For years, colleagues at the Minneapolis Star Tribune, where I was a reporter for 35 years, urged me to write the stories behind my stories, but I couldn’t fathom why. I thought that all newspaper reporters were run down by Harley-riding former National Football League coaches who then declare on network television, “I’ve always wanted to kill a sports writer,” as I was by former Atlanta Falcons Coach Jerry Glanville. Hasn’t another reporter watched fire fighters gut his smoldering automobile while Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig stared along in disbelief? I declined to shake Richard Nixon’s hand, argued with Miss America and scolded a United States senator before storming out of his house. Frozen between floors, I was trapped in an elevator with Muhammad Ali and Don King. I hung out with members of the Grateful Dead. This was my life and now I hope to share those experiences in books -- some in memoir form, others through fiction and still others in children's stories.
I am the author of two books: "The Fighting Frenchman" (University of Minnesota Press) and the children's book "The Turtle Who Lost His Shell" (the Lyons Group).
Now retired from daily newspaper journalism, I currently live in Florida with my wife, Chanda.