Studs Terkel and I never were running buddies. We drank together once in 1980 in a hotel bar in Manhattan where we both were attending a national writer's conference. It wasn't a long drinking session. After one round, he apologetically left me for a young blond who hung on his every word better than I could ever hope to do.
We weren't running buddies after that either. We weren't even "let's do lunch" friends. We'd nod and cordially chat on chance meetings.
But I was an admirer big time of the oral historian. I'd read a couple of his books, caught his radio show from time to time. Even checked him out on the big screen in Eight Men Out. And he knew who I was. He'd read the investigative series I'd worked on at the Chicago Tribune. He'd watched me discuss Harold Washington and the Chicago mayor's race on WTTW-TV's Chicago Week in Review. He'd seen me conduct press conferences as Mayor Eugene Sawyer's press secretary.
So, the day he showed up for a taping on my TV talk show, Common Ground, Studs caught me off guard with an in-my-face grumble.
"Why would they book me on a show that airs at 5:30 on Sunday morning?" Terkel asked the book tour driver who had delivered him to my CBS studio set.
The legendary Chicagoan had been booked to discuss his latest book, Coming of Age. Although I'd only been the executive producer and host of the show for four years, it had been around since the late '60s, born out of racial tensions following the murder of Martin Luther King.
It was understandable that a publishing company would book Studs on the show during a promotion tour. It was a natural. In the short time I'd hosted the show, I'd interviewed Rosa Parks. Carol Mosley Braun was my guest the Sunday before she went on to win the primary election that would lead to her being the first black woman and second black in the U.S. Senate post Reconstruction.
The driver didn't answer Studs' question and right after he'd posed it, my illustrious guest wanted to take it back. "You're cool with me, Monroe. It's just that...."
I nodded. I understood. Depending on who my general manager was and what new program director he happened to be listening to, my show was all over the weekend schedule. During the eight years I hosted Common Ground, the show was in 13 different times slots. My best and my loyal fan couldn't even keep up with its schedule.
"When does your show come on?" she'd ask after the latest time change.
"Mom, it's on at 1 a.m. Sunday," I said, after one of those schedule changes.
Her favorite time had been when it was on at 10:30 a.m. Sunday mornings--sort of. That's when she usually went to church. It was a tough choice but I almost always won out.
This all came back to me recently when I discovered that Studs had donated a video copy of the show we'd done together to Media Burn. Sara Chapman at the independent video archive was good enough to break the show into two 10 minute segments and upload it to YouTube.
Although Studs was on my set to promote his book, there was a major news event we couldn't ignore. We taped right after OJ Simpson had gotten away with murder in the Trial of the Century. So we spent the first half of the show talking about The Juice. In the second half Studs got around to promoting his book. Once the taping was over, he was gave me a hardcover copy of Coming of Age, autographing it with this inscription above his signature: "To Monroe--A delight to be with you--as always, Peace."
Of course, he had commandeered the show. I wasn't the least bit surprised, he was the veteran host. I was the print journalist playing a talk show host on TV. And, I'm so grateful that all those viewers who weren't up at 5:30 a.m. on that October 1995 Sunday morning can check out my interview with the iconic Chicagoan should they wish.
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