Brian Neale was one of the more talented sports “desk” people to come through The Sun in the 30-plus years under discussion here. He had a Missouri journalism degree, practical experience at a small daily in South Carolina, copy-editing talent and a flair for page design. And he did a lot of good work for us for the two years (or so) he worked in San Bernardino.
It perhaps isn’t fair, then, for me to have Brian Neale pigeon-holed as “the guy who represents the point when I lost touch with the staff.”
In reality, the younger staffers almost certainly had stopped seeing me as a peer years before. I just didn’t tumble to that fact at the time.
But after Brian Neale came and left … I was under no delusions. I was too old, the kids were too young, and I had scant idea what shenanigans they might be up to away from the paper. And sometimes even while on the clock.
I recall Brian Neale first and foremost as a party animal. Of course, he was young. Mid-20s. A lot of the guys at the start of this “Season” series were just as young and maybe more reckless, a couple of decades earlier. But back then, I had at least a notion of what was going on.
But let’s start with how he got to San Bernardino. By the middle 1990s, the sports desk was turning over with distressing frequency. Layout and page design were becoming specialized fields; you no longer could just drop an out-of-season writer/reporter into the layout job and expect a coherent section. Page-layout terminals just about killed that option, and daily color finished it off.
Working on the production side now required cutting-edge talent, and that talent rarely stayed anywhere very long because proven production-side ability would quickly lead to a job at a bigger and better paper. We were raiding each other’s desk operations constantly, and the good deskies rose rapidly, made money faster and slid more easily into titled jobs than did reporters.
So when we lost someone like that … and we had lost a guy named Larry Nista (who went to the Register and now is at the Washington Post) … it was work to find a competent replacement.
Then, finding desk people is the hardest part of any sports editor’s job. Almost nobody gets into sports to be a behind-the-scenes guy, stuck in the office. Almost everyone wants to be at the event, covering it, writing about it. They become sports deskies under duress. Or maybe they’re stolen from the news side with some vague promise of hanging out with younger, hipper, harder-living people.
We were about an 80,000 daily, back then, and Neale was a good candidate for us. A 1992 Mizzou grad who had done a year or so at Anderson, S.C. We could offer a raise and get him from the Deep South to SoCal. There never was any question he was a good hire.
Turns out, I never really connected with him. Not on a personal or professional basis. It was, perhaps, inevitable, given the age gap, my preference for writing (rather than production), which took me out of the office too often … and his preference (at the time, anyway) for socializing.
First, the work side. Brian didn’t get (or, more likely, disagreed with) how I thought a sports section should be constructed. I wanted “modular” with a high story count. I wanted a clearly identifiable center piece. I wanted breakouts and lots of points of entry.
Brian may have wanted some of that, too, but he tended to drift in other directions (probably toward what I considered “too artsy”), and I was frustrated by the sections he was turning out.
By 1992, I was the daily columnist, as well as sports editor, and I really didn’t want to be involved in the production side of stuff. Not the nitty-gritty. But when Brian took over as the five-day-a-week production honcho in 1994, he did stuff with the section that I didn’t like.
Eventually, I could stand it no longer … and worked four or five consecutive Saturdays putting out the Sunday sections. The biggest and most complicated of the week. Brian was there, but I was going through the wires and doing layout on paper, the old-fashioned way, and Brian was paginating and doing some copy editing. I can’t imagine he was happy. It was a fairly overt repudiation of him.
I hoped he would pick up by osmosis what I was looking for, and perhaps he did — though he no doubt thought that my preferences were outmoded. But the whole episode indicated the difficulty we had getting on the same page. I couldn’t communicate what I wanted … or maybe he just thought I was wrong.
He did some good work. Especially on the design side. But I had a sense he wasn’t particularly serious about his work, back then … and that he tended to coast. Especially when I wasn’t around.
Meanwhile, he was leading a colorful social life.
He had a girlfriend from the office. He eventually had a clubby circle of work friends, guys his age or younger, and some barely out of high school. And they partied. A lot. With Brian as the focal point of activities.
Or so it seemed to me, and my conversations with some of the principals, after the fact, have never dissuaded me from that picture.
Neale shared a house in north San Bernardino with a staffer or two, and it was Party Central. Brian and the lads would put out the section and stay up late. Way late. On warm nights, they apparently pulled an extra couch out on the driveway and sat there, in the dark. One of the girls who cycled through their social events said the couch on the driveway reminded her of the Fourth of July, “you know, when you take the furniture outside to watch fireworks,” and the couch forever after was known as the “Fourth of July” couch.
His parties/gatherings were very big among the younger staffers, which was just about everyone on the desk side. Six, seven people, with interns and maybe some of the hipper news-side people making cameos.
I imagine folks of his generation could generate all sorts of stories. But the one I was told (and recall) involved his quasi-girlfriend.
Brian may not have treated her well, or perhaps she was difficult, or perhaps a bit of both.
They were arguing. Loudly. As a more-formal-than-usual event was starting up. Just as some first-time visitors came to the door. Someone who didn’t know the place. And as these people knocked, Brian’s girlfriend flung open the door and stormed noisily out of the house and into the night. And Brian apparently said, quite calmly, to the startled newcomers, “Don’t mind her. She’s just the lesbian who rooms with us.”
Rumors of stuff I heard about: Del Taco runs that included pilfering a case of hot sauce off a delivery truck — just because. Off-road-like drives into the hills and vacant lots of north San Bernardino — in the middle of the night. (One hill was known as TB Mountain — because the lads liked to drive up there and eat their Taco Bell tacos while admiring the view.) A foray into the San Manuel Indian Casino with a couple of guys — including an intern trying to take into the casino a stray dog he had just found.
Hijinks.
Brian had a keen wit. And it could be cutting. Some may perhaps recall takeoffs on the name of staffer “Chuck Hickey” (Pants Gooey) that the staff indulged itself in. Someone went to the trouble of creating a file for these names, and Brian contributed dozens, if not hundreds of entries. Some of them among the most scatological.
Brian did seem to make a connection with Mike Davis, who at that time had been at The Sun for all but one year since 1976. Brian declared Davis to be “the coolest old dude I ever met” (Davis was perhaps 43, at the time.) I believe they talked about music a lot.
Sometime in here, too, Neale came up with a nickname. “Shouldie.” At first, it confused me, because another legendary Sun sports party animal had been named “Schulte” (see the 1979 Jim Schulte entry), and he pronounced it SHUL-tee. It sounded a lot like “Shouldie.” I at first thought, as did a couple of the older staffers, that it was some sort of reference to the earlier guy. But that made no sense since none of the New Guys knew Schulte — and probably never had heard of him.
Turns out, some of Neale’s co-workers decided that his neck was not sufficiently long enough … and that his head seemed to sprout directly out of his shoulders. Hence, “Shouldie.” Seemed obvious to them. Caused serious confusion for me.
And the party went on. Some said it even moved into the office, on nights I wasn’t around. And involved breaks on the Sun roof with “controlled substances.” I didn’t see this myself, so I can’t vouch for it. It could be apocryphal, as long-ago events tend to become. I just know it was talked about, and eventually even the out-of-the-loop sports editor heard about it.
Whatever happened, it probably wasn’t much different, I suppose, than the actions of my first sports editor, who used to slam a beer or three on his “dinner” break and finish putting out the paper in a state of inebriation. This was in the middle 1970s.
But I felt silly that this stuff (apparently) went on around me, and I was blissfully ignorant.
Whatever actually happened, Brian’s career didn’t suffer. He and his girlfriend (not the one mentioned above) left for the St. Petersburg Times in the summer of 1995. St. Pete always has been known for its graphics and use of color, and that was a big move for Brian.
A few years later, he moved on to the Chicago Tribune (where he sometimes wrote stories on test-driving motorcycles) then to a dot-com site … where he is one of the top executives. He made the move to the web while so many of the rest of us stayed in print … and were part of the Great Purge of 2008.
Brian Neale was not a bad guy, in the middle 1990s, when he worked for The Sun. The tales that eventually percolated out about that time … when I compare them to what I know went on when I was his age … they are of the same ilk.
They stick with me, though, because they represented a greater, melancholy truth of age and social distance and “boss vs. rank and file” — a truth I forever will link to the name “Brian Neale.”
I no longer knew what my own staff was up to.
16 responses so far ↓
1 Doug Padilla // Jun 30, 2008 at 1:30 pm
One night three of us are at TGI Friday’s (of course). It’s Brian, myself, and somebody else I can’t remember. Maybe that girlfriend. At least one member of the group across the bar looks familiar and the bartender confirms the group is from the band Slayer. Seriously. They had some gig in San Berdoo the next night.
With a Nirvana song playing in the bar, Brian happens to say to us, “Now here’s a real band, unlike, let’s say, Slayer.” Turns out the band member closest to us hears.
“Yeah, well this guy is dead and we’re still out making music,” said the guy with tattoos on his tattoos. Point taken.
We panicked at first thinking we were going to get a bloody beat down by the band once we left the bar. Then we thought about how cool it would be to have bumps and bruises given to us by Slayer. What a story it would make.
Turns out they didn’t care. They left and didn’t even flip us off. Oh well. We couldn’t even get beat up when we wanted to. But it stands as one of my favorite moments with my old roomie. Things like that can only happen with him.
2 Chuck Hickey // Jun 30, 2008 at 2:14 pm
The thing is, and I’m about 98 percent sure of this, I don’t think I ever met him, but he sure did love adding to that list.
3 Nick Leyva // Jun 30, 2008 at 4:10 pm
Wow, the worst things we did in the office were playing Wad Ball games after deadline and throwing the Nerf football around on the roof! Fairly tame stuff now, I guess. :/
4 Brian // Jul 1, 2008 at 12:09 am
Now that’s a classic Paulo skewering! It brought back some great memories of those days and your talent … and ruined my night all at the same time.
I might have pushed the envelope with some layouts and headlines, but I always cared about the reader. I just wasn’t smart enough back then to realize that the 15 guys I knew who read the paper weren’t exactly our target audience.
On the social front, I saw a lot of crazy stuff (dog in casino, intern toting an entire case of hot sauce, bullets whizzing by the 4th of July Couch). But I was hardly the straw that stirred the drink, and I wasn’t even around for some of the most notable events. I never hopped a train to the desert, for instance. Nor almost accidentally set the mountain on fire in an off-roading incident. It wasn’t even me who borrowed the Oberjuerge portrait off the lobby wall – or who accidentally dropped and broke it.
Out of the entire crowd, I was the guy who usually had a girlfriend, so I was actually the lame guy much of the time.
But I did have a master storyteller for a roommate, and he had a knack for turning a mundane or embarrassing situation (ex-girlfriend freak-out at party) into a story with a punch line that got better with each telling. He made us all think we were way cooler than we were. Whatever happened – even if it was just the usual 2 beers at Fridays and a box of tacos on the 4th of July Couch – he spun it into an epic tale of Gen-X-cess.
Honestly, I don’t know how you tolerated us inmates running the asylum back in 94, and I can’t imagine how fabulous some of those stories became after that short-lived Season in the Sun gave way to the next stewards of the sports section.
Still, I feel awful that it’s my name that bears the weight of your great melancholy truth – a truth I’ve since come to understand myself. I wish I could have foreseen it would someday come to this. Had I known, I’d have let you in on the secret years ago when I was skating out of town: The nights were rarely as wild as the stories (Slayer exception notwithstanding). And the worst thing we ever did on the roof was launch water balloons at Gene the guard. And none of us ever met Nick’s mom. (Not you, Leyva, the other Nick.)
5 Joel Boyd // Jul 1, 2008 at 12:50 pm
Wow. I’ve been hoping throughout this series that I might receive the honor of an entry, but now I’m not so sure.
As one of the “clubby circle of younger friends,” though, I have to stick up for Brian here — especially on the work front. As hard as we might have partied after work (and Brian’s right, it really wasn’t that exciting, unless you call beers, tacos and the 45th viewing of “Reservoir Dogs” exciting), Brian always worked at least twice that hard. He (and I like to think I, too) poured himself into the section from 2 to 12 every day, whether or not the results were what was desired. And there never was any “coasting” going on — not that there could be with the usual 2- or 3-person desk.
Brian’s right about one more thing: Reading these, especially as the series gets into my “era,” brings back a lot of great memories. I can’t say I miss living in Berdoo, but I’m also not sure I can say I’ve had more fun working anywhere else.
Oh, yeah, and Doug, you should be very afraid about your entry.
6 Albert Bui // Jul 1, 2008 at 2:05 pm
On the rare occasions I was in Berdoo (to drop off an expense report or write a local story) in my early years as a part-time staffer, I too always felt “out of the loop”. So it just wasn’t a generational gap, Paulo.
Brian, Joel, Dee-ugh, Nick J…et al. alwasy seemed like they were partying rock-star style (based on some of the stories that I was able to eavesdrop upon). At least to me, it was kind of like they were the cool, popular high-school crowd and rest of the “geeks”, myself included, just watched in wonder. I guess I always felt a little envious of how much fun they were purportedly having. By the time I made to the “desk” a few years later, the stories were legendary.
So it deflates me to read that these escapades, over the years, have been embellished upon. To keep things the way I remember, I’ll take Paulo’s recollection as gospel.
Vu
7 James Curran's ex // Jul 1, 2008 at 7:15 pm
Don’t worry Albert. They’re just doing spin control. Those dudes absolutely RUINED my husband!
8 Nate Ryan // Jul 2, 2008 at 2:02 pm
Joel, I’m glad to see you got your “Seasons” entry…no doubt there is much fretting going on as the entries tick down and so many big names (Mikee, Beast, Leah, among others) are still out there!
And though there can’t, by definition, be an entry on the famous Geoff Smith, it’s funny to read these things and recall how much a part of Sun lore he was (even beyond all the train-hopping debauchery with Doug). Case in point: Who came up with the nickname Shouldie? I believe it was Smith.
One more Brian Neale story: I won’t soon forget the day that, as an intern in fall of 1993, I covered a Raiders-Chargers game in San Diego with Brian in tow. He couldn’t get tix to the game, so I dropped him at some sports bar. I came back about six hours later, and Shouldie was toast…as blitzed as I’d ever seen him. We tried to go to some bar/restaurant we’d heard was cool and they wouldn’t let us in because Brian was wearing shorts. We ended up at a TGIFriday’s on Hotel Circle, where Brian tried his damndest to regain the buzz he’d lost en route. On the advice of his waiter, he consumed three or four “Electric Lemondes”…and didn’t feel a thing.
That’s not my best Brian Neale story, but that’s the first one I can recall, and it certainly set the stage for all those trips to TB Mountain or driving “stealth” to Vegas (I wasn’t part of that ill-fated experiment to try I-15 without lights, maybe Doug could fill us in on details) or bringing a dog into the casino.
On top of all the fun we had, Dude also gave me a couch (though thankfully not the Fourth of July version) to crash for most of the summer of 1994. Thanks, hoss.
9 Lea "Heimerman" Padilla // Jul 3, 2008 at 9:09 am
Even though I was only 17 at the time of all this debauchery you’re all waxing poetic about, it was relatively tame. Fun, but tame. Nice guys–every one of you. I mean, I married the craziest one. Had to wait about 10 years so our ages could even out, but everything works out for the best…Paul may have been out of touch with the young guys, but, in the end, everyone benefitted from the relationship. Right?
10 BTN // Jul 3, 2008 at 2:20 pm
Gee, thanks, Nate.
Frankly, I will be thrilled if nobody recalls any more stories about me, at least on this blog that will come up forever every time somebody (future employer doing a background check, for example) googles my name.
Keep in mind, we all have broader context of the kind of people we are and were back then. (Good folk, by and large.)
Despite Paul’s careful wording (he remembers his libel law well, I suspect), the dirt-diggers who might use this someday to deny me a job, or whatever, will not care about that context, and may not care that these stories are from 14 years ago.
What would they take away in my case? Uncooperative employee. Slacker. Gay-baiter. Girlfriend abuser. Probably an alcoholic. None of which accurately describes me, now OR then.
Any time I’m ever denied something in the future, I will have to wonder whether this page on the internet had anything to do with it. Think I’m paranoid? Just google my name. Or Joel’s.
We’re all older and wiser than the Facebook generation, right?
11 anonymous // Jul 3, 2008 at 3:22 pm
hear hear, btn. a lot of you are easy to find and have pretty impressive jobs. there’s a reason bosses don’t know about what happens when you’re not at work.
12 Nate Ryan // Jul 3, 2008 at 3:37 pm
Brian:
I hope it was abundantly obvious that I meant you no harm in that comment. I can understand your misgivings about how it might be perceived, and I am cognizant of the fishbowl-type existence that the Internet Generation has wrought on life in the 21st century.
I can’t edit the comments, but if I could, I’d remove if it bothers you greatly. Or perhaps PaulO could. Or at least the reference to the sports bar/TGIFriday’s that I assume is upsetting you.
Bottom line, I think you were a cool dude then, and I’m sure you’re a cool dude now…and none of the things you’ve said above apply to your character, nor do I think they necessarily are implied in either my comment or the post.
If someone’s going to deny you a job because of a fun time I recalled having with you in November 1993…well, damn, man.
Is there no room for harmless youthful indiscretion in our world anymore? If someone is doing background checks that involve researching what’s being said about people on blogs and using that as hiring criteria…are those worthy employers?
I don’t have an active MySpace or Facebook page, nor do I want one, but I do like having a place to reminisce about the good ol’ days at The Sun. It pains me to think that we can’t do that with a modicum of measured honesty.
At least there’ll be the Vegas trip…and I wish you were going. It’d be good to catch up; doesn’t seem like it’s been 14 years.
Thanks again for the couch…
Nate
P.S. I Googled your name and Joel’s. Is there something damning I should be seeing? Because the first listing for Joel is an orthopedic surgeon in Bloomington, Minn., and there’s not much beyond there (aside from the “Seasons” link).
13 ian // Jul 3, 2008 at 3:48 pm
Nate,
The problem comes from two little words in the original post. I won’t repeat them, but I’m sure you can find them,
I see the point of his worry totally. The original post was rough. Nothing said afterward can help. And removing the post does nothing because of the beauty of google cache.
Measured honesty is one thing. But this isn’t people at a bar. This is open. public. and very easy to look up.
Luckily, I do not think I will be included in one of these things, because I cannot control the tone or the way that anyone will react.
I also have enjoyed reading about the best and worst years of my life. But I don’t want the people at the interview I might have looking me up and hearing about what a blowhard jerk I was at 22. And yes, it does matter.
I know you meant no harm, Nate. You’re the nicest man I’ve ever met in my life. Seriously. But I also understand how nothing goes away anymore. Your permanent now includes hearsay. And if people tell the story enough times, it’s true even if it isn’t.
Ian
14 ian // Jul 3, 2008 at 4:04 pm
As a quick PS, I will tell you that the first thing I do after I receive a resume from a job applicant is google them. First thing. And I’m pretty normal for someone who hires for web-related positions.
15 Nate Ryan // Jul 3, 2008 at 5:29 pm
Ian:
As I said above, I appreciate the sensitivity involved here. You don’t have to work for a dot.com to understand that there can be consequences for what appears on the Internet. I am aware what it means to be “Dooce-ed”.
Again, I wasn’t talking about the original post. I’m talking strictly about what I thought was a rather innocuous reference in my comment. Here’s another true story: One night on the Fourth of July couch in July 1994, I mixed Budweiser with the hard stuff and paid for it.
If that bastion of accuracy and veracity known as the Internet is your first stop in sizing someone up, fine. If that helps you rule out axe-murderers and multiple felony offenders, cool. But if you’re going to reconsider hiring someone because they had too much to drink once as a 21-year-old, then I’m going to reconsider if I’d want to work for you.
16 ian // Jul 3, 2008 at 5:43 pm
Nate, sorry, but you don’t get it. And I apparently don’t either. Sorry I interjected. You’d think I’d learn by now.
Carry on. I’ve enjoyed all of this so far. I’ll google it in a few months to see if I’m mentioned.
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