How a quest for imaginary hockey players led me to The News-Letter
I cannot remember a time in my life without newspapers. My parents always had them in the house, and my sisters and I would try to find the hidden Nina’s in Al Hirschfeld’s inimitable drawings. My first job, or at least my first real job where I did not work for my parents, was at Frate’s News Store in my hometown. I had to get there at 5 a.m. every Sunday to assemble the New York Times; back then, the paper was shipped in sections to be collated by kids like me at each store. This was three hours of intense shuffling, hands covered in ink, $5 in my pocket and a new pack of gum for the bike ride home.