I resigned from The Charlotte News in 1969 to go to work for WAYS radio in Charlotte. I didn’t want to be radio news reporter but John Kilgo, the WAYS news director, had offered me a company car — I was driving a rusty Chevrolet Corvair, the one I bought for $1 — and a whole lot more money.
So I went to see Perry Morgan, editor of The News, and resigned.
“You not hitting me up for more money, are you?” Morgan said to me.
“No sir,” I replied.
“You’re really quitting. You’re going to be a radioman.”
“Yes sir,” I said.
“Boy, you’re a fool!” Morgan told me. “You should be trying to hit me up for more money.”
I told him, I said “Perry, I know the rules. The maximum raise here is $10 a year. It would be years before you could pay me as much money as WAYS is going to pay me now.”
And Morgan replied, “I made the rules. I can change the rules.”
Postscript: He did change the rules, at least for me. And my radio career was over before it had begun.
NOTE: Kilgo, the guy who tried to get me to go to work for WAYS radio, had been a reporter at The News when I graduated college and went to work there full time in June 1966. He was, by far, the most dominant breaking news reporter in Charlotte and, it turns out, the best breaking news reporter I ever worked with or against in a 42 year career. Most of his stories, it seemed like, were published on the front page.
Kilgo’s nickname was “Killer.” I don’t know where that moniker came from but it was well deserved. He did not take prisoners.
When I went to work at The News “Killer” was told to take me around my beat — I was assigned to cover county government, the District and Superior Courts and the Sheriff’s Department — and introduce me, help me get off to a good start. He had covered that beat and knew everyone. He took me around, introduced me, said the usual nice things and then, right in front of me, he would say, “I want you to help this boy out when you can but if you got something good, call me.”
Like I said, “Killer” did not take prisoners.
Coming Friday: More Growing Up Country