The winner of more awards than any editorial writer in the Albany
Times Union’s history, Jim Mc Grath was both an Albany institution and a keen observer of the world beyond his beloved adopted city. When he died in 2013 at the age of fifty-six, the newspaper lost a writer who combined a passionate advocacy for society’s most vulnerable people with a scathing disregard for the elite whose actions created an underclass in the United States. His writing was often elegiac, but his take on his adopted home state of New York and his beloved Albany was variously bemused, witty, irreverent, and indignant. He could relate to the plight of the minimum-wage worker as easily as he could talk to a US senator, and he feared no one. His editorials and commentaries charted many of the most critical issues in New York and the country: the death penalty, civil liberties, gay rights, historic presidential campaigns, the economy, terrorism, and more—all with an incisiveness that remains relevant, if not more so, in the present political era.
In addition to his editorials and op-eds,
I’ll Be Home contains essays, critiques, and other writings that have never before been published, as well as appraisals of his work and life by former colleagues Rex Smith, Fred Le Brun, Dan Lynch, and others. The book is both a tribute to a memorable newspaperman and an insider’s perspective on politics and life through the lens of an editorial writer, a position that Jim described as ‘a great seat at a really weird show.’
Inhoudsopgave
Foreword: When the Newspaper Needed to Speak from Its Soul
Rex Smith
Introduction
Howard Healy
ALBANY
Introduction: The City That Jim Embraced
Howard Healy
The Race Is On in Albany, January 16, 1997
A Sad Note on Lark Street, February 19, 1997
Slayings Tarnish Soil of Albany’s Great Park, December 26, 1997
Drop This Case, April 27, 1998
Come Clean, Mr. Jennings, July 10, 1998
. . . A Defeat for the Machine, September 17, 1998
Albany’s Hot-Dog Politics, April 5, 1999
Justice for Ms. Mc Eneny, May 7, 1999
Time to Right a Wrong: President Bush Should Award the Medal of Honor to Sergeant Henry Johnson, April 24, 2001
Renewing Democracy Is Humbling, September 28, 2001
Jennings, Who Else? November 4, 2001
Outsiders Defy Odds in Albany, November 10, 2001
Whose City Is It? May 10, 2002
Albany’s Anguish, January 3, 2004
It’s All about the Guns, June 18, 2008
Audit the Ghosts, January 20, 2009
Jerry Jennings’s Fifth Term, Fall 2009
Memories of Larks at a Tavern, May 6, 2011
POLITICS
Introduction: Jim Mc Grath Loved Politics
Howard Healy
LOCAL
Preaching to the Faithful, March 17, 1995
All Eyes on Albany, December 22, 1999
Uneasy Justice, December 29, 2003
NEW YORK
A Voting Outrage, May 19, 2001
Voter Beware, November 8, 2005
Transcript of
As It Happens Interview on Eliot Spitzer’s Resignation, March 12, 2008
It’s Senator Clinton, November 8, 2000
NATIONAL
Farewell, Mister Speaker, January 9, 1994
Some Names Worth Hearing Once Again, November 16, 2002
INTERNATIONAL
A Chance for Peace in Ulster, May 22, 1997
Mr. Adams and Mr. Blair, December 20, 1997
Ireland’s Peace Must Prevail, August 20, 1998
George Mitchell, Peacemaker, October 22, 1998
Day of Terror, September 12, 2001
The Day After, September 13, 2001
Rising from the Ruins One Year Later, A Pause to Ponder How We Have Changed, September 11, 2002
SOCIAL JUSTICE
Introduction: A Certain Faith in Humanity
Bill Federman
More Unabomber Injustice, May 18, 1997
Cold Weather, Cold Truths, September 28, 1997
A Lesson Taught Too Late, July 20, 2001
Homeless in Albany, November 25, 2002
“No Room for Mercy, ” September 5, 2003
Injustice, February 15, 2006
A Proud Day for New York, June 26, 2011
The World Owes So Much to Mandela, December 7, 2013
JOURNALISM
Introduction: Mc Grath Thought That Newspapers Ought to Tell the Truth
Dan Lynch
Royko Was the Real People’s Court, May 1, 1997
J. Anthony Lukas, June 10, 1997
Finding Fame in Telling Fibs, July 10, 1998
Mike Barnicle’s Sad Fall from Grace to Disgrace, August 8, 1998
Editorial and Op-Ed Page Critique of the
Portland Press Herald and
Maine Sunday Telegram, August 1999
Reality Check at Skidmore, November 16, 1999
SPORTS
Introduction: A Red Sox Fan Above All
Phillip Blanchard
Introduction: “Hey, Jim, How Does Yaz Spell His Name?”
Howard Healy
A Spectator’s View from the Seats, July 23, 1995
Stanford’s Band of Cruel Fools, October 15, 1997
Sox Appeal, June 20, 2004
Thanks for the Memories, February 20, 1999
How ’Bout Those Sawx? October 22, 2004
Why Didn’t He Do More? November 10, 2011
I’ll BE HOME
Introduction: A Man at Last at Peace with Himself
Darryl Mc Grath
Somebody’s Thinking of Charlie Mc Grath, June 20, 1993
A Road to New Hampshire, December 25, 1994
Soldiering On: Another Generation, Another War, Another Cause to Honor and Remember, May 26, 2002
“Journeys Like Mine Should Never Really End, ” 2006
“I’ll Be Home”: Statement about My Work and My Goals, 2011
A Vanishing Call of the Wild, August 10, 2009
Boston, the Bulgers and Me, August 19, 2013
Small Town’s Appeal Crosses Generations: Cooperstown Sparks Musings of the Past and the Future, August 30, 2013
APPRECIATIONS
Jim Mc Grath’s Albany
Fred Le Brun
Jim Mc Grath: A Newspaperman
Robert Whitcomb
APPENDIX
Meet My Not-So-Silent Partner, June 11, 1996
Dan Lynch
Times Union Editorial Writer Appointed, November 7, 1996
Guild Mourns the Loss of Jim Mc Grath, September 5, 2013
Mc Grath’s Keen Eye, Passion Recalled:
Times Union’s Chief Editorial Writer, 56, Died While Vacationing, September 6, 2013
Steve Barnes
James M. Mc Grath, 1957–2013, September 8, 2013
Times Union Editorial Board
Obituary, September 12, 2013
Darryl Mc Grath
Eulogy, September 14, 2013
Darryl Mc Grath
Remembering Albany’s Voice of Reason, October 4, 2013
Lauren Mineau
Empowered to Do the Right Thing, December 7, 2013
Darryl Mc Grath
Acknowledgments
Index
Over de auteur
Jim Mc Grath was chief editorial writer at the Albany
Times Union. He was named the Hearst Editorial Writer of the Year several times, and also received numerous first- and second-place awards by the New York State Associated Press Association, and two first-place awards by the New York Newspaper Publishers Association. His widow,
Darryl Mc Grath, is an Albany journalist and the author of
Flight Paths: A Field Journal of Hope, Heartbreak, and Miracles with New York’s Bird People, also published by SUNY Press.
Howard Healy is a copyeditor and proofreader for the New York State Bar Association; he retired as editorial page editor of the
Times Union in 2008.
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