Studs Terkel (May 16, 1912 – October 31, 2008) was an American author, historian, actor, and broadcaster based in Chicago.
— Learn more at wikipedia.org
Selected quotes:
“I hope for peace and sanity — it’s the same thing.”
“I’ve always felt, in all my books, that there’s a deep decency in the American people and a native intelligence—providing they have the facts, providing they have the information.”
Conversation with future Nobel Prize winner Doris Lessing in 1969:
Lessing: “You do still have gangsters [in Chicago], don’t you?”
Terkel: “Yes, but these days they’re mostly in business or politics.”
“That’s why I wrote this book: to show how these people can imbue us with hope. I read somewhere that when a person takes part in community action, his health improves. Something happens to him or to her biologically. It’s like a tonic.”
I met Studs in the early 80’s when I was completing a radio documentary on the atomic bomb. I recall calling his office many times before someone finally picked up the phone. It was Studs and he agreed to see me.
I spent the day with him in his studio where we conducted a long interview, in his office stacked floor to ceiling with books and at lunch where he knew all the staff and afterwards bought his trademark cigar from a vendor. His role in the program was to be eye witness commentator to life in America during the war and after the bomb was dropped. He was very generous with his time, gracious and very interested in my program since he too had been fascinated by The Bomb and had conducted many interviews about it.
As an Australian journalist working here since the mid 70’s I’ve learned that in America one can find the very worst but also the best and Studs was one of the very best. We’ll miss him but fortunately he leaves a legacy of books and radio programs that tell the real tale of this country
I had an opportunity to speak with Studs back in the early ’80s while working as a publicist for a publishing company. I thought I had a book on a topic that would interest him. Amazingly, I got right through to him, and he listened so patiently to me prattle on about this great new book and the author he might want to interview.
I can’t remember exactly how he let me down, but I know it was gently. I was so impressed by how graciously he received my phone call, it has influenced my professional relationships to this very day.
Perhaps the truest mark of greatness is a lasting impression of generosity and kindness. Studs paid it forward with such gusto and enthusiasm. May his greatness continue to touch generation after generation.