MAY 2015

Published by The Society of The Silurians, Inc., an organizationof veteran New York City journalists founded in 1924

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Society of the Silurians

EXCELLENCE INJOURNALISM

AWARDS BANQUETThe Players Club

16 Gramercy Park SouthTuesday, May 19, 2015

Drinks: 6 p.m.Dinner: 7:15 p.m.

Meet Old Friends and Award Winners

(212) 532-0887Members and One Guest $100 each

Non-Members $120

Silurians Honor the Best Journalism of 2014

CLOSE UP AND PERSONAL Stephanie Keith of The Daily News snapped this picture at a protest rally at Barclays Centerfollowing the death of Eric Garner. It was awarded the top prize in the Feature Photography category.

Two dozen news organizations wonExcellence in Journalism Awardsfor 2014 in the most competitive

Silurians contest in recent years. Nosingle subject dominated the winning en-tries, although two breaking news stories– the shooting of two police officers inBrooklyn and a fatal building blast in EastHarlem – attracted a lot of coverage. Cor-porate approaches to pursuing profits inhealth care and the imperious behavior ofthe governors of New York and New Jer-sey also received well-merited scrutiny.

At the awards dinner on Tuesday, May19, at The Players, Silurians Medallionsand Merit Awards will be given to report-ers, editors, producers, columnists, edito-rial writers, photographers and bloggersfrom the tri-state area in 26 categories.

The contest, the first conducted by theSilurians totally online, was overseen byAwards Chair Carol Lawson. The judgesdevoted hours to reading, listening to andviewing the entries before convening atthe CUNY Graduate School of Journal-ism to make the final decisions.

Veteran newsman David Gonzalez ofThe New York Times received the PeterKihss Award, given annually to the re-porter whose work best reflects the in-tegrity and meticulousness of the late Mr.Kihss, in addition to emulating his quali-ties as a mentor to younger colleagues.

The Dennis Duggan Memorial Schol-arship Award, awarded annually to apromising student at the CUNY Gradu-ate School of Journalism, was won by ColeRosengren of the Class of 2015.

The winners are:

PRINT JOURNALISMBreaking News

Medallion Winner The New YorkTimes, for ”Two Officers Ambushed.”The Times team: Ben Mueller, Al Baker,J. David Goodman, Matt Flegenheimer,

Kim Barker, Ashley Southall, Jeffrey E.Singer, Nina Bernstein, Alan Blinder, Ri-chard Fausset, Sandra E. Garcia, EdnaIshayik, Thomas Kaplan, Sarah MaslinNir, William K. Rashbaum, KennethRosen, Marc Santora, Nate Schweber,Mosi Secret, Melody Simmons, VivianYee, Jack Begg

Despite minimal metro staffing and thelooming early Sunday deadline, the Timesreporters scrambled to reconstruct thecold-blooded executions of police offic-ers Wenjin Liu and Rafael Ramos in theirpatrol car in Brooklyn. The Times teamalso compiled a comprehensive portrait

Continued on Page 2

David Gonzalez of The New York Times, this year’sPeter Kihss Award winner, with a photo of Kihss.

Ralph Blumenthal

Kihss and Gonzalez: On the Same PageBY RALPH BLUMENTHAL

It was the 40th anniversary of the 1962 Cuban mis-sile crisis that very nearly plunged the world intoMutual Assured Destruction, and David Gonzalez,

Caribbean correspondent of The New York Times, wasin Havana as veterans of Camelot huddled with FidelCastro and other Cuban and Soviet adversaries of thecold war, sharing chilling lessons.

Gonzalez was quizzing Robert S. McNamara in ahotel room when the former defense secretary rose toleave, ostensibly to consult with JFK adviser TedSorenson. Gonzalez turned to his buddy, photographerAngel Franco, and whispered in mock panic: “Do youthink he found out that two Puerto Ricans from theSouth Bronx are doing the interview?”

Leave it to Gonzalez to flaunt his Nuyorican rootsevery chance he gets (although he’s looking more andmore these days like a sleeker Al Pacino). It’s no sur-prise, too, that his down-to-earth street reporting, at-mospheric photographs and journalistic generosity havewon Gonzalez, 57, and currently co-editor of TheTimes’s Lens Blog, this year’s Peter Kihss Award fromthe Society of the Silurians.

Kihss, who died in 1984 at 72 after nearly half acentury of pounding a typewriter at The AP, The Wash-ington Post, The New York World-Telegram, The NewYork Herald Tribune and The Times, was the quintes-sential master craftsman of the trade, a reporter’s re-

porter renowned for digging up facts, poring over thefine print in city reports and mentoring his juniors, andthe award is given in that spirit.

Actually early in Gonzalez’s career, the two crossedpaths, although Gonzalez didn’t realize it at the time.Fresh out of Yale, where he had disappointed his fa-ther by abandoning a pre-med track for psychology,he was working at the National Puerto Rican Forumas the No. 2 publicist (in a two-man office) whenKihss dropped by to pick up a report on the status ofPuerto Ricans nationwide. Gonzalez’s boss was in-credulous. “He came here, himself? Peter Kihss?”Gonzalez didn’t make as much of it and by the timeGonzalez reached 43d Street in 1990, Kihss was longgone. But he relishes the connection. And like Kihss,Gonzalez would find a way to nurture journalistic pos-terity.

“I grew up in the Rodney Dangerfield of boroughs,”Gonzalez likes to say – specifically Beck Street be-tween Longwood and Intervale in the South Bronx,the third and last child of Pedro and Lillian Gonzalez,teenage arrivals from Puerto Rico who met at a churchdance in East Harlem. When he was 7 the familymoved to a better neighborhood, 181st Street andMapes Avenue, near the Bronx Zoo.

“I grew up playing in the street,” he said. “Whenthe Bronx started burning, there were basements we

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President’s Report

PAGE 2 SILURIAN NEWS MAY 2015

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of the killer and illuminated the complextensions of an NYPD then at war withthe Mayor.

Merit Award Newsday for “DeadlyBlast”

When an East Harlem gas explosionflattened two buildings, killed four peopleand injured dozens more, Newsday’steam of 10 reporters produced a com-prehensive look at the tragedy and itscauses.

Feature NewsMedallion The New York Times,

“Baptism By Fire” by N.R. (Sonny)Kleinfield

Kleinfield crafts the story of a proba-tionary fireman’s first fire and his res-cue of a baby boy in a burning apart-ment into a beautifully written and re-searched epic narrative. Not only doeshe tell the story of fireman JordanSullivan and his unlikely path to the FireDepartment, but he gives us an intimatepicture of the men of Ladder 105, thefire they fought and the life and culture of

Cole Rosengren

In Duggan’s FootstepsCole Rosengren, an outstanding stu

dent at the CUNY GraduateSchool of Journalism, is this year’s

recipient of the Dennis Duggan Award.Cole, 28, has already amassed a wor-

thy pile of clips about the lives of ordi-nary New Yorkers. He has filed compel-ling stories from neighborhoods through-out the city, many focusing on the SouthBronx. This review from one of his first-semester professors: “He is smart, ana-lytical, and passionate about bringing pro-fessional journalism to the poorest areain New York City.”

And passion is what made DennisDuggan, a former Silurians president,such a special journalist.

One of Cole’s early stories coveredthe merger of two struggling Bronxchurches. Published by the Hunts PointExpress, it gives a glimpse into the livesof both pastors and congregants as it ex-plains the financial crisis that compelledthem to put aside doctrinal differences.

“By sharing pews and a pulpit,” Colewrote, “they hope to not only survive butalso thrive.”

A recent piece, published in the GothamGazette, describes the scramble for jobsat the Department of Sanitation, as hope-fuls at the African American BenevolentSociety Organization in Queens preparefor the employment exam – the first of-fered since 2007. At stake: 500 jobs. Num-ber of applicants citywide: 94,000.

One faculty member who cited Cole’swork describes him as “an insatiable policywonk” who “wants to tell the stories ofordinary people and how they are affected,pro and con, by the great machinery ofcity government.”

Cole has long been drawn to urban is-sues. As an undergraduate at EmersonCollege (where he was editor-in-chief ofGauge Magazine, the student culture pub-lication), he interned at The Weekly Dig.After graduation, he foundedRealcityOnline.com, a website that

chronicled life in cities across the coun-try. In its three-year run, the site publishedmore than 800 articles.

And now he’s keeping busy at the J-School: a current project, a five-part se-ries for City Limits, will focus on the fu-ture of New York’s garbage system.

Tariq Zehawi of The Record won top prize in the Breaking News, Photography, category with this photo thatshows a SWAT team subduing a mother who had been threatening her children while other officers are whiskingaway the youngsters.

the firehouse.Merit The New York Times, “Palm

Sunday” by Joe GoldsteinThirty years after 10 people, including

eight children, were massacred on PalmSunday in a Brooklyn railroad flat,Goldstein revisited the sole survivor, nowa 31-year-old woman, and the police-woman who rescued her and lateradopted her.

Investigative Reporting

Medallion The Associated Press,“Death on Rikers Island” by JakePearson

In a devastating and chilling 10-partexposé that ran from March to Decem-ber, backed up with exhaustive documen-tation from internal reports, The Associ-ated Press revealed a sickening patternof physical abuse and criminal neglect atNew York City’s largest jail complex, lead-ing to official investigations and reforms.

Merit The New York Times, “Med-dling Governor” by Suzanne Craig, Tho-mas Kaplan and William K. Rashbaum

This exposé of the collapse of the

Moreland Commission and Gov. AndrewCuomo’s promise to clean up corruptionin Albany revealed that the governor is amaster of the back room whose ordersmandating government transparencymight as well have been written in invis-ible ink.

Sports ReportingMedallion The Daily News for

“Cooking The Books” by Teri Thomp-son, Mary Papenfuss, Christian Red,Nathaniel Vinton

A classically investigated and reportedlook at corruption inside the secret, lu-crative world of international soccer atthe highest levels and how a group of te-nacious insiders made millions—often byillegal means.

Merit Newsday, “Five teams passedon Derek Jeter; here’s what they thinkabout that now” by Steven Marcus

A fascinating story about how DerekJeter ended up in pinstripes and the teamsthat passed on him in the 1992 baseballdraft ended up in the dumps.

Silurians Honor the Best Journalism of 2014BY ALLAN DODDS FRANK

As I enter the bell lap of my presidency, I am thrilled to report thatmy terrific successor and old

friend Betsy Ashton will take over theSilurians in June in even better shapethan when I was handed the conch twoyears ago.

Thanks to indefatigable former presi-dents Myron Kandel and MortSheinman, and many other dedicatedSilurians, we now have nearly 310 mem-bers. Sadly, some members have passedaway, but in case you have not noticed,we now commemorate each one with aposting on The New York Times obitu-ary page.

Our Treasurer, Karen BedrosianRichardson, has managed our financesexpertly and our treasury happily hasgrown, thanks to the generosity of ourmembers who have donated more than$3,000 in addition to our dues. As manyof you now appreciate, Betsy and Karenalso have done a fabulous job with han-dling the inflow at our lunches, andmaking it possible for attendees to payby credit card, get electronic receiptsand even reusable name tags. SecretaryLinda Amster has kept marvelous trackof the goings on at the lively board meet-ings that precede each lunch. Formerpresident Linda Goetz Holmes has pro-vided expert pinch-hitting assistancewith the minutes.

Our lunches, which have most re-cently featured WNET CEO & Presi-dent Neal Shapiro, the great gossip LizSmith and New York Times Public Edi-tor Margaret Sullivan, have averagednearly 90 people each month. And, ifyou missed them, thanks to Dennis Cieriand his company, Cieri Media, we nowhave a video archive so you can seethem on a YouTube Channel: https://w w w . y o u t u b e . c o m /playlist?list=PLnKCsfMNf4CNv6-5ur1QFOU3bf1KP3TTQ

You can also click through to the vid-eos by accessing our websitewww.Silurians.org, which Fred Herzogmost graciously administers.

Board members Bill Diehl and Bar-bara Lovenheim, with the help of TedDavid, also have launched a newFacebook page for the Silurians and in-vite you to log on and sign up. Tell uswhat you are up to or what in the newsbusiness is on your mind.

Awards Chair Carol Lawson boostedparticipation in our Silurians Excellencein Journalism Awards for 2014 contestand the level of the entries was excel-lent, with two dozen news organizationswinning awards. In addition to most ofthe Silurians I have already mentioned,the contest, this year exclusively onlinefor the first time, was also judged byRalph Blumenthal, Jack Deacy, GeraldEskenazi, former President Tony Guida,Ben Patrusky, Anne Roiphe and MichaelSerrill. And we are grateful to the CUNYGraduate School of Journalism for pro-viding facilities for us to hold the awardsdeliberations.

Finally, if you are reading this straightfrom the newsstand at the awards din-ner, you will already be appreciating thesensational job Dinner Chair WendySclight has done and how Silurian NewsEditor Bernard Kirsch has revitalized thepublication with outstanding stories fromour members. I also want to thank thePlayers club staff for their efforts onour behalf.

I have been honored to serve as thePresident of this august organization,which I believe has the most enthusias-tic, well-informed, caring, professionalmembership of any group of journalistsin the country. I am certain that theSilurians’ collective energy and momen-tum will carry on unabated.

MAY 2015 SILURIAN NEWS PAGE 3

A New York Reporter’s Vanished Legacy Reappears

Stan Opotowsky: A portrait of the journalist at work

BY JOHN MARTIN

On September 10, 1986, a group ofmourners — reporters and editors— gathered in an auditorium at

the New School in Greenwich Village totrade stories about a departed colleague,Paul Sann, a longtime executive editor atThe New York Post.

As memories unfolded, Ed Kosner,editor of New York magazine, recalled agroup of “night vagabonds” on the Post’scity desk in the 1950’s and 1960’s. Hecalled them “a very, very odd bunch.”

One, a reporter, was identified only as“Opotowsky.”

“He was the only guy who could havetwo cigarettes in his mouth, have his feetup on the desk, and write a story at thesame time, faster than anybody else,”Kosner said,

As a chain-smoking national reporter,Stanford(Stan) Opotowsky cut a vividswath at The New York Post between1955 and 1965. Later, as city editor andmanaging editor, he was less memorable– but far from forgotten.

Writer Nora Ephron once described herdays as a fledgling Post reporter this way:

“I had an editor there named StanOpotowsky, and he was always comingup with these great ideas for me. Hewould say, ‘Go out and find the most ex-pensive apartment for rent in New Yorkand report on it!’”

Jack Robbins, a seasoned Post reporter,said: “He was very easy-going, I liked him.On the other hand — I don’t know quitehow to put this — he was just astonish-ingly terse.”

The son of Ukrainian and Polish Jewswho emigrated to New Orleans from Paris,Opotowsky wrote sports reports for TheTimes-Picayune at age 14. Volunteeringin World War II, he served as a Marinecombat correspondent in the South Pa-cific. After the war, he joined United Pressas a sportswriter and married a fellow UPcorrespondent, Marie Coble. In 1955, hemoved to the Post, a respected liberal af-ternoon paper.

On April 1, 1972, Opotowsky abruptlyresigned as managing editor, pushed outby Sann and publisher Dorothy Schiff.

“Morale at the paper was not fabu-lous,” said Marilyn Nissenson, who wrote“The Lady Upstairs: Dorothy Schiff andThe New York Post.”

“I think people recognized that thepaper’s time had come, and gone,” shesaid in an interview. “I think everybodywas upset with everybody else.”

In a March 11, 1972, memo, Sann ad-vised Schiff: “I would just tell Stan thathe has no future here and we feel it is inthe newspaper’s interest to reorganize thenews operation now.”

Opotowsky quickly sent out feelers.Within days of leaving, he joined ABCNews and was soon promoted to directorof its worldwide television news cover-age. He hired me in 1975 as an ABC newscorrespondent. We worked together forsix years, but I knew nothing of his daysas a reporter.

At ABC, despite his brusque manner,Opotowsky earned a reputation as a bosswho cared deeply about his staff. In April1975, as South Vietnam neared defeat,Opotowsky helped orchestrate an ABCNews operation to evacuate 15 Vietnam-ese employees, several former employ-ees, and their extended families. Callingalmost nightly from New York, Opotowskylearned that the number seeking rescuewas rising steeply as overlooked “sons”and “daughters” appeared.

Opotowsky “protested that the ABCboard of directors would not agree to anyhigher number,” recalled Kevin Delaney,

the bureau chief. “I would have topoint out that we were dealing in hu-man lives. To Stan’s credit, he alwayspushed the higher number through.”

Over several days, Delaney es-corted 101 Vietnamese to the gatesof Tan Son Nhut Air Base, where theyargued and bribed their way past Viet-namese MP’s to reach an AirAmerica terminal. “Thank God forcorruption,” Delaney said. “The sys-tem still works.”

At times, Opotowsky used humorto defuse tension. In 1979, returningfrom the Three Mile Island nuclearaccident, I complained that my crewhad not been issued protective gear.Stubbing out his cigarette, Opotowskydeadpanned: “Look, if in 40 years youget cancer, we’ll apologize!” Welaughed. He immediately ordered anexhaustive series of tests, whichfound no harmful exposure.

In 1981, ABC News shiftedOpotowsky to directing political cov-erage and devising a system of track-ing assignments by computer, a newtool. He retired in 1992, remembered,if at all, as a manager. He died in 1997in Florida.

But last October, while writing abook on network television news re-porting, I decided to include a few lineson Opotowsky. My Internet queryturned up a surprise artifact, a two-page typewritten story Opotowskyfiled via Western Union to The Post.The dateline: Sept 28, 1962, Oxford,Mississippi

His story was about Governor RossBarnett’s defiant opposition to admit-ting a black student, James Meredith,to the University of Mississippi.

Opotowsky explained why the Jus-tice Department had pushed in courtto extend by a few days a deadlinefor admitting Meredith: “There wasthe political consideration to be madejust five weeks before a national elec-tion. The Kennedy Administrationwants to go into those elections witha victory over Mississippi defiance,but a victory that quite clearly wasearned only with a great show of com-passion.”

Three days later, Barnett backeddown.

The discovery of Opotowsky’spress-rate telegram, held in an Ox-ford office for four decades, led to abroader search. The results aston-ished me.

In 1957, the Post assigned Opotowsy, then34, to look into the burgeoning civil rightsstruggle. He wrote a 12-part series investi-gating White Citizens Councils across thesouth. His conclusion was stark and uncondi-tional. The councils, he wrote, were “a bri-gade of bigots whose total domination of thepopulace can be matched only by the Com-munist Party within Russia.”

In 1958, six months after covering the inte-gration by nine black students of Little Rock’sCentral High School, he returned to CentralHigh.

In a series of shocking articles, he reporteda barrage of physical and emotional attackson the eight remaining black teenagers (theninth had been expelled for fighting back). Theperpetrators, he reported, were racist whitestudents encouraged by parents and friends.With few exceptions, moderate white studentshad turned their backs. Neither the school norFederal troops intervened.

On April 7, 1958, Opotowsky wrote thateight black teenagers “walk each day into thehostile world of Central High School guardedonly by their determination and their dignity.”

“Technically, they are the most protectedschoolchildren in the world. They have be-hind them the majesty of the U.S. SupremeCourt, the force of the U.S. Army and thepersonal guidance of the Little Rock SchoolBoard.

“But in reality they walk alone,” he wrote.“You see them move down the twisting hallsof Central High in a quick, tense gait, eyesriveted to the fore, fearful and expectant.”

Citing school records of 42 attacks,Opotowsky said: “This is the sort of thing thathappens almost daily at Central High —kickings and pushings and name callings, inci-dents that are pitifully petty when taken alone,yet horrible torture when assembled in theunbroken chain which has lasted for six monthsnow.”

Fifty years later, Vanity Fair writer DavidMargolick unearthed Opotowsky’s articles onmicrofilm and began using them for an articlethat led to his 2013 book, “Elizabeth and Ha-zel: Two Women of Little Rock.”

“It was just one of those bylines that youlearned to look for,” said Margolick in an in-terview. “His work stood out so much.”

Opotowsky’s coverage “was insightful, itwas very sensitive,” he said, “but it was grittyand gutsy because unlike most reporters heactually went inside the school. He saw theway that these kids were being treated.”

Opotowsky’s daughter Anne, a journalist,editor and graphic novelist, said, “All nine ofthose kids knew my father, they invited himover, they trusted him.”

Her father, she said, was one of a “sub-

group” of Southerners especially skilledat civil rights reporting.

As journalists, they faced danger in“being able to get people to talk to youabout this – white men who would admitto the crimes, prosecutors who had to puttheir lives on the line just to talk to you offthe record,” she said.

On November 22, 1963, Opotowsky,who had covered the 1960 Kennedy presi-dential campaign, was working on a storyin Washington, D.C. When he picked upa pay telephone to call his office in NewYork, said Anne Opotowsky, he got a busysignal before he could insert a coin.

“His instincts told him that nothing couldever have done that, other than a crisis,”she said. “He found out about five min-utes later and got on a plane” to Dallas.

Days later, she said, her father con-fronted Melvin Belli, Jack Ruby’s lawyer,as he portrayed patriotism as his client’smotive for killing Kennedy’s assassin, LeeHarvey Oswald.

“My father wasn’t buying it,” she said.“It increased Belli’s respect for my fa-ther and it developed a relationship. Theywould talk and he would tell him thingsoff the record. My father got tons andtons of information from a guy that hedidn’t give an inch to.”

The following year, Opotowsky co-wrote a Post series exposing lucrative in-sider deals for restaurant franchises at the1964 New York World’s Fair. The no-biddeals favored friends of Robert Moses,the city’s parks commissioner.

Opotowsky wrote four books. Criticswere often (but not always) impressed.

“Vivacious, sharply written, highly read-able,” wrote a New York Times revieweron March 6, 1960, of “The Longs of Loui-siana,” which described the family thatdominated his home state for decades.Despite the author’s flair for storytelling,the critic decided, “the book is about asprofound as a tabletop.”

Nevertheless, a Times book columnistpraised the author’s description of the dayin 1935 that Huey Long was assassi-nated. “Mr. Opotowsky uses the skill of anovelist to develop all the suspense a situ-ation can stand.”

“The Kennedy Government” (1961)described the political figures aligned withthe newly elected president, explaininghow Kennedy chose among them to formhis cabinet.

Richard Rovere, a leading political ana-lyst, found “a sound, sensible, crisply writ-ten account of the President’s work inassembling a government.”

The problem, he concluded, was thatdespite Opotowsky’s “competent, objec-tive, and instructive” reporting, the bookwould be useful only for readers who didnot follow the news and they “don’t readpolitical books.”

“TV – The Big Picture” (1961), a“close, hard look” at the world of thebroadcast medium, was written during aNew York newspaper strike and attractedlittle attention.

His final book, “Men Behind Bars”(1972), appeared in the wake of the AtticaPrison riots and described dehumanizingexperiences still faced by convicts today.

This winter, 17 years afterOpotowsky’s death, a New York Timesreporter who covered many of the sametopics recalled his work.

“I am sad to say I did not know StanOpotowsky personally, only by his repu-tation as a fine journalist,” said Gay Talese.

“I read many of his pieces — his wasa prominent byline, and I always read ThePost,” Talese wrote in an email. “He wasa respected figure in serious journalismduring my time on the beat.”

PAGE 4 SILURIAN NEWS MAY 2015

BY MAGEE HICKEY“Do you sing?”It was freezing cold. We reporters

were huddled together waiting for a firechief to give us any morsel of informationabout a suspicious fire, so we could goback to the relative warmth of our TVtrucks. Fortunately no one was seriouslyhurt on a forlorn block in the north end ofNewark.

But I was on another mission as well:recruiting newscasters to sing in the firstcabaret fundraiser I was organizing. Itwas to benefit a special needs school mylate father had helped to develop and ithad been named after him.

The Lawrence F. Hickey Center forChild Development, run by Astor Servicesfor Children and Families, serves 40preschoolers who have already been ex-pelled from other nursery schools and kin-dergartens in the Bronx. More than 80percent live below the poverty line.

Now, the tougher question for my fel-low intrepid reporters.

“Hey, will you risk looking like a foolup on stage, trying to sing, to raise moneyto help others?”

I was working at CBS 2 News at thetime. And I had already corralled a passelof my closest colleagues at the deuce tojoin me in this enterprise.

Reporter Hazel Sanchez and meteorolo-gist John Elliot were the two terrifically tal-ented standouts in the crowd of more thana dozen fearless colleagues, includingKirstin Cole, Dana Tyler, Cindy Hsu,Maurice DuBois and Lou Young.

I had been hoping for a representativefrom each TV station. Luckily, for me,Sarah Wallace of Eyewitness News is agood sport. And she is married to HarryMartin, formerly of My9 News, who hap-pens to play the piano and write music.

They jumped on board, as did my good

friend Ernie Anastos, anchor of FOX 5. Ernie and I first met in Providence, R.I.,

in the 1970s. I was a Brown Universityjunior interning at WPRI-TV and Erniewas the brand new general assignment re-porter, fresh from a radio gig in Boston.We became fast friends and have alsoworked together at WABC and WCBSover the years. But I didn’t know he wasa wonderful cabaret singer.

So now I just needed someone fromNBC 4 and NY1.

I didn’t find any takers at that Newarkfire. But eventually Andrew Siff, whoplayed Mayor Bloomberg so well in ourannual Inner Circle musical, joined in bothsinging and playing the piano. BuddMishkin brought along his guitar and didan original song about James Taylor.

And the funny thing is I am the one whois scared to death to sing in public.

Six years ago, I stumbled into a “FaceYour Fear” cabaret singing class atthe 92nd Street Y, taught by the incrediblynurturing Collette Black. With my heartpounding and my throat dry, I warbled afew tentative notes. What I lacked in in-nate talent I hopefully made up for withself-deprecating humor.

I am not sure why I decided to try toconquer this fear of singing, but it hadsomething to do with missing my mother,an actress, who had passed away theyear before. Jean Hogan Hickey hadloved the Great American Songbook andso do I. My childhood had been filled withsongs from all the great Broadway musi-cals, with my mother being a lot likeAuntie Mame in real life.

My mother had always taught me tobe brave, confront what scares you, neverbe snobbish or self-satisfied. Once youtake the attention off yourself, it freesyou to think of others, in this case, thedevelopmentally delayed children at the

Hickey Center.So now I am a singing fool. It doesn’t

matter if I am any good or not. My signature songs are parodies of my

long TV news career in this city, havingworked at every station in town, three ofthem twice, over the last three decades.

I come out on stage dragging my mi-crophone, which is so heavy because it hasmicrophone flags from the seven stationsI have worked at. I sing a parody of theparody song from “Blazing Saddles,” “I’mTired.” The late, great Madeline Kahnplayed the broken down cabaret singer Lilivon Schtupp, singing about being sick andtired of love in the original. Now I singabout being sick and tired of TV news.

“Tired of being admired, until mycontract’s expired, tired of then getting firedlet’s face it, I’m tired,” I sing, dragging myheavy microphone behind me.

Another favorite parody, also withwords by my journalist colleague Bob

Wiener, is a reworking of “I’ve GrownAccustomed to Her Face” from My FairLady.

Bob wrote, in making fun of my longcareer in tv news:

“Damn, damn, damn, damn. They’ve grown accustomed to MY face. I used to make their day begin. They’ve grown accustomed to my

hair, My Wild Irish flair, My smiles, my frowns, My Q score’s ups and downs.” I can’t believe I’m working still. Some say I’m too old to fit in...”

You get the gist.So now, along with my fellow singing

TV reporters, we have raised close to$100,000 to help the children at the HickeyCenter.

IN TUNE: Ernie Anastos and Magee Hickey, the author, at a benefit event.

PresidentALLAN DODDS FRANK

First Vice-PresidentBETSY ASHTON

Second Vice-PresidentBERNARD KIRSCH

TreasurerKAREN BEDROSIAN RICHARDSON

SecretaryLINDA AMSTER

Board of GovernorsRALPH BLUMENTHALJACK DEACYBILL DIEHLGERALD ESKENAZITONY GUIDALINDA GOETZ HOLMESCAROL LAWSONBARBARA LOVENHEIMBEN PATRUSKYANNE ROIPHEWENDY SCLIGHTMORT SHEINMAN

Governors EmeritusGARY PAUL GATESHERBERT HADADROBERT McFADDENLEO MEINDL

Committee ChairpersonsAdvisory

MYRON KANDELDinner

WENDY SCLIGHTLegal

KEN FISHERMembership

MORT SHEINMANNominating

BEN PATRUSKYSilurian Contingency Fund Trustees

LARRY FRIEDMAN, CHAIRNAT BRANDTJOY COOKMARK LIEBERMANMARTIN J. STEADMAN

Silurian NewsBERNARD KIRSCH, EDITOR

Society of the SiluriansOfficers 2014-2015Continued from Page 2

Business & Financial Reporting

Medallion The Record, “The For-Profit Prescription” by Lindy Washburn

This three-part series revealed howthe business of health care has changeddramatically in New Jersey, enablingsome for-profit hospital operators tomake fortunes by acquiring faltering non-profit institutions in a shadowy health-care/business/political environment.

Two Merit Awards Bloomberg Newsfor “Wall Street Finds New SubprimeWith Brokers Pitching 125% Loans” byZeke Faux

When there is a new way to exploitthe vulnerable with predatory lending, fi-nancial vultures will find it. This story il-luminates the latest dark blot on therecord of the financial industry as its usu-rious practices target small businesses.

Vanity Fair, “War of the Words” byKeith Gessen

A map of the battle between Amazonon the West Coast and Hachette pub-lishing in France over money that has thefinancial fate of publishing capital of theworld and writers everywhere in its grip.

Science and Health Reporting

Medallion The New York Times, “AFather’s Wish, a Daughter’s Anguish”by Nina Bernstein

An exhaustively researched and elo-quently crafted narrative of a daughter’sfrustrating and heartbreakingly fruitlessquest for end-of-life home care for herdying father. By personalizing the storyand writing it as poignantly as she did,

Bernstein brought into stark relief themanner in which the nation’s health sys-tem, driven by financial incentives andbased on finding the maximum govern-ment reimbursement, works in favor ofhospitals, nursing homes and other health-care providers over the needs of the pa-tients they serve.

Merit Bloomberg News, “Emergencyby Appointment at Mount Sinai” by DavidArmstrong, Peter Waldman and GaryPutka

This exposé of how Mount Sinai —one of New York’s leading hospitals -games the Medicaid system to extractmaximum profits while degrading emer-gency room care should be requiredreading for regulators and legislators.And patients.

Arts/Cultural Reporting

Medallion Bloomberg News, “ArtFlippers Chase Fresh Stars as Murillo’sDoodles Soar” by Katya Kazakina

This story exposed the mania of theart market and the bad behavior ofmoneymen who are chasing little-knownyoung artists, buying and stockpiling theirworks and then hyping them to makequick financial killings.

Merit Vanity Fair “Too Rich, TooThin, Too Tall?” by Paul Goldberger.

A disturbing portrait of the shadowscast by new construction projects for theultra-rich and how Central Park and thepsyche of New York City will suffer.

Editorial Writing and Commentary

Medallion The Record, Charles StileStile, in a yearlong series of riveting

columns, chronicled in keen-eyed detailthe political evolution of the embattledgovernor of New Jersey, Chris Christie.Prompted by a quote from MahatmaGandhi that Christie oddly invoked in hiskeynote speech at the Republican Na-tional Convention in 2012, Stile matchedthe governor’s deeds to other words byIndia’s legendary exponent of non-vio-lence, resulting in a wry, informativestudy in contrasts.

News Analysis

Two Medallion Winners TheRecord, “Christie’s Report LanguageTells a Story, ”by Herb Jackson, JohnReitmeyer and Michael Linhorst

The Record expertly parsed the 344-page report prepared by Christie’s le-gal team that exonerated him. TheRecord’s analysis delineated many in-stances in which the report failed tomeet accepted standards for writinggovernment investigative reports.

Newsday, Columns by Joye BrownIn several insightful columns about

life on Long Island, Joye Brown calledon Hempstead Town officials to bearresponsibility for shortcomings in edu-cation. Another column investigated aspate of unsolved killings in SuffolkCounty and prompted a public outcryfor action.

Community Service

Medallion The Daily News, in con-junction with the CUNY GraduateSchool of Journalism’s NYCity NewsService, for “Stop the Mold: Tracking the

Continued on Page 6

Finding Her Voice(s)

Something Seemingly for Everyone at Awards Dinner

MAY 2015 SILURIAN NEWS PAGE 5

The Beginning of a Very Long Love AffairBY HERBERT HADAD

I never expected anything to come ofthe job. I showed up at an ancientbuilding in downtown Boston, took the

elevator to 5 and entered a large, disor-derly room. The ashtray was the floor.Cackles and shouts bounced off the walls.I asked for the person whose name I’dbeen given by my college, and a nervous,unsmiling man appeared. “The hours arebad and the job has no future,” he said.“You’ll work 4:30 until 12:30 in the morn-ing, Tuesday and Wednesday off. Andmake sure you arrive on time.” I an-swered, “Yes, Sir,” and he gave me a sus-picious look. He seemed to know I wouldnever call him “Sir” again. I stared aroundthe City Room and began my career atThe Boston Globe.

I watched and listened carefully. Onenight, a political reporter asked everyoneto say he was out if an especially obse-quious state senator called, and already Iknew to put the call through. “This isSenator McGillicudy and I’m happy tohave this opportunity to explain my newlegislative package,” he said. All aroundjaws grew taught with suppressed laugh-ter. Then the explosion came as thesquirming reporter spotted a colleagueimitating McGillicudy. As he did, anotherreporter administered a hotfoot by light-ing a match tucked into his instep.

When the reporters spotted a couplemaking love an in adjacent building, some-one tracked down the phone number anddialed. The whole City Room was at thewindow. The phone rang and the coupleleaped off the desk. “God is watchingyou,” the caller said. I wondered aboutthat couple for a long time. I bet they fledhome and mystified their families andneighbors by resuming regular worshiphabits.

Yet I noticed that the same men whoenjoyed these pranks seemed to take theirprofession of reporting the news with agravity that resembled reverence. WouldI want to be one of them someday? Itwas most unlikely.

“No one leaves a staff job at theGlobe,” we five copy boys had been in-formed. “No one’s been hired in fiveyears, no one may be hired in the next10.” In a quieter tone we were told theydon’t want Northeastern boys, of whichI was one. If a reporter is ever hired, he’llbe from Harvard.

Many of the men in the City Roomwere ruffians in disguise, street wise butoften poorly educated in the formal sense,yet well suited by temperament to coverthe daily news. They would be the last oftheir breed. I had inadvertently placedmyself into an apprenticeship to them,which would lead to a dead end.

A copy boy’s pitiful status did carry amodicum of prestige unless he was ob-noxious in habits or appearance. Some-thing resembling brotherhood emergedbetween us, the reporters and the editor,although no one wanted to be an editor –it was obvious reporters had all the fun.

The one woman on the scene was amedical writer who moved her deskaround the corner from all the hijinks andtreated the men like frisky kid bothers.And the ringmaster of this human circuswas City Editor Alexander J. Haviland.He was bald and handsome, wore atweed suit and insisted on being called“Al.” He commanded respect and affec-tion with apparent ease but would not tol-erate slipshod reporting or writing. Hewould go over a story, with a sharpenedpencil in hand, word by word, reporter athis elbow, and when he was done the re-porter would say, “Thank you, Al,” and

he would say, “Not at all.”I witnessed it all from my perch atop a

metal desk. “Not at all.” What a graciousexpression. I began to use it and still do.

“Copy!” a gruff editor shouted.“Cream, no sugar. And tonight, not tomor-row.” I raced down to a HowardJohnson’s across the street and placedthe coffee on his desk, expecting noacknowledgement. “Not at all, Harold,”I said.

“Copy!” shouted another elderly edi-tor flailing the air with a sheath of pa-pers. I flew across the room, rolled thepaper into a cylinder and sent it in thepneumatic pipeline to the composingroom. “Not at all, Warren,” I whisperedclose to his head.

I realized after some time that I wasbeing lured irresistibly into the City Roomlife. I loved the joy and anarchy that grownmen with wives and children seemed tosprout with meager encouragement. Iadmired their equal devotion to their work.

“Herbie, you’re studying economics,have you decided want you want to be?”my father asked over dinner on a nightoff. He had been trained as an accoun-tant shortly after arriving in America fromthe Middle East. He spoke almost a dozenlanguages, I admired him and, over a bowlof large purple olives, I confessed my in-fatuation. “Dad, I’m going to become anewspaperman,” I said.

I returned to the same copy boy jobfor four years during college, a time inwhich my second education commenced.“Write the lead as clearly and as tightlyas you can,” Al told me one night. “Workon it hard and the rest of the story willfall right into place.” It seemed nothingmore than an ancient truism, but I did ashe instructed and he was right.

During a daytime stint, the day cityeditor, Alfred J. Monahan, insisted, “Thelead must be a maximum of 16 words.” Isometimes found that impossible, but Inoticed the lead on this story is only nine.

Reporters added their wisdom. Oneremoved a few sheets of paper foldedinto three panels from his breast pocket.“Get the quotes right,” he said. “Thequotes must be absolutely accurate. Therest of the story you can remember.”Another said to carry pencils. “If you

cover a fire, the spray will ruin notes madewith a pen.” And a profound observationfrom a third: “Show me a reporter withtoo much respect for authority and I’llshow you a lousy reporter.”

One night shortly later Al Haviland sum-moned me to his desk. “Get to the ParkerHouse. There’s a fire alarm in.” I beganto gush a thank you but his look said toshut up and run. I ran to the hotel – therewas no smoke or fire trucks or people hang-ing out of windows. I ran inside. “I’m herefrom The Boston Globe to cover the fire,”I told a clerk. He looked dumfounded. “Getthe manager!!” I demanded. He appearedand said, yes, an alarm was turned in, per-haps by a guest who had overindulged andthought he was summoning room service.Everything seemed in order so I called Al.He must have known it was a false alarmby then from the fire department signal boxin the City Room. But he said six of themost important words I have ever heard.“Good work. Come on home, Son.”

I left the Globe and became a reporterin Keene, N.H. And one day the Globecalled and asked me to come back for areporter’s job. I’d broken the Harvardcode. Eventually I came to New York,where I was born, and worked for“Sesame Street” and ABC News, did astint in Washington for the Muskie forPresident campaign, reported for the Postand the Times, and ultimately joined theU.S. Department of Justice.

And at every place I’ve been I’ve used

THIS IS THE WAY IT WAS A scene from The Boston Globe City Room in the 1950’s.

New MembersMaggie Berkvist was a photo editor at The New YorkTimes (Book Review Section and the Magazine) from1960 to 1979. From 1980 to 2013, she was afreelance photo editor and researcher at The Timesand at LIFE magazine. She now takes photographs forthe WestView News, a monthly publication coveringher West Village neighborhood.

Myra T. Forsberg, from 1983 till this year, when sheretired, held down a number of posts in various culturedepartments of The New York Times. The roles shefilled included classical music and dance editor, deputyculture editor, Weekend section editor, and copy edi-tor. Prior to joining The Times, she was entertainmenteditor at The San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News. Joan Kron has been writing professionally since 1969.Her byline has regularly appeared in magazines and news-papers on subjects ranging from fashion to facelifts andfrom décor to decorum. Since 1991, she has been acontributing editor at large at Allure magazine. She is theauthor or co-author of several books, including “High-Tech: The Industrial Style and Source Book for the Home”and “Lift: Wanting, Fearing, and Having a Face-Lift.”

Bert Shanas, before embarking on a career in publicrelations, was with The Daily News from 1964 to 1986,where he took on various reporting and editing assign-ments, including education editor. In 1975, he was aco-winner of a Silurian Excellence in Journalism Awardfor investigative reporting. He has also taught journal-ism at NYU and at Hunter College. Charles Strum was with The Times from 1979 to 2014,during which time he was a metro editor, New Jerseybureau chief, obituaries editor and a national deputyeditor. In 2006, he was named an associate managingeditor. Pamela Vassil, from 1977 through the early 1990s,was an art director and photo researcher at The Times(on staff and then freelance); her work could be foundon the Op-Ed and Editorial pages, in Sunday Arts &Leisure sections and other special sections.

Leonard Fisher is a retired associate editor of The New-ark Star-Ledger, where he had been on staff for 36years. Prior to that, he was a reporter for UPI and forDorf Feature Service.

In MemoriamEdith J. Cahill, a long-time Silurian and a veteran re-porter who worked for The New York World Telegram& Sun and WNBC-TV, died on Feb. 28 at Calvary Hos-pital in the Bronx. She was 89. When the New YorkNewspaper Reporters Association — now known as theNew York Press Club — was formed in 1948, she wasa charter member.

Milton Hoffman of The Journal News, who was knownas the dean of Westchester journalism, died on April 7.He was 86. In a 50-year career that ended with hisretirement in 2002, Hoffman was a reporter, metroeditor, columnist, editorial page editor and a mentor togenerations of reporters who became known as “Milt’sKids.” In 2001, he was recognized by the Silurians aswinner of that year’s Peter Kihss Award.Hoffman won first-place awards for editorial writingfrom the Deadline Club and The Associated Press ofNew York State.

the same early lessons in how to be agood and true newspaperman. They in-cluded the values of being kind as wellas tough, the importance of friendship andthe folly of vanity.

Years later, feeling imposed itself. Itarrived with a curious force and it lin-gered. It was this: had I been able to stayon at the old Globe, smiling good eveningto Al, greeting my friends and heroes inthe City Room and beginning the night’sadventures, I would have been happy toshow up there every night for the rest ofmy life.

PAGE 6 SILURIAN NEWS MAY 2015

Continued from Page 4Scourge in Public Housing,” by Greg B.Smith, New York Daily News. AllegraAbramo, Natalie Abruzzo, Julia AlsopFrank Green, Gwynne Hogan, RossKeith, Roxanne Scott, Melisa Stumpf,María Villaseñor, NYCity News Ser-vice.

This investigative series on problemswith the New York City Housing Au-thority depicted the heartbreaking,ongoing frustration many tenants suffer.These stories triggered a city investi-gation into the epic failures at the hous-ing authority.

Merit The Poughkeepsie Journal,“Killers & Pain” by Mary Beth Pfeiffer

Utilizing Freedom of Information re-quests and robust data bases, this se-ries revealed the deadly links betweenheroin and prescription drug overuse.

Breaking News PhotographyMedallion The Record, “Hostage

Situation” by Tariq Zehawi Zehawi’s dramatic photo of a SWAT

team subduing a mother who had beenthreatening her children also capturesthe precise moment when other offic-ers were whisking the youngsters tosafety.

Merit The Daily News, “EDP Busi-nessman” by Marcus Santos

An unconventional portrait of an

emotionally disturbed man hurling iceand epithets at New York City’s finestnear the World Trade Center.

Feature PhotographyMedallion The Daily News, “Eric

Garner Protest at Barclays Center” byStephanie Keith

A close-up and personal depiction oftwo vastly different faces in a con-frontation between police and protest-ers in Brooklyn following the death ofEric Garner.

Merit The Daily News, “Ramos-Liu Memorial” by James Keivom

For his powerful photo of a formerpolice officer and his daughter at a me-morial for two NYPD officers whowere murdered in Brooklyn.

Sports News or FeaturePhotography

Medallion The Daily News, Rob-ert Sabo

Sabo’s you-have-to-see-it-to-believe-it photo of Giants receiver OdellBeckham making a stunning touchdowncatch against the Cowboys.

Merit Newsday, “CaliforniaChrome” by J. Conrad Williams

A glimpse of the Derby andPreakness winner, and a possum, work-ing out at Belmont Park.

MAGAZINESInvestigative Reporting

Medallion Bloomberg News, “Any-thing But Secure” by David Evans

Evans uncovered a $1 billion internet-based scam that preyed on investorsaround the globe with promises of big re-turns trading currencies. The U.S. Attor-ney in the Eastern District of New Yorkopened a criminal investigation.

Feature WritingMedallion Vanity Fair, “To Live and

Die in America” by Nancy Jo SalesThis exploration of the murders of four

young Iranians who had migrated toWilliamsburg, Brooklyn, to develop an indierock band called the Yellow Dogs cap-tures the decline of one former band mem-ber and how his despair shattered the

James Keivom of The Daily News was cited for a Merit Award, in the Photogra-phy features category, for his shot of a former police officer and his daughter ata memorial for two NYPD officers who were murdered in Brooklyn.

Kihss and Gonzalez: On the Same PageContinued from Page 1could go in.” He attended Catholic gram-mar schools and Cardinal Hayes HighSchool on the Grand Concourse wherehe ran track. To this day he veneratesthe priests and nuns who taught him –“the illuminati of the South Bronx,” hecalls them. Discipline was sometimesharsh but he wasn’t molested. “I knowthat happened,” he said. “Happened tofriends of mine. Didn’t happen to me.”

He had never heard of the Ivy Leaguebut his teachers wisely encouraged himto apply to Yale. Upon graduating with adegree in psychology (“which was use-less”), he worked for Puerto Rican andHarlem civic groups while nurturing aninterest in photography at a Bronx col-lective called En Foco. “My parentsthought a photographer was a guy on thecorner taking Latino communion pic-tures,” he said. They also convincedthemselves they were rearing a doctor.Years later, at his father’s wake, peoplewere still coming over asking him,“How’s medical school?”

“Holy [expletive]!” he reflected, “didmy father not tell them?”

As he learned photography, Gonzalezalso taught it, to youngsters at Commu-nity School 61 on Charlotte Street. Inspir-ing tales like that didn’t show up in thedesolate photos when President Carterpaid a visit, but the borough was oftenstereotyped, complained Gonzalez. “Takewhat you know about the Bronx – andthink differently.”

He was working at the Puerto RicanForum when Thomas A. Johnson, the firstblack reporter at The Times, came by, likeKihss, to pick up a report. Johnson soonleft the Times to found the Harlem ThirdWorld Trade Institute and invited Gonzalezto join him. After two years there,Gonzalez, at Johnson’s urging, applied tothe Columbia University Graduate Schoolof Journalism, where he won a fellow-ship to cover tuition. “Columbia taught mehow to write,” he said, singling out men-tors like Prof. Penn Kimball and WallStreet Journal reporter Karen Rothmyer.When he graduated in 1983, it was

Kimball who told him about an openingat Newsweek.

Gonzalez was hired as a researcherand rose quickly, winning promotions toreporting assignments in Detroit and Mi-ami. But in Miami he became “superhomesick” for New York, especially af-ter coming across a copy of “MeyerBerger’s New York,” a collection of thegreat man’s Times columns. By 1990 hewas back at Newsweek headquarters onMadison Avenue, with a fancy title,deputy bureau chief – and bored out ofhis mind. “It was one of the most difficulttimes of my life,” he recalled. He spenthis days going to lunch and killing time.Maybe, like his idol Mike Berger, he won-dered, he was more cut out for life as anewspaperman? Or — dare he think it?— a columnist?

At an Hispanic journalist conventionin San Francisco, he learned that TheTimes was recruiting. “It was a time whenNew York Newsday was kicking our assso they wanted to beef up coverage,”Gonzalez recalled, from the latervantagepoint of a Timesman. Suddenly,Latinos were hot. Assistant ManagingEditor Carolyn Lee badgered him to sendThe Times his résumé. And then he wasbeing ushered in to meet her fellow AME,the fearsome Allan M. Siegal, keeper ofthe paper’s exalted standards.

“Everyone warned me about AlSiegal,” Gonzalez said.

Siegal sat him down and said, “Let’scut the crap. Where’d you grow up inthe Bronx?” Siegal, it turned out, was alandsmann.

Gonzalez had been warned that get-ting hired at The Times was an exhaus-tive process but there was ExecutiveEditor Max Frankel courting him andwaxing lyrical about “the Traditions ofThe Times.”

“Holy [expletive]!” Gonzalez thought.(He often thinks in expletives.) “Is heoffering me the job?”

He started off on general assignment.When Metro Editor Gerald Boyd offeredhim the Brooklyn bureau, Gonzalez saidno way. Brooklyn? Where was Brook-

lyn? When Boyd asked what about theBronx?, “I couldn’t say no to that.”

In one big exposé, Gonzalez investi-gated the “South Bronx Padrino” RamonS. Velez, who had built his Hunts PointMulti-service Center into a multi-milliondollar empire. But to his chagrin, Velezemerged unscathed.

Gonzalez’s family often asked him,“How’s The Daily News?” Fine, hewould answer, puzzled. He realized thatThe News was the only newspaper theyknew. If he was working for a paper, ithad to be The News.

Imagine Gonzalez’s delight when in1992 Columbia honored his fresh brandof street reporting with the covetedBerger Award.

Much as he loved covering theBronx, when Ari Goldman left the reli-gion beat to join the Columbia Journal-ism faculty, Gonzalez asked to replacehim. He loved covering religion too –from a street perspective. He did a storyon how midnight mass in the Bronx wasbecoming too dangerous – so midnightmass was being celebrated in daylighthours. He did another story on whatimpossible things believers were pray-ing to St. Jude for. One of them was ajob.

He had been at the paper three yearswhen Mort Zuckerman called. WouldGonzalez be interested in a column atThe News? (Finally, his family wouldhave it right.) It was attached to seriousmoney. Gonzalez needed to think aboutit. But there are no secrets in this busi-ness. Boyd called him in. What was thisabout The News? What could The Timesdo to keep him happy?

Well, The News had offered him acolumn. How about the “About NewYork” column — originated by MikeBerger in 1939. Mike Kaufman was writ-ing it then and Gonzalez had occasionallyfilled in when Kaufman and his prede-cessor, Doug Martin, were off. But whenKaufman left...

In 1995 Kaufman decamped forPrague to publish George Soros’s news-paper. Gonzalez went back to Times edi-tors and held them to their promise.

After four years on the column, The

Times sent him to Miami as the Carib-bean correspondent, where he spent an-other four years covering Haiti and theDominican Republic, Cuba, El Salvador,and Guatemala. By then he was marriedto fellow journalist Elena Cabral, who hadleft the Ford Foundation to take a report-ing job with The Miami Herald, and theyhad a son, Sebastian, later to be followedby a daughter, Paloma.

He had also returned to his earlier in-terest in photography, doing some of hisown shooting on assignments. So whenTimes editor Jon Landman turned up inMiami in 2003 and offered Gonzalez achance to return to New York with a newphoto column called City Wide that wouldsplash his panoramic pictures over themetro display page, sometimes all six col-umns wide, Gonzalez grinned, “That’llwork.”

He continued to report, too, winning,among a slew of prizes, the DistinguishedWriting Award in 2008 from the Ameri-can Society of Newspaper Editors for histhree-part multimedia series, “HouseAfire,” about a storefront PentecostalChurch in Harlem. In 2009, he joinedAngel Franco and four fellow photogra-phers in founding a collective, Seis del Sur,or Six from the South, to document life inthe South Bronx. He also became a found-ing member of the Bronx DocumentaryCenter, a nonprofit gallery and educationalcenter in Melrose near the Hub.

As co-editor of the Times Lens blogwith Jim Estrin, Gonzalez, starting in 2013,joined 150 photographers and 75 gallerists,curators and editors in a huge annualmentoring project, the New York Portfo-lio Review, offering free career consulta-tions for young photographers.

Meanwhile he’s also been writing theSide Street photo column every otherMonday while contributing stories as well.“I’m a street reporter, that’s where thestories are,” he says. “I like to be the firstreporter someone has talked to. I like totalk to regular folks.”

Of course, after years far afield fromhis beloved city, he’s landed back homein his native borough. OK, so he boughtthe family a co-op in Riverdale, but, hey,it’s still the Bronx.

Continued on Page 7

Silurians Honor the Best Journalism of 2014

MAY 2015 SILURIAN NEWS PAGE 7

Continued from Page 6dreams of the others.

Merit Bloomberg Markets, “Andy HallGoes All In” by Bradley Olson

A penetrating profile of a legendaryWall Street commodities trader whosegolden touch trading oil may have turnedto lead.

Public Service

Medallion Financial Planning maga-zine, “Could Financial Planning Help Stemthe Rate of Military Suicides?” by AnnMarsh.

This in-depth examination of how fi-nancial stress has become a major factorin military suicide led to Congressionallegislation mandating the military to pro-vide financial advice and counseling toactive-duty personnel and veterans.

M e r i t B l o o m b e r g M a r k e t s ,

“Overworked and Underwhelmed” byDawn Kopecki

This article helped prompt Wall Streetinvestment banks to rethink the path toriches they set out for young associates.It illustrated the stress and lack of a nor-mal 20-something life that are devastat-ing to physical and mental health

TELEVISION

Investigative Reporting Medallion News 12 New Jersey,

“Kane In Your Corner: Students Re-strained”

A troubling investigation examining theabuse — or is it discipline — of specialneeds children in New Jersey. In the ab-sence of laws governing the conduct ofteachers and counselors, children are atrisk and their parents are in the dark.

Merit NY1 News, “Sex Trafficking”by Dean Meminger

A good look at the exploitation of teen-age girls in New York and the difficultyof stopping it.

Breaking NewsMedallion NY1 News, “No Indict-

ment in the Death of Eric Garner”It was high drama as NY1 broke the

news that there would be no grand juryindictment in the chokehold death of Gar-ner on Staten Island.

Feature News

Medallion ESPN, “Outside the Lines:Tragic State.”

John Barr, correspondent; WilliamWeinbaum, producer;

Bryan Brousseau, Joe LoMonaco,Marc Lustig, directors of photography;Rob Berman, Scott O’Leary, editors;Chris Buckle, deputy editor; JoshuaVorensky, production assistant; CarolynHong, coordinating producer; RaynaBanks, asssociate producer; PJDeCordova, Eric Lynch, assignment edi-tors; Dwayne Bray, senior coordinatingproducer; Vince Doria, vice president ofnews.

This examination of the tragic after-math of the injuries suffered by heavy-weight title contender MagomedAbdusalamov in a Madison Square Gar-den fight offers deep insight into how thefight establishment works and how im-perfectly it functions when it comes toprotecting fighters.

Merit NY1 for “How NYC Works:Food Rescue.” Roger Clark, Reporter.Davide Cannaviccio Producer & Photog-rapher. Jessica Steiner, Producer; DanKomarinetz, Editor Leisha Majtan, cam-era operator.

A delightful jaunt around New Yorkwith a delicious behind-the-scenes lookat how City Harvest feeds the needy.

Public Service

Medallion WPIX 11, “Pregnant andAddicted,” by Narmeen Choudhury, cor-respondent. Victor Lopez, photographer/editor.

Compelling stories of three women drugusers who confront their addictions andthe births of their methadone-affectedbabies while receiving treatment in aLower East Side clinic and working to-ward becoming responsible parents.

Merit WLIW, “MetroFocus SpecialReport: The Eric Garner Decision.”Rafael Pi Roman and Jack Ford, anchors;Michael Hill, reporter. Sally Garner, ex-ecutive producer/writer; Erica Zolberg,editorial producer; Andrea Vasquez,Marisa Wong, producers; Matthew Chao,associate producer; Ann Benjamin, direc-tor; Kirsti Itameri, multimedia producer;Sean McGinn, producer/editor; KerrySoloway, editor; Christofer Nicoletti, pro-duction assistant; Diane Masciale, gen-eral manager, WLIW21; John Servidio,vice president of subsidiary stations

A thorough and thoughtful round-up ofa big breaking story.

RADIOBreaking News

Medallion 1010 WINS, “NYPD Of-ficers Fatally Shot”

1010 WINS reporters delivered rivet-ing coverage when two officers wereshot while sitting in their patrol car inBrooklyn

Merit WCBS 880, “Explosion inHarlem”

A quick, comprehensive reaction to abig breaking news tragedy.

News FeatureMedallion ESPN Radio, “Outside the

Lines and The Sporting Life: RobertsRules.” Kelly Naqi, correspondent; Will-

iam Weinbaum, producer; Robert O’Reilly,Justin Stokes, location sound mixers; Ja-son Sharkey, editor; Kelly Rohrer, pro-duction assistant; Carolyn Hong, coordi-nating producer; Rayna Banks, associ-ate producer; Eric Lynch, assignmenteditor; Dwayne Bray, senior coordinat-ing producer; Vince Doria, vice presidentof news.

A portrait of Michele Roberts, newhead of the N.B.A. players union. Welearn she is charming, bold, and dedicatedto making certain that, in her words, “aninstitution this important and one that ispredominantly African-American cannotbe allowed to fail.”

Merit WCBS 880, “The Gem VacVets” by Wayne Cabot/

Military veterans tell their stories onVeterans Day as a small group does ev-ery Tuesday at a little shop in New Jer-sey.

ONLINEBreaking News

Medallion The Wall Street Journal(WSJ.com), “East Harlem Explosion”

With digital bulletins, constant tweets,video, and overall mastery of social me-dia, alongside print coverage, Journal re-porters covered the explosion that killedeight, collapsed two Park Avenue build-ings and overturned countless lives.

Two Merit Awards DNAinfo.com,“4-Year-Old Tortured Before Death En-dured Nomadic Life Filled With Abuse.”Murray Weiss, James Fanelli, JanonFisher

Fine pursuit of the reasons for the un-necessary death of a 4-year-old boy whoslipped through the cracks of the socialservices network.

Newsday.com, and Newsday Staff,“Cops Shot”

An exhaustive multi-media coverage

of the shooting of two New York policeofficers in their patrol car.

Investigative Reporting/Web Exclusive

Medallion ProPublica, “How WallStreet Tobacco Deals Left States WithBillions in Toxic Debt.” “Tobacco Bond”Series by Cezary Podkul.

Building special data bases to probethe public records left by Wall Street bonddeals built around scheduled payoffs fromthe national tobacco settlement of 1999,these meticulously researched storieswere the first to document that nearlyhalf the money no longer goes to benefittaxpayers. Instead, it’s being siphonedoff to cover a multi-generational legacyof debt taken on by dozens of the gov-ernments involved – debt that some maynever be able to repay. Apps built by YueQiu and Lena Groeger allow readers totrack the financial effects of these baddeals county by county in New YorkState and elsewhere.

Merit DNAinfo.com, “Mayor’s TopAide Hid Relationship With ConvictedFelon” by Murray Weiss & JamesFanelli.

Ongoing digging about the relation-ships of the chief of staff for the FirstLady of New York affected the runningdispute between the Mayor and the po-lice union leadership.

News Commentary

Medallion TheStreet.com, “Unac-countable Bureaucracy” and other col-umns by Susan Antilla

In these searing columns, Antilla high-lights the anti-consumer sentiment that hastaken hold of significant portions of theRepublican Party as it attempts to dis-mantle agencies such as the ConsumerFinancial Protection Bureau, which shesays “has broken new ground reining insleazy debt collectors, slipshod mortgageservicers and banks.” In just two years,the agency has handled 270,000 com-plaints from consumers and has returnedalmost $3 billion to them.

Merit The Record, “GWB Files,”Staff of The Record

The Record’s ongoing catalogue of theevolution of the George WashingtonBridge scandal is the multi-mediascorecard subscribers need to keep trackof this cast of characters.

Public ServiceMedallion ProPublica and National

Public Radio, “Red Cross” by JesseEisinger & Justin Elliott, ProPublica;Laura Sullivan, NPR

The diligence of this reporting teampaid off as it refused to accept the origi-nal explanations from the Red Crossabout how it spent hundreds of millionsof dollars during responses to HurricanesSandy and Isaac. As ProPublica/NPRconcluded: “The Red Cross botched keyelements of its mission after Sandy andIsaac, leaving behind a trail of unmetneeds and acrimony.”

The Red Cross’s shortcomings weredetailed in confidential reports and in-ternal emails, as well as accounts fromcurrent and former disaster relief spe-cialists.

Merit Newsday/News 12, CashCrop: “Marijuana on Long Island andAcross the United States.” MandyHofmockel, Thomas Maier, Saba Ali,Matthew Cassella, Timothy Healy andNewsday.com and Newsday Staffs

The complete package on marijuanaon Long Island with text, photos, videos,charts, maps and other interactive graph-ics, legal documents, etc.

THE CATCH Robert Sabo of The Daily News was at MetLife Stadium to take thisphoto of the Giants receiver Odell Beckham making a stunning touchdowncatch against the Cowboys. The shot garnered top prize in the Sports Photog-raphy competition.

Silurians Honor the Best Journalism of 2014

PAGE 8 SILURIAN NEWS MAY 2015

The Gospel According to Liz Smith

HOW MUCH AM I BID At the Silurian March luncheon, Allan Dodds Frank holds up amemoir by Liz Smith, who was the guest speaker.

Margaret Sullivan at the podium.

Public Television’s No. 1 Fan

Bill Diehl

Bill Diehl

In her luncheon visit in February, LizSmith, 92, noted that she was born oneyear before the Silurians were born as anorganization. And speaking of age, Smithopened her talk (standing at the podium,declining a chair) by noting a Time maga-zine cover about the frontiers of longev-ity that said“this baby could live to be ahundred and 42 years old.”

Smith said she isn’t worried about liv-ing that long, unless you have a religiousbelief that there’ll be something wonder-ful in the hereafter. But “I find it per-fectly wonderful right here.” Address-ing the internet, Smith said there oncewas a time when a byline meant some-thing, but not anymore. Now everybodycan have a byline, expressing theirthoughts, attacking people, praisingpeople, without fear of getting fired orgoing to jail.

Texas-born Smith arrived in NewYork in 1949. Armed with a journalismdegree, she later became a producer forMike Wallace’s CBS Radio chat show,“Mike and Buff,” and was a ghostwriterfor the “Cholly Knickerbocker” gossipcolumn.She spent 11 years working forHelen Gurley Brown’s Cosmopolitanmagazine. She called Brown an extraor-dinary woman, though she disapprovedof everything she believed in. “I guessshe kept me around as a curiosity.”

As for being dubbed the GrandeDame of Gossip? “I never thought ofmyself as a very good gossip,” she said.“I was always more a sort of star-struckobserver, a bystander. I’ve had 65 yearsof working, observing this wonderful lifein New York and I wouldn’t take any-thing back for those glory days.”

— Bill Diehl

Margaret Sullivan may be one of the fewpeople in the world of journalism who canwag a finger at The New York Times—and the paper listens, quite respectfully.

She is its public editor, the fifth person tohold that untouchable position at the paper.At the Silurians’ March meeting at the Play-ers Club, she spoke passionately of the re-spect she has for The Times and eloquentlyof the juggling act inherent in the role.

“I get a paycheck—but I’m not of TheTimes,” she explained. She was respond-ing to a question by Joe Berger, who askedhow she was able to navigate the news-room which she may have to criticize fromtime to time.

“I try to be respectful,” she said. “Nosurprises.”

Among the most difficult jobs she hastackled has been a public discourse on thepaper’s coverage of Israeli politics. Shebelieves the paper “can never satisfy any-

one.” And her perception of the paper’sIsraeli-Arab coverage?

“I think it sets out to be fair, but some-times falls down.”

She also is juggling the newer forms ofjournalism with the kind she grew up with—“when there were gluepots on the desk.”She concedes that in hiring her, the paperwanted her to expand the public editor’srole into various platforms. “Now the firstthing I do is turn to Twitter,” she quipped.

— Gerald Eskenazi

Neal Shapiro Bill Diehl

There are many moments when peopletell Neal Shapiro just how important pub-lic television has been in their lives.

“My daughter became class valedicto-rian because of what you did,” Shapiro re-called a father told him.

It was one of many such anecdotes herecited, with pride, at the Silurians’ Aprilluncheon at the Players’ Club.

Since 2007, following a career in com-mercial television, he has been the CEOof WNET, where he oversees ChannelsThirteen, WLIW21, and NJTV.

“Public TV,” he said, “can make ourcountry smarter, and improve people’slives.”

Small wonder he considers his televi-sion operations “a public trust.”

“Great TV should touch you in your headand your heart,” he explained. “Commer-cial TV doesn’t care about that — they wantto see how many eyes are watching.”

His vision of public television has playeda major role in his many awards, account-

BY TONY GUIDA

I build my house of strawI build my house of hayI toot my fluteI don’t give a hootAnd play around all day- “Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?”

A curious building rose in the courtyardof MoMA/PS1 in Long Island City lastsummer. Forty feet high, it resembled a tee-pee at its base and suggested a slinky uptop. Ten thousand bricks were used in itsconstruction but nothing like it had ever beenbuilt before. It was neither a residence nora commercial structure, but a herald fromthe future, a curtain raiser on what maybe the next generation of building.

Its creator, David Benjamin, is not youreveryday architect. He is also a bio-re-searcher whose studies of bone growth,bivalves, and slime mold inform his ideasabout building. With this structure his ideawas to reinvent the most basic compo-nent of architecture, the brick.

“This brick is basically made ofchopped-up corn stalks, agriculturalwaste,” he told me. “We combine thatwaste with mycillium – mushroom roots– and in about five days, with no addedenergy, it grows into solid objects.”

The Book of Genesis springs to mind.“Dust thou art and to dust thou shaltreturn.”

Benjamin agreed: “We were think-ing that building materials could have akind of ecosystem and cycle like ourbodies do, like plants do, so yeah, ex-actly like that quotation.”

Architecture, meet synthetic biology.It’s Benjamin’s passion and the reason henamed his firm The Living.

Already he has created Living Light, aninteractive canopy in a park in Seoul, Ko-rea, whose flashing lights announce airquality conditions across the city.

Soon to come in New York’s EastRiver, Amphibious Architecture, floatinglights whose colors will broadcast thepresence of fish and the river’s levels ofpollution.

And Hy-fi, Benjamin’s name for astructure built, essentially, of hay.

Hy-fi won last year’s prestigious YoungArchitects Award given by MoMA/PS1.Museum director Pedro Gadanho saidBenjamin’s idea could be revolutionary.

“Imagine, if you can, that people couldget a little packet of mushroom roots andthey could mix it with whatever is avail-able and build their own structure.”

Revolutionary indeed. Not just forprimitive cultures but for urban land-scapes as well.

Ron Shiffman, an architect and urbanplanner at Pratt Institute, points out thatthe progenitor of the modern movementin city planning, Patrick Eddies, was a bi-ologist who looked at cities as living or-ganisms.

Shiffman said that by studying natureone can study the next generation of build-ing. “Unless we do that,” Shiffman warns,“unless we look at the environment from

that perspective we are not going to sur-vive as a species.”

Many architects and engineers tell usour buildings produce a heavier carbonfootprint than anything else in our envi-ronment. From the energy it takes to pro-duce glass and steel to the energy wastedby inefficient structures our built environ-ment is profligate; a luxury, experts say,that is increasingly unaffordable.

David Benjamin’s brick – grown, noenergy wasted – points toward a bravenew sustainable world.

“It is one of those things that is a gamechanger,” said Susan Szenasy, editor inchief and publisher of Metropolis, a maga-zine of architecture and design.

“The fact that David was able to ac-

complish a whole building no matter howprimitive it is, that’s its charm,” she said.“Hand-laid brick, an old system but a newway, maybe that is the new avatar.”

Szenasy smiled, and said, “It’s incred-ibly encouraging because human intelli-gence at work is a fascinating thing towatch.”

At the close of summer according toplan, Hy-fi was dismantled, all 10,000bricks composted. Though it has beenreturned to the earth from which it grew,the promise of Hy-fi lingers and intrigues.

(Tony Guida now freelances for a pro-gram called Arts In The City on CUNYTV. This article is based on one of hisepisodes, which aired this year. )

A Home, HomeFrom the Range

In the courtyard of MoMA/PS1 was a building made up primarily of chopped-up corn-stalk bricks.

ing for some of his 32 Emmys.Before he came to WNET he was

president of NBC News, where he over-saw Today, NBC Nightly News and Meetthe Press.

Now, the challenge for public-TV is nodifferent from that facing commercialtelevision: “We have to think how themedia world is changing. So much ofwhat we see is a legacy of what was.We need new ways.”

— Gerald Eskenazi

Eyes on the Times