Faith@Ease

Despite my juvenile resistance to her urgings, I have to credit my junior year high school English teacher, Gaye Kelley Crocker, a flamboyant and frustrated actress who came to life in our classroom by insisting those of us under her tutelage would become devoted (by requirement) readers of The New York Times. She especially pressed upon us the columns of Brooks Atkinson, the renowned theater critic, who wielded his pen and opinions for 35 years as The Times’ judge of good and bad drama on and off Broadway.

I was a kid in Brooklyn, the youngest son of immigrants, a rabid fan of the Brooklyn Dodgers, and enrolled in the closest high school of our neighborhood, Manual Training High School. As an institution at that time struggling with its erroneous association with trade schools, Manual sat in the then diverse neighborhood of Park Slope where the predominant students were sons and daughters of immigrant laborers and tradesmen who had little thought of, or encouragement toward, academia.

During my tenure there, the school slowly became earmarked as a “tough” school that harbored teenage gang members and had little standing as a place deemed college-preparatory. Its faculty seemed young and transient, and its curriculum seemed weighted heavily toward vocational and technical training with a few teacher-saints who fought the good fight for the liberal arts in English, Drama, and Art. Even Manual’s athletic teams were mediocre except for its talented swimming and diving squads.

Miss Crocker seemed a misfit, even in her literary specialty. But she taught us, through demand and determination, to turn to The New York Times for our submerged appreciation of drama and art.

In my working class family, the only newspaper my parents brought into the home was the New York Daily News. Its subtitle probably spoke best to its popularity with my parents: “New York’s Picture Newspaper.” Neither of my parents was an active reader, but I often saw them perusing the Daily News.

For me, as a high schooler, the only access to The Times was the school library or my frequent trips to the Brooklyn Public Library just to read the newspapers. Of course, if Miss Crocker assigned a particular column of Atkinson’s, it cost me only a few cents to buy that day’s copy of The Times. (And I seem to remember she always had several copies of the newspaper–or at least clips of Atkinson’s columns–strewn about her desk.)

Thus I was introduced to the wider world of The New York Times, but it was in college that I got simple, step-by-step instruction in “How to read The New York Times,” from a young history teacher who stepped in for another teacher on Sabbatical to teach a sophomore elective class in current events.

Dr. Arno Willi Fred Kolz had grown into a pre-teen recruit of Hitler’s Youth Corps in Nazi Germany, but his family escaped and relocated to the United States during Kolz’ teen years before World War II erupted.

The opening week in Kolz’s class on current events was spent taking us through a guided tour of the massive edition of The Sunday New York Times, which in those days weighed in at approximately five or six pounds.

Kolz unwrapped the stack of newsprint and held up the front section of the folio paper with its signature gray front page of assorted headlines, subheadlines, and photos with captions. Then, with little fanfare, he folded back the front page and announced, “Always begin on page two!”

Along the bottom of page two, Kolz drew our attention for the next 50 minutes to the index of stories in the entire newspaper. The index gave capsule descriptions of every story and article in the paper. He taught us in 50 minutes how to read an entire edition of the Sunday Times and to become careful readers of important articles. (I think of Kolz and this lesson every time I scroll through the online Google News or the digital version of The Times.)

I recall thinking to myself after that first day in Kolz’ class, “Wow!” And from that moment I became an ardent fan of The New York Times. Later, I recall reflecting on what a wonderful gift this newspaper had become to this transformed German history teacher and how even more impressive was his passion for sharing this passion with his students.

Now, with Gaye Kelley Crocker and Arno Kolz waning memories, and my 40-year career as a journalist in “retirement,” I find myself driven to encourage others’ appreciation for The New York Times and its related family in “the media.”

[Currently, I’m motivated chiefly by the twittered rantings of another New York kid from Queens who seems to have never learned how to read the gray lady or any other good newspaper in this nation that honors and upholds the freedom and integrity of the press].