starts a Fantasy League for Club Membership drives, make sure your top two picks are Myron and Mort. Together they have recruited the vast majority of our new members this year, bringing our total membership to nearly 300. Sadly, since June, four loyal Silurians have passed away. Treasurer Richardson has negotiated a new arrangement with the Players club, which despite its financial difficulties has done a good job of delivering delicious Gerald Eskenazi, who once covered the Jets for The New York Times, won over Joe Namath by telling him one of his lunches and professional service in the shortcomings: he didn’t know anything about pro football. dining room and at the bar. I am happy to say the new arrangement speeds up the BY GERALD ESKENAZI And another buddy, Bernie Kirsch, like quarterback of a team that had fallen into drink line by having wine poured in ad- t’s blasphemous, I know, but being Mike a one-time sports editor of the In- disrepair, and it had been half a dozen vance. While I regret having to institute a $5 price increase on the lunches, that a sportswriter is one of the hard- ternational Herald Tribune, used to cover years since his Super Bowl victory. What move was appropriate in light of the new Iest—if not the trickiest—jobs in skiing before he had any idea how to strap could I say to this jaded athlete? I fig- demands on the Silurians by the Players. journalism. one on, or could tell the difference be- ured, honestly is the best policy. The changes in economic conditions and Yes, the other folks at The New York tween a mogul and a schuss. “Hi, Joe,” I said, my first day of training our arrangement also mean that the Times used to call us the toy department. What our ignorance of sports such as camp, “my name’s Jerry Eskenazi. I’m Silurians Board has now approved a $10 But what I discovered during my 40-some- skiing, or auto-racing, or knowing the dif- going to be covering the Jets for The New surcharge for lunch for all those who thing years writing sports was that, when ference between squash tennis and York Times, and I don’t know anything show up without reservations. I wrote about an event that wasn’t strictly squash racquets (not to mention court ten- about football.” (It wasn’t entirely true, but Another major change for Silurians sports, it was an easier assignment. nis) did was make us better journalists — I did have to ask the Daily News beat guy lunches has been the move, also for eco- As surprising as it may seem to the for it forced us to ask questions. Even just what a tight end was.) nomic reasons, from the third Thursday non-sportswriter, we are not born with a simple, seemingly stupid questions. Joe laughed, and stuck out his hand. of the month to the third Tuesday. distinct knowledge of the difference The first two luncheon speakers in the I remember a table-tennis champion And for years afterward, whenever Joe fall season have been entertaining and il- among the foil, epee and sabre in fenc- rolling his eyes when I asked him how would see me, he’d introduce me to luminating. Former Washington Post/ ing. Nor did we grow up with the arcane many points it took to win a match—as if people by saying: “He was an honest Albany Times Union editor Harry language of figure-skating, appreciating any fool should know it. And I felt espe- sportswriter. He told me he didn’t un- Rosenfeld was our September speaker an Axel jump or a camel spin, and telling cially proud the next day when he told me derstand anything about football.” and gave us a fascinating glimpse into his a good one from a bad one. how much he enjoyed my story. I felt even Joe said that in a good way. But over life and his new book: “From Kristallnacht But beyond the expertise is this: you’ve better when a guy who owned a darts store the years, athletes who have been unhappy to Watergate: Memoirs of a Newspaper- got to write a darn good story as well, — you know the game with a “double- with the way they’ve been described by man.” incorporating adjectives and knowledge, top”—told me my story was the best darts sportswriters often complain that we never My favorite insights from Harry per- avoiding the clichés that infect much of story he had ever read. A wise-guy col- played the game—and thus couldn’t pos- tained to the handling of Watergate report- sports reporting, very often under a tight league of mine added, “Yeah, and prob- sibly be in a position to criticize them when ing by the Washington Post and his two deadline. charges as Metro Editor - Bob Woodward ably the only dart story he ever read.” they failed at something. I wonder if Van and Carl Bernstein. Harry pointed out that So The Times sent me to Palm Beach Along the way, my vocabulary was in- Cliburn felt that way about a negative mu- from the Watergate era rose a journalistic to cover polo. The Prince was playing and creased with the use of “dedans”—you sic review, or Nuryev complained about mantra about having “two sources,” a I had to write about it as if I knew what I know, an overhang in court tennis, a a critique of his dancing. belief that sprang from the early competi- was talking about and could convey the carryover from the days when tennis was My answer to athletes often was in a tiveness between Woodward and excitement and the aura of the sport. Now, played in the castle courtyard. By the way, positive light. I’d point out that, essentially, Bernstein - before they absolutely trusted this may be hard to believe, but in my little did you know that in paddle tennis, some- no one has ever played the game they each other – and each would come up shtetl hometown of East New York, Brook- one takes a tennis ball, sticks a hypoder- played since, in a country of 300 million with a different source for the same re- lyn, home to immigrants, pushcart peddlers, mic needle in it, and lets the air out until it people, only a few hundred could make it vealing new fact or development in the mom-and-pop stores and apartment bounces no higher than 31 inches when to the level that they had achieved. story. Harry says now that through “his houses, I never saw anyone playing polo dropped from a height of 6 feet? I found that most of them appreciated old man’s eyes” he realizes that what counts is: “the validity of the information, in a vacant lot. I’m showing off—these are some of the that comment. For they agreed with me. not on the number of sources.” Did you know that at half-time at a polo other sports I’ve covered during my in- The elite athlete is unique. And perhaps a Our second luncheon speaker was the match, everyone leaves the stands, walks triguing career. I came to each of them gymnast forgave me when I asked what television all-star Linda Ellerbee; I was onto the field amid the manure and clumps knowing nothing: the difference was between a front tuck lucky enough to have met her in 1972 of dirt, and smoothes things out? It’s called Gaelic football (you must not switch and a gainer. when I was the Juneau Alaska bureau divot stomping. Yes, those ladies in the hands while running with the ball), bull- I turned the tables once at a press con- chief for The Anchorage Daily News. floppy yellow hats and high heels pick up riding, Olympic wrestling, gymnastics, fig- ference for a big harness race, where While there were many high points in the divots kicked up by the horses and pat ure-skating, cricket, surfing, crew (pairs somehow the organizers had managed to Linda’s speech, my favorite was her rant them down, joined by their gentlemen with cox, and others!), indoor lacrosse, get that 1960’s sex symbol, Jayne about television reporters and anchors friends in blazers, who wipe their hands on diving (don’t make a big splash if you want Mansfield, to show up at the luncheon. She who idiotically ask people – often in tragic situations – how they feel instead of what their breast-pocket handkerchiefs. to score high). turned out to be quite clever and enjoying do they think. My great old friend, Mike Katz, prided But I also discovered that, in some of the banter about her image. Then I asked Honoring Seymour Topping by giving himself on never driving a car. It wasn’t these offbeat sports, the athletes and their her a sports question: him our Lifetime Achievement Award is merely that he didn’t have a license, he coaches will appreciate it if you put your- “Do you know the difference in har- one of the real privileges I have as the just didn’t know how to drive. So what self at their mercy, admitting you know little ness racing between a trotter and a pacer?” President of the Silurians. He is the origi- did The Times make him? He was the or nothing about the rules and just what it Without hesitation, she replied, “No. nal definition of indefatigable foreign cor- auto-racing writer, and a terrific one. He’d is they do. But as long as they do, isn’t that all that respondent. As always, I eagerly await be writing about down-shifting and draft- But I took a chance when it came to matters?” hearing him. Top is one of those rare ing and radial tires—in addition to the of- covering football, when the paper asked Ah, thanks, Jayne for that quote. And people whose “war stories” are always ten-bizarre lifestyles of the good ol’ boys me to become the Jets’ writer in 1975. Joe by the way, a trotter is diagonally gaited important … and always true. who did this sort of thing. Namath was still the nationally known while a pacer has a lateral gait.