The below was written when Dick Stolley died in June of last year. This year, Dick's Darling Daughters were able to host a mask-optional party (proof of vax required) for a crowd of some 125 geezers. But I thought I better repost so that I wouldn't have to explain all over again what Dick represented.
There used to be special people whose job was to go into war
zones and state houses and theaters and private homes and wild places to
bring back information for the rest of us about what was going on in the world.
These people were not necessarily smarter or braver than anybody else, but they
shared a desire to discover the truth and a nose for falsehood. They had what
was called news judgment.
Yesterday we lost a real journalist. Dick Stolley joined Life Magazine
in 1953, when magazines and pictures were important. As a reporter,
writer, bureau chief and managing editor, he covered the world, from the
civil rights movement on. He is the person who had the news sense—and
skill at negotiating—to land the rights to the only film of JFK's
assassination. He also hired me for the first issue of a magazine he
founded called People, my first job in a career that would change my life, much of it at Life and People.
Over the years he hired me back twice, and taught me—and many
others—what it was to be a journalist, back when that was a respected
job title rather than a word spit out dismissively.
These days
everyone’s a photographer and a reporter, but they are mostly reporting on
themselves, from their fixed points of view.
Wars from the inside. Protests from the inside. Restaurants. Movies.
Professors. Movements. Politics. No objectivity, evenhandedness,
factchecking. No attempt to put these feeds of information
in context. No editing. No one to look at the work and say, "Un-understand" or "Huh?" “Wait a
minute, can this really be true?"
Everyone's a critic, but only a handful have the critical eye. And one of them is gone.
Martha Stolley, the youngest of Dick's Darling Daughters, who seems to have organized the whole shebang at the Century Club, opened the proceedings with a great video and then introduced the speakers, beginning with Jim Gaines (above), former ME of People, Life and Time magazines. The speakers were bookended by Hal Wingo, who worked with Stolley at Life and then the startup at People and I think, til the end, was his best friend. Hal looks like he either didn't want his picture made, or he had no idea who I was. And, granted, many of us looked different than when we met four-odd decades before (red check TK!).
Between the really important People people came me and Cutler. (Photo of me by Donna Ferrato). I did my rap (text below), and Cutler did his standup routine, properly crediting me for having introduced him to People magazine (and Dick Burgheim and Dick Stolley).The following is the face that we saw over and over: the OMG is that you??? face. This "You (?)" was Irene Neves, everyone's favorite person.
Jim Seymore, editor of Entertainment Weekly and Sally Proudfit, once Dick Stolley's gatekeeper, hung around for the post-program libations. Oh, and caviar and smoked salmon and open bar. Somebody said, "This doesn't look like a Time Inc. celebration—nobody's at the bar!" Well, then there were Steve Dougherty and Lisa Russell. And me. We held up our end.
A few photographers were present. Harry Benson (above) with notable author Chris Whipple. Henry Grossman with MC Marden (below), photography director who spoke and, not incidentally, grew up about a block from me.
Then there was photog Taro Yamasaki with Life-er Karen Emmons (above). And Russell Burrows, son of reknowned photog Larry Burrows and husband of even more reknowned Life photo editor Bobbie Burrows.
Then there were Kristin McMuran Ewald and Joyce Seymore (above).And Dick Burgheim, my mentor, with the two blonds and his partner Ricki. The youngest people at the affair were Stolley's grandkids (and partners). They pretty much had no idea what any of us were talking about. After the after party, some of us went out to an after-after party arranged by Ralph Spielman (below with, left to right, Cable Neuhaus, Ralph) Donna Ferrato, Karen Emmons), at Jane Doe Bar around the corner from the Century Club.
At Jane Does were Linda Gomez (my houseguest), of Life and Ron Arias, of People, after my time there. She confessed that as a Hispanic, Ron had been her journalistic hero for years, though they had never met until that night. And then there was Jim Jerome, whose Rolodex I cited in the rap below. The joke about his Rolodex is that it was completely blank. You would ask him for a number, and he would twirl the thing around, look at a card and tell you the number. But his contact cards were blank. He knew all the phone numbers and extensions by heart. So here is the rap.
Richard Stolley went to LIFE
the year that I was threeIt didn’t take him long to
make some history
Flew into Dallas with the
rest of the pack
He got the Super 8, and they
got jack.
Journalists were freakin’ but
the kid from Pekin
Kept his cool and his class
and he kicked their ass
Definition
of the best
RBS
Bureau in LA, and in Gay
Paree
Following the action at home
and overseas
Segregation, generation, civil
rights, white flight, head case, space race,
Always running place to place.
When Life-the-weekly lived,
he became the AME.
It didn’t last, now in the
past, a distant memory.
Then Andrew Heiskell, C of
the B
Suggested startup People in 1973.
He called on the best, RBS
Mia Farrow in her pearls,
cover boys and cover girls
Burgheim, Wingo, Seymore,
Gaines, Ewald, Lanny Jones
Farah Fawcett, John Travolta,
and Sly Stallone
Page Six, paparazzi,
Hollywood Reporter
I got deeply into gossip
though I knew I didn’t oughter
Birth dates, circ rates, home
takes, plate breaks—we had to pay for those mistakes
Copysets, Telex, cigarettes,
Atex,
Red checks, green recs, Jim
Jerome’s Rolodex
It became a huge success.
Oh yes
RBS
(Aside: This was back in the
day when a camera used film and a Royal was a typewriter.)
Pics and Pans, Star Tracks,
Up Front and Chatter
The boss’s approbation, the
only thing that mattered
I’d be shaking in my boots
when I had to see The Man.
He could throw us all a
monkey wrench with un-understand
When Dick wrote “Huh?“ You
knew that you were screwed, and it was back to edit ref, copy desk and the
blues.
He put us to the test
RBS
I quit, got hitched, moved to
Chi-town, had a kid
Sublet my pad on Riverside to
Stolley, when I did.
Ancient couch from Ms. McCall,
a mattress on the floor was all
I had the upper hand for once,
it really was a thrill
Til back I went, hat in hand,
thank goodness he was chill
He was back at LIFE, the
monthly not the weekly
Where photographers still
ruled, and I do mean completely
To Dick a pic was surely worth
at least a thousand words,
(To all us writers at the
time that seemed a bit absurd.)
He took me back in 83, along
with Graydon Carter
But making rate base, selling
ads, just kept on getting harder.
Mr. Stolley left the building
in 1993
It no longer felt like the
same company.
We watched the stock ticker
and here comes the kicker:
A deal with AOL, and the
whole thing went to hell
Now everyone’s a star and a
web celebrity
There’s Insta and there’s
TikTok and it’s all just me me me
Did People make us sheeple,
glued to our news feeds?
Or did it simply speak to
some basic human needs.
Good golly, Mr Stolley
I do believe you were the
original Influencer
Public discourse has no
class, light years from Zapruder.
No facts, mostly hacks, everything
is cruder.
Internet, cell phones, laptop
computers
They would have made
reporting a major piece of cake.
But no one even leaves the
house these days for goodness sake.
When readers get their news
from Facebook and from Twitter, can you really be bemused if I sound a bit
bitter?
Richard Stolley taught us plenty,
mostly how to think
Count characters in hedlines,
and always write to length
Fine, create, but tell it
straight, and always keep it couth
He believed in the news, and
he believed in the truth
Wisdom we should pass along today
to all our youth.
Like a boss
Oh yes
He’s the best
RBS
And me and Steve put on our Burberry's and went home. I don't know what time he went to sleep, but for me it was 2 ayem. Like three hours after my bedtime.
4 comments:
FANTASTIC post — words, photos, and that stellar rap. I felt like I was there!
SUCH a rap! Bravabravabrava!
Great post Claudia! Brought back so many memories of Time Life days!
Thanks Claude, If it weren’t for you I’d never know whatever happened to all my colleagues. Wish I’d been at this event. Yes, Stolley was a truly admirable journalist and boss. Wonder if there’s anyone like him left in print media these days. Certainly nothing like him in digital broadcast.
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