Biography
I joined Northwestern in 1980 full-time, changed to emeritus in 2008, and taught one quarter a year in Medill’s IMC master’s program through 2013. Before NU I was in the Navy for 3½ years, often in Vietnam from 1965 to 1967. Then I became a newspaper employee in Chicago, working as a reporter, rewriteman, city editor, financial editor, assistant managing editor for features and publisher-editor. I worked for the Daily News, Sun-Times and Law Bulletin. In 1973 after finishing graduate work, I began teaching at NU’s night school. The revered newsman Ed Eulenberg (immortalized for inventing the phrase, “If your mother tells you she loves you, check it out”) recruited me to take over his course. (What Eulie actually said was, “If your mother tells you she loves you, kick her smartly in the shins and make her prove it.” Mythology has edited him.) At Medill I taught courses in basic writing, newswriting, advanced reporting, magazine writing, public relations, marketing, etc., concentrating particularly on business journalism for graduate students. I was a department chair and served about 15 years as board chair of Students Publishing Co. On the side I did a lot of freelance writing, coaching of writers and corporate consulting. These days Judy and I spend summers in Wisconsin and part of the year in Boulder, Colo., home of our daughter and her family.