Tag: Frank Daniels Jr.

You Can’t Make Me

When I was a reporter for The News & Observer several of us were standing around one afternoon shooting the bull with our publisher, Frank Daniels Jr., and we got to talking about retirement.

Frank Daniels Jr.
Frank Daniels Jr.

Frank said we would have to retire when we got to be 65 years old.

I said, “Frank, I’m not going to retire when I’m 65 and I don’t think you can make me. I think there’s a law against that.”

And Frank said, “Oh, I’ll make you alright. I’ll put you in a room by yourself and make you write obits.”

I said, “Frank, that would do it.”

Postscript: By the time I turned 65 Frank Jr. had sold The N&O to the McClatchy Co.  I was 66 years and four months old when I retired and went to work full time for an attorney. And, no, I wasn’t writing obits at the end.

Coming Friday: I’m Next! And Other Snowbird Stories

Not A Smart Thing To Say

NOTE: For the record, today’s post is #300.

Occasionally Frank Daniels Jr., the publisher of The News & Observer for most of my time there, would stop me on the back steps of The N&O and ask me about a story I was working, or had worked. A few times, not many, he sent for me to come to his office.

He never gave me instructions, do this, don’t do that, I guess he just wanted in on the news.  And, after all, it was his newspaper.

Frank Daniels Jr.
Frank Daniels Jr.

On one  occasion, I don’t remember what the story was about but I clearly remember that it involved a rich guy, Frank’s secretary called me on the phone and said he wanted to see me.

I was not raised around money —brother, sister, that’s an understatement — and although I’ve met a few rich people I like, Frank Jr. foremost among them, I’m not comfortable around those kind of people. I prefer the company of “mortgage payers,” the term one multimillionaire I interviewed used to describe me and my kind.

The fact is, I guess, I’m biased against rich people.

Anyway, I went down to the second floor, to Frank’s office. We talked about a story I was working and I told him,  “This guy is as rich as Midas and I never saw a rich guy you could trust as far as you could throw him.”

Those words were not out of my mouth before I realize that was not the smartest thing to say to a man whose family owned newspapers worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

But Frank didn’t even blink.

Coming Friday: You May Find This Odd