Dick McLinden probably didn’t go quietly into that Good Night

BJ newsroom retiree Dick McLinden, who presented a cantankerous side while working on the copy desk while quietly working with Boy Scouts for 75 years, passed away Sunday, Sept. 6. He lived in North Canton forever.

Dick retired from Ol’ Blue Walls in 1990. He was better known for his work in the Sunday department on the Beacon magazine.

Dick McLinden

He got to the copy desk in time to encounter a slew of computer changes as the BJ found its footing in the technology age. I was the newsroom technology coordinator so I received Dick’s scowls as I tried to usher the veterans into the computer age.

It was a charade. Dick and I understood and liked each other.

After his retirement, Dick never touched another computer.

He was one of five Guild retirees who had their healthcare benefits restored to retirement day levels in 2012 by U.S. Federal District Court Judge David Dowd.

The others were television editor John Olesky of Tallmadge, who filed the lawsuit, photographer Don Roese of Cuyahoga Falls, reporter Dick McBane of Lilburn, Georgia, and maintenance’s Harold Bailey and wife Elizabeth of Kent.

By 2010, Dick has survived a heart attack, had cataract surgery in both eyes and had a Pacemaker installed. There was more to come, but he met it McLinden style: Head on, no apologies.

Dick's wife, Alice, died in 1999 after 49 years of seeing the cheerful and generous Scouting side of him.

He also had a wicked sense of humor. In retirement, Dick wrote this letter to the late Harry Liggett, founder of the BJ Alums blog and another newsroom curmudgeon:

“It took almost a week to get over the shock of learning that somebody actually cared about whatever happened to McLinden!

“I'm a total computer illiterate as of now. Everybody and his brother seems to be bound to the computer these days, and I guess I never did run with the herd.

“But it hasn't been easy. When I get the urge to compute, I go out to lunch or something. Boy, am I well fed!

“When I'm not eating I'm taking pills or going to the doctor -- or the bathroom. Marcus Welby would be proud. Seems I'm keeping his colleagues in business. Let's see ... a second knee replacement, triple heart bypass, carpal tunnel surgery, cataract surgery, the heart failure before Christmas, a pacemaker and defibrillator, and maybe a couple of distemper shots from a passing veterinarian sometime when I wasn't looking.

“They tell me that Aetna is considering a whole new category for me -- way too risky.”

As for his days in the Sunday department, Dick wrote to Harry:

“Anyway, you asked about the old, golden days in the Sunday Department. And that's just what they were. I only had to worry about the Beacon Magazine when Kenny Cole was off sick or something. My guess is that they just wanted to keep Lary Bloom and Bill Bierman from getting us into a lawsuit.

“The News and Views section was fun. I was pretty much responsible for it after Lloyd Stoyer left, and that was far and away my best time at the Beacon. I got to write Biography in Brief for several years as well as edit copy. That's why I went there. But Ben Maidenburg's departure changed that in a hurry. No more handling his weekly column. No more picking the Sunday features I thought most appropriate.

“So that was that. Shippy and I got the axe from that department within a few months of each other. Mostly filling space like Art Cullison, Donn Gaynor and some other rejects who didn't fit in well with the new grand design. Not that it was all sackcloth and ashes. I liked the people on the copy desk for the most part. With an exception or two, of course.

“But no JSK and no Maidenburg took away the feeling that I was helping contribute to the best paper in Ohio. So retirement couldn't come too soon. I have a hunch some of the rest of you felt that way, too.

“There it is. My BJ career in a cracked nutshell.  Sorry about the lack of a photo. An old one of Tyrone Power will do nicely.”

Ah, classic McLinden. As he wrote, “I never did run with the herd.” Mavericks are what made newspapers -- Ol' Blue Walls, in particular -- such a grand and glorious place to work all those decades.

Bon Voyage, Dick. I’m sure you’ll meet Fran Murphey and quip: “You didn’t go to Hell?”

Dick’s obituary:

Richard J. McLinden

1927 - 2015 |

 

Richard J. McLinden, 87, of North Canton, died early Sunday morning, September 6, 2015, following an extended period of declining health and is now reunited with his beloved wife, Alice.

Born in Canton, October 2, 1927, to the late James and Grace (Buchtel) McLinden, Dick graduated from Timken Vocational High School in 1945. He served honorably in the U.S. Army before graduating from Kent State University in 1951 with a degree in journalism. His 40-year professional career as a newspaperman included staff, feature and editorial positions with The Canton Repository, The Marion Star and The Akron Beacon Journal.

In his leisure time he enjoyed a good round of golf, a game of cards with friends and playing the saxophone and clarinet. Closest to his heart, however, was his long-time commitment to Scouting at the Troop, Explorer Post and Council levels. His dedication to the Boy Scouts of America spanned more than 75 years, during which time he served as a role model to thousands of young men. Other memberships included the Catholic Men's Luncheon Club and the Timken High School Alumni Association where he was a member of the reunion committee.

Predeceased by his parents; his wife, Mary Alice (Boerner) McLinden; his brother, Jim McLinden, and 2 great-granddaughters; Dick is survived by his children, Tim (Pam) McLinden, of Yellow Springs, Ohio, Suzie Collins (and Ken Wilhelm), of Fort Mill, S.C., Jeff (Lynn) McLinden of Colorado Springs, Colo., Amy (Ed) Kuhlman, of Rockford, Ill., Andy (Maura) McLinden, of Lakewood, Ohio and Jenny (Mike) Bachtel, of Massillon. Also surviving are 11 grandchildren, eight great-grandchildren; his sister, Mary Katherine Hembree, of Canton; cousin, Patricia Bird, of Canton; sister-in-law, Jean Roberts, of Akron; and a host of nieces, nephews, cousins and treasured friends.

A Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated at 11 a.m. Wednesday, September 9, 2015, at St. Michael the Archangel Catholic Church in Canton with burial to follow in Massillon Cemetery. Calling hours will be Tuesday evening, September 8, from 6 to 8 p.m., at Atkinson Feucht Hare Funeral Home in Massillon and thirty minutes before Mass, from 10:30 to 11 a.m., Wednesday morning, in the church.

The family wishes to thank the staff of Brookdale Senior Living Community and Crossroads Hospice for their kind service and have suggested memorial contributions in their dad's name made to the Camp Tuscazoar Foundation, Inc., P.O. Box 308, Zoarville, OH 44656-0308.

To sign our on-line guestbook and confirm driving directions, please visit, www.atkinsonfeucht.com  

Atkinson Feucht Hare Funeral Home Massillon, Ohio 330-833-4193

 

Published in Akron Beacon Journal on Sept. 7, 2015

Is civility or confrontation the answer?

Dave Scott, BJ regional issues reporter and deputy Business editor before he joined Jim Carney, Jewell Cardwell, Olga Reswow, Laura Ofobike and Bill Lilley in the April 2014 buyouts exodus, takes issue with BJ editorial page editor Michael Douglas, “a man for whom I have tremendous respect, (who) wrote this clinker of an editorial column” suggesting that Akron mayoral candidates may be too civil.

That hit a nerve with Dave -- who shared with Doug Livingston the 2014 National Association of Black Journalists Awards for their series on black, poor children hit by cars.

Dave responded on his blog, “Better Outcomes: Repairing the World One Word at a Time.”

He wrote:

“Many of you know that I spent much of my last two years at the Beacon Journal writing about civility as part of the Akron Beacon Journal’s America Today project. Those stories helped the paper win the Ohio Associated Press’s Public Service Award.

“Some people, apparently including Mike, thought of civility as some kind of limp-wristed approach to public issues.”

In the wake of Don Plusquellic’s long, successful and combative reign as mayor, Mike commented on the debate by the candidates to succeed Plusquellic.

Mike’s stance is:

“The problem for Akron isn’t a lack of civility. Rather, we risk being too civil, of failing to confront directly the challenges the city faces.

"That isn’t a call for banging heads with pots and pans. The point is, confrontation plays an indispensable role in making good decisions.”

So, what do you think? Should Akron mayoral candidates, and candidates at national and state levels, be more civil or more confrontational?

On Saturday, Sept. 5 the BJ ran Dave Scott's letter to the editor.

Email John Olesky at jo4wvu@neo.rr.com if you want to weigh in on this discussion.

Connie Bloom with her quilt art

Connie will have Brecksville in stitches

Former BJ Features Department editor/columnist Connie Bloom will be at the Brecksville Public Library at 10:30 a.m. Friday, Sept. 2 to discuss “If Quilters Ruled the World.”

Connie is Ohio’s fabric art (quilts) guru. She is publisher/editor of QSDS (Quilt Service Design Symposium), a quarterly online magazine about fabric art.

The presentation is for Western Reserve Quilters Anonymous.

But Connie says non-WRQA members are welcome to show up, too.

Connie has a 350 square foot studio as the resident quiltmaker in Summit Artspace on the third floor at 140 E. Market Street, next door to the Akron Art Museum.

The photo is of Connie and a fabric art she’ll be toting to Brecksville for the Talk & Trunk Show.

Connie was part of the 2008 BJ exodus that saw more than 400 years of experience walk out the door.

She is married to Bob Shields.The presentation is for Western Reserve Quilters Anonymous but I bet they wouldn't mind a few random visitors. The address is 9089 Brecksville Road.

Freddy Krueger’s daddy dies

Cleveland’s Wes Craven, who put the capital H in Horror movies, died Sunday at the age of 76.

This is the guy who unleashed Freddy Krueger onto a terrified audience in “A Nightmare on Elm Street” in 1984, leading to a plethora of sequels.

Wes Craven

The former Clarkson College professor in Potsdam, New York, also released “Last House on the Left” in 1972, about a Manson-like group raping and torturing. In 1977 came “The Hills Have Eyes” about a family terrorized by cannibalistic mutants.

It was only two months ago that Jeff Rice, who concocted “The Night Stalker” starring Darrin McGavin, also passed away. That’s frightening.

To read PD and former BJ entertainment critic Mark Dawidziak’s brilliant article about Craven, click on http://www.cleveland.com/tv-blog/index.ssf/2015/08/wes_craven_1939-2015_soft-spoken_horror_master_from_cleveland.html#incart_m-rpt-1

Word spreading of 50-year AF reunion

Charlotte Sun Editor John Hackworth (Hackin' Around) on this morning's front page featured a story about Kent State graduate and former WKNT news director Bob Carpenter’s Vietnam Air Force buddy USAF finding him on Facebook after 50 years, leading to their Florida reunion, as was reported July 30 in this BJ Alums blog.

Here’s the Charlotte (North Carolina) Sun article by Hackworth:

HACKIN’AROUND
His band of brothers
They were some of the best in their class. Bob Carpenter, of Punta Gorda, Dennis Maki and Richard Kozlowski all graduated from Air Force intelligence training with top honors — and a camaraderie that would transcend the years.

Carpenter, the former executive director of the Punta Gorda Business Alliance and an award-winning public information officer with the Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office, spent some time with me recently describing the work he and his two close buddies did for the United States Air Force Security Service in a period that included the Vietnam War.

They were overwhelming memories that came to the front during a recent reunion with Maki — whom he had not seen for 50 years.

“Dennis now lives in Fremont, Neb., and he found me on Facebook,” Carpenter said. “We started communicating and his wife, Diana, bought him a ticket to come visit me in Florida. She wanted him out of the house while she packed to move.”

The days together were spent reliving the past.

“Dennis was heavier and he had a gold tooth replaced. I would not have known him if I passed him on the street.

“We went all over the place but we sat and talked so much, too. I’m not sure how many times we said ‘remember when.’ We went over the good, bad and ugly.”

Carpenter said the visit gave him some closure since he had attended Kozlowski’s funeral a year or so ago.

The three friends spent years gathering intelligence in places like Crete and Vietnam. While they often took different paths in their duties, they always stayed together, usually working out of the same building.

“When we got out of tech school they sent us to Greece,” Carpenter said. “We were all trained as Soviet analysts. Maki, though, was the only one that continued to monitor the Soviets. I became a Turkish analyst. I went downtown and bought two Turkish language books to learn the language and became a self-appointed Turkish linguist.”

One of Carpenter’s first big discoveries earned him a commendation when he translated a message about a bomb planted at the American embassy in Nicosia.

“They got everyone out, but the building blew up. That was in 1964. Generals flew in and gave me a commendation but it was all secret — like spy stuff. I guess 50 years later I can talk about it.”

When sent back to the U.S., the trio of friends became even closer as they spent weekends in Corpus Christi, Texas, doing things young men do.

Carpenter said he became bored with the job of counting Soviet aircraft coming into Cuba. So, all three volunteered to go to Vietnam, just as the conflict there was expanding.

“That mission was out of this world,” he said. “We sent out drones over China and did some great reconnaissance.”

When that assignment ended, and the three returned to the U.S., Carpenter volunteered to extend his enlistment and return to Vietnam.

“I was flying in EC47s and locking the pilot and co-pilot in the cockpit and telling them where I had to go to monitor ground communications. We’d find a target and called in the bombers.”

Carpenter’s life after active duty took him back to the U.S. where he earned a degree at Kent State University. Ironically, he was there during the infamous protests that led to National Guardsmen killing four students and wounding nine on May 4, 1970. He was one of 1,500 or so Vietnam vets on a campus of 20,000 students. It was an odd time as demonstrators against the war often clashed with the ex-military men — including Carpenter, who had his own radio show.

His experiences there are enough for a whole new column someday.

When he retired from the sheriff’s office, Carpenter spent a lot of time traveling with wife Kaye. Those trips led him back to countries he first experienced as a young Air Force analyst.

“We went to Crete and I showed her some places we were. I took another cruise to Beijing and Singapore and I had two days in Saigon. Some veterans wouldn’t get off the ship and go to Saigon, but I enjoyed it.

“We went to this one hotel where I used to sit and drink Coca-Cola and the general manager came out and welcomed me back to his country. You would never know that Vietnam was a communist country the way people acted.

“They called the war the American War and the presidential palace is like a museum with American Jeeps and aircraft displayed.”

A lot of memories.

And seeing Maki made them all real again.

“You never lose that camaraderie,” Carpenter said. “Those guys are my brothers.”

 

Thrity to do children’s book

Former BJ reporter Thrity Umrigar, a national sensation as the author of six novels and a memoir set in her native India, is branching out. She will be putting together a children’s picture book.

Thrity Umrigar

Let Thrity, who has been teaching creative writing at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland since 2002, explain it:

“Friends, I am writing with some incredibly good news. I have just accepted an offer from a publisher for my very first children's picture book. I love kids and have wanted to write children's books for a long time, so I am very happy to be able to finally do so. My editor seems very excited, also. More news to come.”

Bombay native Thrity’s previous novels are “Bombay Time” (2002), “The Space Between Us” (2007), “If Today be Sweet” (2008), “The Weight of Heaven” (2010), “The World We Found” (2012) and “The Story Hour” (2014), and all set in the country of her birth, as was her memoir, “First Darling of the Morning”  (2008).

Thrity began her reporting career with The Lorain Journal. Two years later, in 1987, she came to the BJ.

She left the Beacon to attend Harvard on a Nieman Fellowship, wrote “Bombay Time” and her author career took off.

Thrity left India at the age of 21 to attend Ohio State University.



Don & Mary Ann Roese
in Arches National Park in Utah

McDonald’s not the only place for golden arches

Retired BJ photographer Don Roese and wife Mary Ann, married for 54 years, added The Arches National Park in Utah to their travels.

They may be there a while.

There are more than 2,000 natural stone arches in Arches National Park.

I’ve been there with my late wife, Monnie, in 1997.

Postcard pictures at every turn.

It was part of our 21-day, 1,200-mile circle of Arizona and New Mexico, through Navajo country and national parks, including the big daddy of them all, the Grand Canyon.

Don and Maryann go to Alaska so often that the Inuits think they are one of them.  New Zealand, Sint Marten in the Caribbean, Florida . . . been there, too.

 

Sometimes they even are in Cuyahoga Falls, where they live.

 

But life is not all fun and games for Don and Mary Ann, not that they aren’t big on it.

When they’re home, they go among Akron area people living outdoors in tents, under tarps at camps, under bridges, in doorways or inside abandoned buildings and vehicles.

 

Roese is among at the Peter Maurin Center volunteers who go out one evening each week to bring food, clothing and blankets to them.

The center at 1096 S. Main St. is a gathering place were the homeless can go to find food, clothing, friendship and respite from the bitter cold. 

But, for now, someone else is handling those humanitarian chores.

Don and Marian have about 1,998 more arches to check out.

From left: Meredith Roese Grom, Don Roese, Mary Ann Roese 
at Gemini Bridge in Moab, Utah  

Dennis Balogh & John Olesky at Hudson's Art on the Green

 

Balogh heading to Brooklyn for a wedding

Retired BJ chief artist Dennis Balogh will be heading to Brooklyn in September for his daughter’s wedding. She lives there.

Dennis and wife Patty’s daughter Lori is in New York City as a designer for a graphic design firm. Dennis and Patty also have two sons.

But Saturday Dennis was ensconced in his usual August hangout, Hudson’s 35^th annual Art on the Green where Darrow Road (Ohio 91) and Ohio 303 meet.

Balogh has been a regular at Art on the Green, missing a year here and there.

In other years, it was retired BJ photographer Denny Gordon’s wife, Bonnie, and her sculptures, former BJ chief artist Art Krummel with his paintings and former Features Department editor and columnist Connie Bloom with her fabric art (formerly know as quilt art) as Ohio’s fabric art guru. 

Dennis’ art pedigree is impeccable.

Balogh’s illustrations have graced such magazines as the Saturday Evening Post (the cover), Kiplinger Financial, New York Stock Exchange, St. Louis Magazine, Success Magazine and  Harvard's HBS Magazine.

The National Association of Black Journalists, National Headliner Awards and Creativity Annual are among his awards. He did portaits of the past presidents of Samford University in Alabama that hang on the campus walls. He has illustrated the top CEO's of the year for New York Stock Exchange Magazine.
 

He got his training wheels by doing Channels magazine cover illustrations for me during my days as television editor at Ol’ Blue Walls.

I was the midwife at Channels’ birth in 1980 and left by baby in others’ hands when I retired in 1996. Today there is no Channels, obliterated by the plethora of cable channels and on-screen TV guides that can be changed by the hour.

Balogh went from Cooper School of Arts in Cleveland to the Cleveland Press to the Columbus Dispatch to the BJ. Today, he and his wife live in Broadview Heights.

After 21 years at the BJ, starting in 1985, Balogh was part of a major exodus in 2006 when 335 years of experience walked out the door. 

In 2000 the Beacon art staff included Terence Oliver, John “Derf” Backderf, Art Krummel, Rick Steinhauser, Phil White, Dennis Earlenbaugh and Balogh. It used to be if you said, “Come here, Dennis,” when Dennis Haas also was there, a crowd would show up.

Fifteen years later, they’re no longer at Ol’ Blue Walls.

Terence Oliver added this note after reading this original article:

“Hey John,

“I just saw your nice story on Balogh. Good job! Just wanted to let you know a few other awesome folks were in the Art Dept. in 2000, too. Kathy, Deb and Jemal were there, too. We also had Brian Shelito  before he was transferred to sports to avoid being part of a layoff. And I think technically, Art had moved up as a Technology manager. 

“Best,

“Terence”

The BJ did, indeed, have an awesome art department. Including the late Clyde “Bud” Morris, Joe Grace and Walt Neal before the 2000 crowd took over.

Finally, after recovering from jet lag and whatever else hit me, I put together an online photo album of the Aug. 14-21 Danube River cruise by Paula and me.

One of the highlights was the Passau, Germany organ in St. Stephan Cathedral, the largest church organ in the world.

The 17,774 pipes were divided into five groups so that you had sound coming from the front, from the back, from the left, from the right and from above.

It was the most astounding church sound I’ve ever heard, and I’ve been to the Mormon Tabernacle in Salt Lake City, Utah, which has the best acoustics in the world. To demonstrate, a woman at the altar dropped a pin, which we could hear clearly in the back row of pews.

The Passau concert was pretty close to feeling like you died and went to Heaven.

If you are interesting in looking at the online photo album of our Danube River cruise, click on

https://picasaweb.google.com/115483244393507838338/2015DanubeRiverCruise

Willie Nelson, eat your heart out

Singer Willie Nelson, whose trademark concert song is “On the Road Again,” has nothing on Sandy Bee Lynn and husband Glenn Lynn who, fittingly, are musicians in the Cuyahoga Falls New Horizons Band.

BJ Reference Library retiree, who later put in about 15 years at the Orrville and Wadsworth public libraries and lives in Doylestown, and Glenn are headed for Canada after stops in Madison, Wisconsin, Minot, North Dakota, Eau Claire, Wisconsin and Fergus Falls, Minnesota.

Madison was the first day of their trip, and covered 573 miles.

Glenn temporarily a Mountie

In Eau Claire Sandy and Glenn saw 4½ miles of sunflowers planted by a widower to honor his wife, killed by cancer. He sells the seeds and gives money to charity.

Why stop at Fergus Falls? Sandy’s nonchalant response: “Not much. Seemed like a logical place to stop. It's pretty.”

Fergis Falls has 13,138 people. The Falls were discovered in 1856 by Scottish trapper Joe Whitford, who was killed in 1862 in a Sioux uprising. He named them after his boss, James Fergus, who never set eyes on the place.

Cruising, as on a large ship, also is in their travel history.

This is a lot of traveling for a great-grandmother who narrowly survived an auto accident in 2010 that resulted in intestinal surgery, fractures in her left hand, spine and right foot. The drunk who hit her is in the Ohio Penitentiary.

 

Sandy plays viola and Glenn plays the saxophone in the New Horizons band. They’ve been married almost three decades. They honeymooned on a ski trip to Austria.

Sandy’s father, Henry Fuller, parachuted into France on D-Day. He was among 126 survivors of the 792 who jumped with the 502^nd on The Longest Day. There’s an exhibit about Henry, a letter carrier in the U.S. Postal Service for more than 30 years, in the MAPS (Military Aircraft Preservation Museum) just off Akron/Canton Airport.  

Sandy and siblings Ron and Timothy, who attends Sandy's concerts often, lived on North Hill for 10 years, till she was 14.

Sandy retired from Ol’ Blue Walls after 18 years, then worked at the Orrville Public Library before winding up her librarian career at the Wadsworth Public Library in 2008.

Thursday, Aug. 27 they were in Medicine Hat, Alberta, Canada. Then on to Calgary, the airport Paula and I used before we enjoyed Banff and the elk, where Glenn donned a Canadian Mounties cap ... sort of.

Today, Sandy and Glenn are leaving Canada to return to their Doylestown home. Ah, but the memories will follow them forever. And what tales they'll have to tell to their fellow New Horizons Band members!