Chapter 6: It's Off to Austin

Between working and school, my social life was limited. So when my brother and his girlfriend invited me on a blind date to meet her girlfriend, Pam, I was all in.

Call it destiny, or the Universe's grand plan, but that fateful night in January brought two soulmates together. I was more than smitten. I was -- madly, deeply, completely -- in love, and over the next weeks and months, my writing reflected it. Cards, letters and poems, using all the words I knew to describe feelings of indescribable joy.

While it became quite a challenge to stay focused on my studies, I was preparing to make the transfer to UT-Austin for the Fall semester, where I would immerse myself in as many journalism courses as possible. Of course, there were still bills to pay, so it was a given I had to find work in Austin as soon as possible after I arrived.

On the personal front, things were moving fast. Three months after that blind date, we got engaged, and soon after were talking about setting a wedding date later that year. 

After saying painful goodbyes, I loaded up my car and started the 200-mile trek to UT, whose campus, which I would be sharing with some 50,000 other students, occupied some 430 acres in downtown Austin -- and I thought getting around UTA was tough. Gone was Mom's home cooking. Now it was catch-as-catch-can in one of the UT dorms. Plus, it was the first time I had ever spent any meaningful time away from home, so there was that.

Along with journalism, I had to take a PE class, plus an elective. Obviously not in my right mind, I thought it would be fun to take Fencing for PE, which started at 8 am. Who did I think I was -- Eroll Flynn playing Captain Blood? And 8 am -- really? Likewise, I chose Astronomy as an elective, thinking how cool it would be to study the planets and stars, which I loved so much as a young man. Wrong. For starters, there were 300 students in that class, and instead of planets and stars, it focused on Doppler shifts and math that made my head spin. Thinking back to previous grade point disasters, I beat a hasty retreat and dropped it like a hot potato.

But, my upper-level journalism classes were everything I had hoped for. On one occasion, I got to meet Clifton Daniel, former managing editor and Moscow Bureau Chief for the New York Times, who was there for an inspiring guest lecture. Better still, I had a chance to work on the UT student paper, The Daily Texan, that functioned more like a regular city newspaper, even to the point of taking on the establishment in their editorials.

The Vietnam War was peaking. Young men were drafted into serving, and any college student not taking at least 12 semester hours was subject to the draft. Thousands of students would gather to protest, and I clearly recall sitting in a classroom and hearing a low rumble that became a roar as hundreds of students marched by the building, all shouting, "One-two-three-four, we don't want your [expletive] war."

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AP teletype machine

After getting my class routine established, it was time to find a job. Trying to avoid unloading trucks, sorting parcels or becoming a server, I decided to take a bold approach at doing what I loved -- newspapers. In Austin, that meant The Austin American-Statesman.

So one day after class, I walked into their building, located by the Colorado River, to inquire about a job. It led to a meeting with Richard Seaman, the managing editor. We had a nice chat and I told him frankly, I needed a job and would do anything they had available. He said they had an opening for a nighttime tape operator. It paid a $1.25 an hour.

Not even sure what the job entailed, I hastily accepted, excited about the prospect of one, working at a real newspaper, and two, making real money, even if it was minimum wage. My hours were 5 pm to midnight, while my classes were 8 am to 3:30 pm. Well, no one promised it was going to be easy, right?

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TTS-coded tape

​My assignment was rolling tape in the wire services room. Here's how it worked:

The wire room housed the news services machines, such as Associated Press (AP) and United Press International (UPI). These teletypes delivered a  constant, loud, clattering feed of the latest news and features, 24 hours a day. At the same time, each story was transmitted via perforated yellow tape as TTS code, which linotype machines could read and set in type. My job was roll the tape associated with an individual story, secure it with a rubber band, mark it with an identifying number, and have it ready for the editor if it was chosen to appear in the next day's edition.

The day wasn't far off when computers and digital would change this convoluted, labor-intensive process forever, but right now, it was an endless, repetitious and mind-numbing job. But it was a job, at a major and respected Texas paper, and I was only steps away from editors and reporters scurrying to publish the news of the day. I knew one day that would be me.

One day happened sooner than I thought.

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