In Memory of John Walter

Many, many years ago, I visited John Walter in the newsroom of the Ithaca Journal. He spent most of the time pacing around like a caged lion, but he did reveal his current dream: He wanted to run the headline "Terrible Accident Happens" before he left Ithaca. I doubt if he ever did, but I say, now that he has passed away, the time has come. I suggest 3-36 Bodoni Bold in a Benday box.

My friendship with John — so long ago, and yet so vivid — was formed when we were young, and those times, it seems to me, are worth recalling. Because I believe that a person never really changes much from the person he was in college. And John was such a wonderful person from the moment I met him in September 1967, in the first week or two of my freshman year at Northwestern.

I thought it was all fresh in my mind, but 1967 was a long time ago. Luckily, I've kept an awful lot of Daily Northwesterns for all these years, and recently I read them — from the day John became editor of the Daily until the day his term ended — to, as real lawyers say, refresh my recollection.

They were giddy and serious times, and John was a splendid mix of giddiness and seriousness.

The Board of Publications made him editor of the Daily on April 26, 1968. The news article described him as an "independent." That meant, of course, that he was not in a fraternity. But John was way more independent than that.

The stories covered the year John was editor demonstrate the dizzying changes taking place on campus and in the world. Parietal hours, black anger, a drafted dean of students, massive campus protests, fraternity and sorority strife, a physically changing campus.

From the start, John made his mission clear. He set out his vision for his paper in his first editorial statement in early May 1968: "We are a free voice. We are censored by no one. … Our daily news reports will be as objective as possible."

And after a year of stress, near the end of his term he wrote on March 5, 1969:

"We exist in the middle of this university — a hypersensitive position that is continually under fire for one reason or another. The fire we accept when we tackle the job. Of late, we have been hounded by administrators for 'naming' a university center; by Students for a Democratic Society for calling some of their aims too generalized; by Greek leaders who close us out of meetings, saying we inhibit open discussion by reporting it; by friends of some students for not indicating in our news columns that the students who were arrested may be innocent.

"A sentence or two about our role:

"We report the news of this university to its members; beyond that, we offer our thoughts and opinions on this university to attempt to move it in the direction we think it should be moved. And that includes criticism of both students and administrators when needed."

About halfway through John's tenure, the Daily ran the First Annual Tired Typewriter Awards. Gamma Phi Beta Sorority received the first annual Jack Fuller ("If one more person comes into this office and tells me what a newspaper is supposed to be, I'm going to kill him.") Award.

By the way, the Daily also bestowed on itself the Newspaper of the Year Award. We deserved it, too.

John could certainly be quirky. I walked into the newsroom one day, soaked from a torrential rainstorm, and John promptly poured a cup of water over my head.

But he inspired such confidence in us all. And when you read the stories he wrote himself while he was editor, you can really get an understanding of what he cared about. There's a story about an African American homecoming queen [Daphne Maxwell Reid (WCAS70)], snubbed during the festivities. And a story about Arlington Cemetery, written at the height of the Vietnam War. And a story about the actress Patricia Neal, steadfastly making her way back from a devastating stroke.

And John wanted so much for the new student center to be named for a beloved professor named Otis Walter, that for months, the Daily used only the name The Otis Walter Center while the administration steamed and fretted about the $2 million gift it was about to lose. That was a battle that could not be won. But how nice it would be if the Daily Northwestern were published today from the Walter Center instead of the Norris Center.

When it was over, and new editors were named, on April 25, 1969, John wrote in an editorial called "Goodbye to All That:" "If our sins are our ideals, and our crime is our dedication to serving the student, we plead exceptionally guilty."

I think John was glad to give up being the editor. I know I was two years later. But there are things we covered when John was gone that he would have liked to have been part of. I'm sure that's still the case, but still, what a wonderful life.

Jack Kerouac must have been thinking of John Walter when he wrote: "The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes, 'Awww!'"

And Ben Hecht must have been thinking of all of us when he wrote: "Time is a circus, always packing up and moving away."

But you can still hear the roar of the lions and the music of the band.

I'll miss him.