Cutting My Teeth

Back in 1963 I arrived in Los Angeles and immediately began looking for work. I bought the sunday Los Angeles Times newspaper which was 4 inches thick. My whole lineage had always been in printing from books to newspapers all away back to the Gutenberg press . Johann Gutenberg who printed the first bible back in the 1400 century was part of my lineage . My father worked for the Pittsburgh PostGazette, my grandfather worked for the Pittsburgh Sun and my uncle worked for the Pittsburgh Press , so unbeknownst to me I had printers Ink in my veins from birth.

While looking through the Sunday Times I thought as large as this paper was they must need help and low and behold I saw a Los Angeles Times ad for a sales rep , but they were looking for a college graduate and I only had 2 years of college under my belt. But I figured what the hell being from back East I was very aggressive and set my mind to getting the job .

Monday morning I showed up at the Los Angeles Times employment offices and presented my resume to a young lady sitting at the front desk. She looked at my resume and said “ you only have

2 years college and the position is for a college graduate , but I’ll file your resume and if anything comes up we will give you a call .

She then sat my resume down on her desk and left the room to go to lunch. I was sure my resume was headed for file 13 , that’s the rubbish basket. So I picked up the resume , walked to the door that said Mr. Flaness Personnel Director. I knocked on the door and a voice inside said come on in which I did. I told Mr. Flanders that I came for the sales job and handed him my resume . He scanned it rapidly and said I’m sorry young man you have to be a college graduate. And I told him you don’t have a college graduate in this building that’s a better salesman than me . He looked at me with a quizzical look and said you’re a pretty cocky fellow and my answer to him was “ I’m not a cocky fellow I’m just a great salesman “ and all I need was an opportunity. If you hire me and I fail you don’t have to pay me . He said to me “ do you think you’re a good enough salesperson to sell some of our sales managers “ and I said “ of course without a doubt “. He said can you come back tomorrow for an interview with one of the managers and I said just give me the time . He said “ be here at 8:00

AM sharp “ .

I came back Tuesday and sold the 1st manager . I came back Wednesday and Thursday and sold the next two managers . I thought to myself “ after 3 interviews were they hiring me to run the damn newspaper “ ! Then on Friday I was in a room with all 3 managers and the big boss of the advertising department.

He said to me “ you’ve managed to convince these 3 managers that you have the ability to do the job but you’ll have to convince me “. Let me ask you the 1st question “ what type of money do you think you can make here at the Los Angeles Times . I paused for a moment and then ask him how much money he was making? There was dead silence in the room then all of a sudden he bust out laughing and then the 3 other managers joined in . He said to me you can start Monday , be here before 8:30AM .

I worked for the Times for 9 years making $12 ,000 a year plus we received cost of living raises each year . But I wanted a merit raise as I was one of their top salespersons . When they wouldn’t give me a $15 dollar a week raise I went for an interview at the Long Beach

Independent Press Telegram and was hired immediately with a $15,000 salary per year . I became the salesperson to handle all 10 of their supermarkets … Vons , Lucky’s , Safeway . A&P , Krogers , Albertsons , Ralph’s and 3 mom & pop smaller markets . In two months I became their top producer doubling their revenue from $300,000 to $640,000 thousand a year and I was taking the new revenue from the LA Times . One year to the day I got a call from my old boss Chuck McKenny offering me $25,000 per year . I was thrilled to death that Mother Times wanted me back in herbarms at twice my old pay just 1 year earlier ! I immediately went to my boss at the Press Telegram and told him the offer from the Times and he said ‘We can’t match that and you should take their offer “ which I did . It was one of the biggest mistakes I ever made ! The Times just wanted to neutralize me as I was hurting their market revenues and they treated me like dirt in less than 2 years . I quit them moved to Solana Beach and became the Advertising manager at the San Dieguito Citizen .Three months later the paper burned to the ground and the rest is History …I started the MilitaryPress and I’m now approaching 50 years publishing the Press !