HAVE PEN, WILL TRAVEL: PART FIVE

Memoirs of a Freelance Journalist

Reflections and Conclusions About My Freelancing Life

I find it impossible to compare the three phases of my journalism career and choose one I would consider the best. Big city newspapering from 1968 to 1980, self-employment as a freelancer from 1980 to 1997 or trade press editor from 1997 until the end? I enjoyed each phase and prospered. But freelancing provided some basic lessons of entrepreneurship that I need to record. I’m certain the evolution of the Internet changed the business of freelance journalism in ways I can’t even imagine. But I still feel each entrepreneur needs some fundamental truths to survive. So, here’s a quick list of fundamentals that stand out to me.

"That's $200 per day plus expenses."

·    Remember Rockford. As a TV private eye, Jim Rockford ranked as the role model for low overhead, living in a trailer on Malibu Beach. Most importantly, he knew regardless of the fee structure, he still was selling his time. Get a daily rate and work to receive it. Make adjustments if it benefits your long-term goal. But in the final analysis, remember everyone is working by the hour.

·    Pay yourself a regular wage and save the rest. You have to run your business as a business with yourself as the only employee. Give yourself a salary and live on that even when some large windfall contract falls your way.

·   Make every client feel like he is your only client, whether you are on assignment from Time magazine or The Houston Digest.

·    Never show doubt about the value of a completed assignment. Let the editor volunteer any criticism before you give him a reason to doubt before he’s even seen it. Many times, I became discouraged with a story and wanted to warn an editor that it might not be up to par. But I bit my tongue and rarely heard any complaints. Be assured, your clients will tell you if they have some.  

·    Stay alert for unexpected opportunities falling in your lap. My story highlights the many times that random meetings materialized into meaningful opportunities for jobs.

·    Embrace your curiosity. In freelance writing you should always be thinking about interesting story ideas or angles. But that habit should emerge in any sort of enterprise.

·    Never expect any relationship to last indefinitely. Start planning for the exit as soon as you begin one.

·    Pay your dues and use that experience to become a sponge. For freelancing, I had paid my dues with 12 years of newspaper reporting. In that period, I learned what I needed to know to produce salable stories as a freelancer. Paying dues is less about humility than it is about learning your business. Think of The Beatles performing eight-hour shifts in a seedy German bar where they needed to learn and cover every song ever written to fill their card. Observers have described Bob Dylan as a “sponge” during the years before he started writing his own music, learning every song he could find. If you want to open a restaurant, work in one first and learn all you can. 

Now, here’s an anthology of memorable articles I produced in 16 years of freelancing, listed by publication from my earliest association to the latest.

Westward, the weekly Sunday magazine of The Dallas Times-Herald newspaper

·    “A Trove of Tall Tales of Lost Fortune and Greed” (March 15, 1981)—This article shares the stories behind the five most reliable lost treasure stories in the American Southwest as selected by lost treasure magazines publisher John Latham.

·    “Sour Lake: It Bought Success With Oil But Now It’s Overdrawn” (August 23, 1981)—This cautionary historic tale profiled the rise and fall of the East Texas town of Sour Lake, an early oilpatch boomtown that exhausted its oil reserves so quickly the reservoir collapsed into a polluted sinkhole that encouraged the state to begin regulation of oil drilling under the Texas Railroad Commission.

·    “Football’s Winningest Coach: Bear Bryant and Amos Alonzo Stagg Have Nothing on Brownwood High’s Coach Gordon Wood” (November 29, 1981)—This marked the first time for me to write a lengthy feature about the legendary Texas coach Gordon Wood who had logged an amazing 361 career high school victories, outpacing Bryant’s 316 in the college ranks, with several more seasons lying ahead.

·   “Innocents In The Land Of The Guilty” (December 6, 1981)—This article explored the procedures and emotions related to the real problem of female prison inmates giving birth while incarcerated, including profiles of a couple of women who lived through the experience.

·    “Call Him Dr. Know-It-All: Dr. Richard Evans Is THE Authority In Fields Where No Others Exist” (June 13, 1982)—A lengthy profile of a University of Houston psychology professor who had built a national reputation as an expert willing to explain and speculate on the reasons for almost any sort of human behavior.

·    “The Texas Rangers: No More Shoot-outs and Six-guns. Today’s Ranger Uses Everything from Legendary Reputation to Hypnosis to Get His Man” (September 19, 1982)—Besides including a brief history of the iconic Texas police unit, this article examined its role in the state’s modern law enforcement hierarchy with a profile of one current ranger who specialized in hypnosis as an investigative technique.

·    “The Lady & The Cops: They Said Guadalupe Quintanilla Was Retarded. Now She’s Showing The Houston Police A Thing Or Two.” (April 10, 1983)—This article profiled a University of Houston professor who had overcome a troubled background to forge an association with the Houston Police Department in a bid for better Hispanic community outreach.

·    “Texas Heroes: Eight People Who Made A Difference” (July 3, 1983)—Using research from the Carnegie Hero Commission and news accounts, I located a group of eight Texans who had saved strangers facing life-or-death situations, interviewed them about the impact on their lives and included academic research about the psychology of heroic action to produce an article with some amazingly dramatic stories as well as educational insights.

Texas Sports

·    “A Couple of Wild and Crazy Racquetball Champs” (April 1981)—This article profiled a pair of rising amateur racquetball stars who won tournaments and played practical jokes on their more serious rivals.

·    “The Scientist And The Astros” (June 1981)—Well before the emergence of high technology training methods and intricate statistical analysis across all sports, the Houston Astros were employing a University of Houston consultant to offer unique conditioning programs for the players, and this article introduced him to the world.

·    “It’s A Tough Job, But…” (August 1981)—For this article I attended tryouts for the Houston Oilers’ cheer squad, the Derrick Dolls, explaining the process and profiling a couple of the participants.

·    “High School Coaches: The Best In Texas” (August 1981)—This feature represented an ambitious project to anonymously poll a selection of top college coaches and rank their selections for the ten best high school coaches in Texas, including interviews and brief profiles of each of the ten.

·   “Keeping Score With Sarcasm And Light Humor” (October 1981)—This article profiled operations of the infamous Astrodome scoreboard including tales about its reputation for roiling and tormenting opposing players and teams with animated antics and graphic light displays.

·    “Astros’ Secret Weapon” (April 1982)—This profile of Astros third baseman Art Howe captured the unsung hero’s emergence as one of the best players in the National League, including an interview with his little league coach.

·    “The Kid” (June 1982)—This article profiled the career of Jose Cruz, one the most significant Houston Astros of all time in an attempt to identify the source of his childlike enthusiasm. During my interview with Jose in the dugout of the Astrodome during batting practice, he likely saved my life by intercepting a foul ball headed straight for my head.

Southwest Airlines in-flight magazine (later called Spirit)

·    “One Man’s Election Collection” (November 1981)—This article profiled a Houstonian with an extensive collection of historic election buttons and memorabilia.

·    “Greater Love Than This…These Southwesterners Risked Their Lives For Strangers. Why? What Makes A Hero?” (February 1986)—Here’s an example of recycling as a freelancer, providing an updated version of the same story sold in 1983 to Westward, as explained in that section above.

·    “Hard Line Justice: His Brand Of Sentencing May Be Unorthodox, But Judge Ted Poe Is Leaving His Mark On The Texas Criminal Justice System” (October 1987)—This was one of several magazine features I wrote about a Houston judge gaining attention by requiring probationers to perform unusual tasks to qualify for probation, ordering everything from service on clean-up crews for public facilities to personally hand-written letters of apology to their victims.

Houston City magazine

·    “Card Sharks: Texas’ Poker Greats Tip Their Hands” (February 1982)—This article profiled Houston’s poker community, dividing it into two groups—the professionals and the recreational players playing for high stakes under the radar among the city’s business elite.

·    “End Of An Astro Era? Yankees Are Taking The Wonder Out Of The Eighth Wonder Of The World. If They Take Out The Tipsy Tavern, Can The Scoreboard Be Far Behind?” (June 1982)—This article recounted the detailed history of this legendary sports stadium while analyzing the plans for its future.

·    “They Defend The Police” (June 1983)—This article profiled several prominent Houston defense attorneys with experience defending officers against murder and assault charges, recounting the legal strategies employed in several notorious cases.

·    “Beyond Basket Weaving: The New Wave In Adult Education” (December 1984)—In this article I profiled a Houston entrepreneur who had created a new industry with Leisure Learning Unlimited, providing both an informative small business story and a look inside the thirst for continuing education as a recreational pursuit in a variety of subjects.

·    “Breaking Away: Cracks In The Houston Legal Establishment” (September 1985)—This article chronicled the historic and risky decision by three veteran institutional lawyers to leave those large firms and create a boutique trial defense firm for what they called “You bet the company” litigation while charging unprecedented high hourly fees.

·   “Restaurant Risks: Starting Your Own Little Place” (April 1986)—This article explored the risks and rewards of restaurant entrepreneurship, including a list of suggestions from consultants for anyone ambitious enough to try.

·    “The Life And Times Of D.A. Johnny Holmes” (August 1986)—This article profiled Houston’s iconic district attorney, John B. Holmes, Jr.

Salt (A monthly magazine promoting stories about social justice)

·    “The Gertrude Thomas Home: Where Beauty Is Never Skin Deep” (April 1983)—This article profiled a woman I had discovered six years earlier while working at The Houston Post. I described her as having a monopoly on heartbreak because she had devoted her life toward caring for severely disabled and retarded children abandoned by their parents.

·    “She Speaks Their Languages And Teaches Them Hers” (June 1983)—Here’s another example of recycling, in this case the Guadalupe Quintanilla story published just two months earlier by Westward as detailed above under “The Lady & The Cops.”

The Legal Times

·    “Tenneco Expands Legal Staff In Recessionary Era” (April 4, 1983)—My debut feature for this national legal affairs and business publication involved profiling the in-house legal staff at one of Houston’s largest oil companies.

·    “Bankruptcy Work Means Black Gold For Houston Bar” (August 1, 1983)—This front-page story explored the boom in oilpatch bankruptcy work that had occurred following an oil-price collapse in the previous year.

·    “Health Care Giant Charts New Seas” (August 22, 1983)—This front-page article chronicled the growth of a Houston law firm specializing in hospital representation while exploring the evolution of health care law in an increasingly complex business environment.

·    “Outspoken Texan, Baron Establishes Toxic Tort Domain” (November 21, 1983)—This front-page article profiled Dallas litigator Fred Baron as he built a reputation for representing clients injured by work with asbestos and other toxins.

·    “Texas Capital Feels Winds Of Legal Competition” (March 5, 1984)—This ambitious project involved a profile of the Austin legal community, including profiles of several major players, filling four pages in the paper.

·   “Potomac Fever Passes Quickly For Texas Lawyers” (May 14, 1984)—This article profiled several Texans who had returned to practice back home after serving time working for politicians or the federal government in the nation’s capital.

·   “Offshore Business Gives Houston Maritime Work” (June 25, 1984)—This front-page article recounted the history of maritime legal practice while exploring the role that offshore oil drilling plays in the modern era.

Muse Air Monthly (an in-flight magazine for the short-lived Muse Airlines)

·   “World’s Winningest Football Coach: Gordon Wood, Coach at Brownwood, Texas,

Has A Won-Lost Record That’s The Best In Football At All Levels” (October 1983)—If this sounds familiar, that’s because this article is another example of recycling and updating the Gordon Wood feature written for Westward two years earlier. In my defense, this magazine launched on a short schedule and the editor asked if I had any material ready to go.

·   “Tales Of Hidden Treasure: John Latham Built a Publishing Firm On Rumors Of Gold, Silver And Other Treasures Hidden In The Southwest. Or, So the Story Goes.” (December 1983)—If this sounds familiar, that’s because this article is another example of recycling and updating the treasure stories feature written for Westward two years earlier. In my defense, this magazine launched on a short schedule and the editor asked if I had any material ready to go.

·   “Bright New Lights In The Medical Firmament: After DeBakey And Cooley, The New Super Doctors Of Texas May Come From Among These Six Physicians” (January 1984)—This article profiled six rising stars of Houston’s vaunted superstar medical community and examined the evolving complexity of high profile medical reputations.

·    “After The Game Is Over: Though They Get Little Sympathy, Pro Athletes Suffer Through a Worse Transition Than Just About Anyone Else” (October 1984)—For this article I interviewed several retired professional athletes and chronicled their emotional, physical and financial transitions into retirement.

·    “Here Come The Zebras: A Football Official’s Life Can Be Glamorous, Exciting And Rewarding. But Most of All, It’s Dangerous” (September 1985)—For this article I interviewed several Texas business professionals about their part-time avocation and alternate reality officiating major college football games.

·    “Our Friend, The Alligator? You Can Hunt Them Again, But There Might Not Be as Much Excitement as You Would Expect” (February 1986)—When Texas removed alligators from its endangered list and opened a hunting season in 1985, I persuaded a small hunting guide firm to take me along on a hunting trip as its guides explored the business possibilities for adding alligators to its annual schedule of trip offerings. And Muse Air Monthly bought my article recounting the experience.

The National Law Journal (NLJ)

·    “Texas Firms Reeling From Oil Price Drop” (June 23, 1986)—My debut front-page feature for NLJ examined the impact of oilpatch economics on lawyers and firms who handled legal work for companies in that industry.

·    “A Judge With Unique Ideas On Sentencing” (July 28, 1986)—I would later recycle this profile of colorful Houston judge Ted Poe for Southwest Spirit as explained above.

·   “Jury Sentencing: A Last Stand In Six States” (January 19, 1987)—This front-page article examined the evolution and outlook for the controversial practice of allowing juries to assess sentences in criminal cases rather than leaving that aspect of trials to a judge with the help of research from probation professionals.

·    “No Apologies Made For The Profit Motive” (March 30, 1987)—This front-page feature profiled colorful, high-priced Houston civil litigator Stephen Susman and the evolution of his firm, Susman, Godfrey & McGowan.

·    “Searching For An Old Salt’s Heirs” (January 25, 1988)—This inside feature profiled the probate court work of a pair of married lawyers who specialized in the under-the-radar work of finding lost heirs owed funds from forgotten estates.

·   “Bankruptcy: No Longer A Dirty Word” (March 14, 1988)—In this front-page feature I explored the evolution of bankruptcy as a business strategy for cutting losses and the impact of that growth on the attorneys practicing in that field.

·   “Strange Quiet As Deadline Draws Near” (May 16, 1988)—In this inside article, I examined the work of immigration attorneys meeting the demands of undocumented workers seeking amnesty under the nation’s 1986 immigration reform law.

·   “A Scourge Of Doctors Garners Their Respect” (September 19, 1988)—This inside feature profiled the career of Houston civil litigator Richard Mithoff, who gained a national reputation for medical malpractice lawsuits.

·   “Probate, Texas Style” (May 22, 1989)—This front-page feature chronicled the history of Texas probate laws that had evolved to make the Texas probate code a dominant factor in high-profile national inheritance cases like the Howard Hughes multi-jurisdiction estate battle of a decade before, including highlights of legendary Texas estate legal squabbles.

·   “Increased Mobility Adds To Common Law Claims” (August 14, 1989)—In the wake of several high-profile Houston court cases over claims of common law marriage, this article explored the legal landscape of common-law marriage.

·    “They Face The Same Problems Others Do, But With A Twist” (September 25, 1989)—This inside article profiled the inhouse legal staff at the nation’s largest operator of funeral homes, Service Corporation International, examining some of the unusual types of litigation that can confront it.

·   “Law Firms Scramble For Health Business: Changes In The Industry Pose A Strategic Dilemma For Attorneys” (June 4, 1990)—This front-page article profiled the status of healthcare legal work in Houston and nationally, identifying the business strategies required by firms to remain competitive.

·    “Coastal’s Crusaders: Feisty Corporate Counsel Fight Their Own Battles” (May 4, 1992)—This front-page feature profiled the inhouse legal staff of Houston’s Coastal Corporation, demonstrating how the company’s controversial top executive deployed his legal team as a revenue generator and an industry bullying tactic.

·   “Have Gavel, Will Travel: The Wheels Of Justice Are Spinning In Texas—Literally” (April 26, 1993)—This front-page article examined the controversial Texas practice of appointing retired judges as “visiting judges” to help solve courtroom delays caused by heavy dockets.

·   “The Dead Rise Again In Court: Historical Figures Get Their Day. Legal ‘Ghostbusters’ Say Serious Issues Are At Stake.” (June 21, 1993)—This front-page feature chronicled a trend in using modern forensics to solve historical cold cases, examining legal strategies like those offered in the civil lawsuit by the descendants of alleged 1874 Colorado cannibal suspect Al Packer to clear his name or the entertaining mock trial of alleged Lincoln assassination conspirator Dr. Samuel Mudd.

·   “Blowing Whistles: Spilling Beans In The Private Sector Is Now Big Legal Business” (September 20, 1993)—This front-page feature examined the evolution and growth of civil whistleblower litigation arising when private sector companies retaliate against employees for alerting the government about corruption on federal contracts.

·   “This Hit Man Is Shooting For Arrests” (October 18, 1993)—In this inside feature, I chronicled the story of an investigator for the Harris County District Attorney’s office who had built a career posing as an undercover hit-man for hire and collecting a long list of convictions.

·   “Gaming Industry A Legal Jackpot: Lawyers Representing Gambling Businesses Hit The Big Casino” (February 28, 1994)—This front-page article explored the legal community impact of increased interest by states across the country to legalize casino operations within their borders.

·   “Fire And Death In Waco Spark A Legal Slow Burn: A Billion Dollars In Litigation Includes A Novel Bid To Hold The Media Liable For Killings” (December 12, 1994)—This front-page feature presented a roundup of all litigation stemming from the April 1993 confrontation between the federal government and the Branch Davidian church group of David Koresh in Waco, Texas.

·   “How Weil Gotshall Lassoed Houston: Using Texas Talent The New York Firm Has Become One Of The City’s Top 10 Players” (May 8, 1995)—This front-page feature provided the inside story of how a New York firm invaded the Houston legal community.

·   “He Tamed Texas’ Wild Forensic Frontier: Houston’s Medical Examiner Made The Old County Morgue A More Modern Operation” (September 18, 1995)—This inside feature profiled Houston’s legendary medical examiner Dr. Joseph Jachimczyk, who had retired at the start of that month after 38 years in that post building a national reputation for work on numerous high-profile criminal and civil cases.

·   “Fake Evidence Becomes Real Problem: From Fingerprints To Photos To Computer Data, Lawyers Are Learning To Be Vigilant” (October 9, 1995)—This front-page expose examined examples of attorneys attempting to submit phony evidence in several criminal and civil cases nationwide. One law professor assigned it for several years as required reading in one of her classes.

Houston Metropolitan Magazine

·   “Trial By Legend: When Mike DeGeurin Inherited Percy Foreman’s Criminal Law Practice, He Knew His Toughest Battle Would Be Against His Mentor’s Mythic

Reputation” (July 1989)—This feature profiled one of Houston’s rising young legal stars as he worked to succeed one of the nation’s most famous legal icons.

·   “The Finders: Local Seekers Prove Wherever There’s A Need, There’s A Market” (December 1989)—In this article I profiled a couple who operated an unusual but successful business locating things for other businesses that were difficult to find, such as older model cars for use in period movies.

·   “Expert Witnesses: A Growing Sideline For Know-It-Alls” (January 1990)—This article explored Houston’s importance as a place that could provide experts in many technical fields for testimony in civil lawsuits and the agencies involved in matching experts with lawyers-in-need.

·   “Trigger-Happy Cops? With More Trouble On The Streets And Fewer Officers To Face It, Does Houston Have The Right People Behind The Badge?” (May 1990)—This article chronicled Houston’s historic struggles with police brutality, and examined new training and recruiting methods aimed at reducing confrontation.

·   “Divorce In The Boardroom: Today’s Business Must Be Ready To Face ‘Marital’ Woes” (July 1990)—This article explored the fundamentals of procedures for businesses breaking apart with examples from recent Houston business splits at firms and partnerships large and small.

·   “Lawyers Vs. Lawyers: As Legal Malpractice Cases Grow, Suing Your Attorney Has New Appeal” (November 1990)—This feature explored the evolution of legal malpractice litigation and the increasing acceptance by some local attorneys to represent clients in suits against their own kind.

·   “That Magic Moment: When Inspiration Came To Call, These Local Entrepreneurs Were Ready” (July 1991)—For this article I interviewed several successful Houston entrepreneurs in an effort to pinpoint the exact circumstances for their discovery of the new niche or need that led to creation of their businesses.

·   “Not Just For Laughs: Business Humorists Shoot The Bull For Fun And Profit” (October 1991)—This article explored the relatively unheralded community of local humorists earning a living by serving as hosts for corporate retreats and private business meetings.   

·   “Be Careful Of What You Wish For: Most Of Us Have Dreamed Of Coming Into A Fortune. For These People Their Dreams Came True And Then Their Troubles Began.” (December 1991)—In this feature I explored the concepts of windfall psychology by examining the experiences of several Houstonians who became wealthy all of sudden in a variety of ways, from winning a bass fishing or poker tournament to collecting a large civil court settlement.

Texas Highway Patrol

·   “Game Warden” (Spring 1995)—For this article, I spent a day with a female game warden checking boats in Galveston Bay and provided an article about that branch of the law enforcement community.

·   “Hate Crimes: A Growing Number Of Texans Are Using Hatred To Justify Violence And Murder…Again” (Summer 1995)—This article explored the evolution of hate crime laws, providing officers with information about the procedures and reasons for using them.

·   “Killer Kids: America’s Youth Are Both Killing And Being Killed In Record Numbers And It’s Only Going To Get Worse” (Fall 1995)—This article chronicled the rise in juvenile crime and the outlook for improvements.

·   “Reforming Death: The Death Penalty In Texas Has Been Criticized For Taking Too Long, But New Legislation Seeks To Change That” (Winter 1995-96)—In this article I reviewed the long history of capital punishment in Texas and provided an update on legislation pending for changes.

·   “Hypnosis: Unlocking The Mind” (Summer 1996)—This article chronicled the history of the use of hypnosis in criminal investigations, including the legal controversies over its use in criminal cases.

HAVE PEN, WILL TRAVEL: PART FOUR

Memoirs of a Freelance Journalist

Beyond Magazines: Books, Public Relations and An Audacious Exit Plan

 Besides writing continuously for magazines and newspapers, I produced four books during my freelancing career, two for sale in book stores and two for private clients. In 1989 I researched and wrote a book about The Federal Reserve System—a history of the Fed to be used in high schools as an additional textbook in economics or history classes.

In 1991 I was hired by a publisher to research and write a coffee table book about Houston, entitled Gateway to the Future. In both cases, the publishing companies contacted me through referrals from magazine editors in my client list.

The publishers for both of these books paid a set fee for all rights--$1,250 for the book about the Fed and $2,500 for the Houston book. The publisher for the Houston book, Windsor Publishing, also sold advertising inside the book and made most of its profits from that. When the Windsor editor contacted me, he asked me to send him an outline for a book about Houston if I were to be hired to write one. I was able to do that within a day, based on my knowledge of the city where I had lived and worked since 1971. Windsor even staged a couple of book release events at bookstores where I would sit and autograph copies of Gateway. One of these found me seated beside an author peddling a book titled The One-Hour Orgasm. Needless to say, he received more attention than me.

Compared with the experiences from the two publishing company books, the two privately published projects proved both more interesting and more profitable. The first contract landed in 1992 when a publishing entrepreneur in Connecticut contacted me on a referral from the ASJA membership directory inviting me to apply for a contract job writing a history of a Houston company called Big Three Industries. This publisher had created a business reputation producing corporate histories in the Northeastern U.S., and Big Three’s retention of him for its book represented a geographic expansion opportunity. He needed a journalist in Houston to interview company executives and research documents, offering me $15,000 plus expenses (equivalent to $28,000 in 2021) to produce a book during the next year.  This deal ranked as the largest single-project fee in my freelancing career—but I’m still not sure it passed the test of the Rockford Rule for $200 per day based on the time I would spend to complete it.

Founded in 1920 by the father of a legendary, innovative and colorful Houston oilpatch entrepreneur named Harry Smith, Big Three had grown from a regional pipeline welding operation into the nation’s largest producer of industrial gases for the petrochemical industry. In 1986 the French industrial gases giant Air L’Quide had purchased Big Three as a wholly owned subsidiary, leaving its operations much as they had been before the acquisition.

But the corporate leaders in Paris had changes in mind for greater control, so the Houston executives wanted to finally produce a hard-hitting corporate history that would tell the legendary story of the company and its founders before the French had a chance to shutter access to company documents and interview sources. So, they retained Greenwich Publishing to produce that book, and Greenwich hired me to write it.

At 82, Harry Smith in 1993 was purported to be a crusty old character with no time for nonsense. Ousted as chairman after the acquisition but still healthy, Harry had established a small oil exploration investment firm in an office in Houston’s River Oaks area where he spent several days each week working just as he had all his life. His successors at Big Three could not predict how Harry would react to my questions and my tape recorder. Without Harry’s personal story, however, there could be no book. But he welcomed me with open arms and even grew impatient for our interviewing sessions, which covered many days for two hours at a time.

He really wanted to tell the story of an ambitious young man expelled from high school for pranks, drifting around Mexico and playing professional golf there and finally coming home to assume control of the family welding business, inventing the concept of moving industrial gases through pipelines to petrochemical plants as that industry developed along the U.S. Gulf Coast in the 1930s.

Besides getting Harry’s story, I needed interviews with his top lieutenants to fill out the narrative. When I called one to arrange an appointment, his wife described him as near death and unable to talk. A few days later, however, she called back and said if I still wanted an interview I should come to their house immediately—“like today.” It was the first time in my career I had gotten a literal death bed interview.

Whlle I worked on the book, however, the absorption of Big Three into the global conglomerate was moving faster than anticipated. The French executives seized absolute control of the Houston operations and decided to kill the book project. But the local leaders remained keenly interested in finishing it anyway. They made one final effort to persuade a change of heart, sending me to visit one of the French executives at his summer estate near San Francisco, show him a draft and discuss it with him.

That meeting ended as I expected with the foreign executive astonished that Harry Smith and others had provided so much detailed insider information about their business. He laughed in my face at the idea of producing a book like this and sent me back to

Houston. Nevertheless, in one final act of defiance, the locals decided to proceed in secret. The company paid us in full for the book, which it published in a limited edition for a select group of company veterans. Harry in particular expressed his pleasure in a letter. And over the years I have received requests from several Big Three old-timers for copies of the “top secret” volume we titled “Built on the Air.”

Although shorter, the fourth book of my freelancing career proved just as interesting as the history of Big Three. And it represented the only time in my 16 years that my small annual classified ad in the Yellow Pages paid off, finally earning enough to cover the $1,600 total spent since 1980 for the listing under “Writers.” This project began with a phone call from a Vietnamese refugee who had reviewed those listings seeking a writer to produce a book about his life story.

He called himself Dan Vo, but over the course of our project I would have reason to doubt that as his real name. Due to the mysterious and clandestine elements of our brief relationship, I came to believe he might have been living in Houston under the U.S. government’s witness protection program. He always insisted on meeting at my home for our interviews in 1994, refusing to provide a phone number and calling me instead to make arrangements for our schedule. He offered no information about himself beyond what we needed for the book. Of course, I felt a bit concerned dealing with such a sketchy fellow, but I couldn’t resist the lure of the story he told or the $5,000 fee I eventually received for production of a book we decided to call “China Green.”

On the business side, my negotiations for compensation of this project allowed me to finally experiment with a sideline business idea that had been fermenting in my brain for several years without any opportunity for implementation. I had concluded early in my business that a market existed for personal memoirs with me ghostwriting privately financed books for subjects who wanted to bequeath a legacy of ideas and experiences to their descendants. I had even discussed the idea with a couple of estate attorneys, hopeful they might have elderly clients interested in combining a memoir with a will as part of their estates. I even had produced a couple of brochures marketing a business I called Personal Biography Unlimited, extolling the importance of leaving more than money for one’s heirs.

Besides being too busy with magazine and newspaper assignments to mount an aggressive marketing effort, however, I also struggled with a formula for compensation that would allow me to collect a profitable hourly fee while allowing the customer to know precise costs before signing a contract. I had developed a rough blueprint for compensation in my mind without attracting any clients for negotiation. Then Dan Vo found me in the phonebook, and I made him my personal memoirs Guinea pig.

Dan knew exactly what he wanted. He tempted me by saying he had an extremely interesting story to tell that might be worthy of sale to Hollywood. Of course, I had heard that before, but you never can predict when someone really will have a story worthy of sale to Hollywood, so I continued to listen. It grew more realistic when he explained he did not want a writer to pitch it for him.

Instead, he wanted a writer to produce a rough literary version that he could then pitch himself. He wanted the writer to remain anonymous while agreeing to accept nothing from any subsequent sales of the story for film or to a major publishing house. He wanted to offer our manuscript as a project written by himself. In short, Dan was willing to invest his own money to pay me to record his story in his belief he could sell it for broader circulation. And, at worst, he said, he would have a readable book for his descendants—a comment that echoed my marketing material for Personal Biography Unlimited.

I realized that my agreement to those terms might cost me an opportunity for attachment to a multi-media project with windfall potential. It seemed clear, however, he would not tell his story without it, so I would never find out either way. Still, I had to be paid for whatever work I would contribute. Using my compensation blueprint and applying the Rockford Rule, I offered to produce his story at an hourly rate to cover the time for recorded interviews, transcriptions and a narrative manuscript about his life story. And I agreed to cap my fee at $5,000—even if the project required more than 200 hours to complete at $25 per hour. I estimated I could do this job well within that time period or at least close enough to make it profitable. At that point Dan would receive the interview tapes, the typed transcripts and a reasonably literate manuscript. If he decided to publish the manuscript as a book himself or wanted me to assist his pursuit of a movie-deal, we could negotiate additional fees for my assistance in that phase.

Dan agreed to the terms and signed the contract I drafted without any help from an attorney. He paid an advance of $1,500. As he told his story, I grew relieved to learn it did not have Hollywood in its future, at least in my opinion. But it proved interesting enough as it followed him across the Pacific as a child of the so-called boat people after the 1975 fall of Saigon and into the home of his relative-sponsor in Maryland where he grew up.  Working in the Washington D.C. area, Dan got involved with a Chinese gang that operated a human trafficking ring. As an undercover operative for the U.S. government, Dan had helped to destroy the gang, sending dozens of its members to prison.

Or, so he said. If I had been writing his story as a journalist, I would have spent countless additional hours double-checking the records and interviewing other sources to ensure it all actually happened as he had said. But I viewed my role with Dan as ghostwriter for a vanity book and realized he would not have paid overtime for those extras.

When he arrived at my house to receive the tapes, transcripts and manuscript, Dan still owed me $3,500. I worried that I was about to get stiffed because I didn’t even have an address to use in a small claims court lawsuit if he just said thanks and left. Instead, he sat at my kitchen for two hours reading the manuscript before making final payment. Of course, he paid in cash with $100 bills, and I never heard from him again.

Inside my brochure for Personal Biography Unlimited

In the process, however, I concluded my compensation scheme for personal memoir ghostwriting as a sideline probably held merit. But I still never had time to mount any sort of marketing effort to attract more clients. I did keep a list of potential targets, clipping stories in the papers about doctors or architects retiring at the top of their professions—people with money and stories to tell that would fall short of marketable autobiographies.

Meanwhile, I also wondered if the next knock at my door might be someone demanding I lead them to Dan Vo. And every time a new movie surfaces about human trafficking from China, I take a peek to see if the plot resembles anything I heard from him. So far, it appears our manuscript of “China Green” represents the only version of his tale.

Public Relations

While technically “free” to write for anyone willing to pay me, I realized early that I needed to move cautiously about accepting assignments from public relations firms. Because I wanted to work primarily as a journalist, I could not risk the potential damage to my credibility if editors suspected I wanted to peddle stories for PR clients boosting their business. This aspect of freelancing hit me in the face almost immediately when I contacted the first editor of Houston City magazine in 1980 with a story idea about an historic Houston business specializing in fountain pens. Instead of considering the merits of the story, he challenged me to prove that I was not working for the business. I wasn’t. But the encounter made me think this editor had been burned by some PR practitioner posing as a freelancer. So, I took note.

During the next 16 years, I would accept writing jobs for a variety of Houston PR and marketing firms, but I steadfastly refused to engage in pitching press releases to the media. I wanted to work in the shadows, functioning as an information provider rather than a pitchman. Most PR practitioners need contract writers because they excel at smooth talk rather than writing. And I enjoyed some interesting experiences on the writing fringes of PR where the pay exceeded the $200 per day required by the Rockford Rule.

One example of a typical PR freelancing assignment concerned my work for Goldstein Communications on behalf of its client, Houston real estate developer Ed Wulfe. The Goldsteins were a husband-and-wife team without any staff while Ed helmed a large company developing malls and strip centers across the city. Ambitious and energetic, Ed wanted someone to ghostwrite essays for placement in professional journals or newspapers promoting himself and his company. He hired the Goldsteins, and they hired me. I can’t recall how they found me, but they agreed to my hourly fee and likely charged Ed quite a bit more.

Ed’s essays covered a wide range of subjects, political to instructional. Our first collaboration involved his desire to share his method for brainstorming. I attended one of his staff brainstorming sessions and carefully recorded his rules for effective brainstorming, such as building off someone’s really lame idea without insulting them. I actually found the assignment intriguing and delivered a pretty impressive article that was published under Ed’s byline in a national professional journal. Ed was ecstatic. He wanted more.

He started calling me directly at all hours of the day and evening with his latest ideas on subjects. When I finally informed him he had to work through the Goldsteins and could not call me directly, he said: “To hell with them.” Ed offered me a job writing for him—speeches, essays, op-eds—he had ideas for everything. After thinking briefly about the opportunity, I ultimately concluded it would be the kiss of death for my business if I got a reputation for stabbing my benefactors in the back and stealing their clients. I reported the offer to the Goldsteins who responded by terminating our relationship. So, I lost Ed and the Goldsteins.

Another small shop found more effective ways to deploy my journalistic skills in the pursuit of PR. It hired me on several occasions for media training of corporate executives. Basically, my job involved playing rough with an executive during a practice interview so he could learn how to be polite with rude reporters.

On another assignment, this firm teamed with a larger firm on a complex training project for the Houston office of Australia’s Broken Hill Petroleum Company. They recruited about a dozen journalists including me to respond to a scripted exercise involving an imaginary offshore well blowout that killed people. Neither the reporters, nor the Broken Hill execs knew the script and both teams had to learn about events unfolding in real time with a group of actors and PR representatives fielding questions as if they were emergency workers and law enforcement.

The grand finale occurred at high noon when Broken Hill’s CEO attempted to answer questions at a practice press conference to update the reporting team on the day’s events. The PR firms scored well when the CEO discovered the reporters had learned more about the disaster than his staff, leaving him to flounder unmercifully while facing our questions. Then, of course, the PR representatives took him aside for a debriefing about ways to improve both the media presentations and the internal investigations of company disasters. 

Other PR opportunities emerged from unlikely spots proving that every entrepreneur should remain alert during all encounters. Remember that waiter job I had for a couple of weeks at the start of my freelancing business in 1980? A couple of years later I received a call from the management consultant who had hired me for lunches there while he reorganized the restaurant. He tracked me down because he needed some writing to help market his new business as a provider of commercial signage.

He had just landed a large contract to place signs inside Houston’s Intercontinental Airport directing visitors to the restrooms, escalators, baggage claim and other important locations. He hired me to ghostwrite an article about him and his business under his byline, of course. He was thrilled when The Houston Business Journal agreed to publish it. The airport contract had given him credibility, and our article provided lots of educational information about the science of signage.

Although they did not produce revenue, two other PR opportunities bear noting. One came from an editor at the AAPG Explorer who left that organization to launch his own little PR business in Tulsa. He offered me the chance to serve as his Texas office without

Three of my cards

really providing a job description. Two days later I received a box of business cards identifying me as the “vice president” for his Tulsa-based firm. Then I never received an assignment or anything resembling a job. I suppose he hoped I would become some sort of rain-maker in Houston, soliciting clients for the group and generating revenues. But he never called to say so. In fact, he never called again. But I kept the cards and still show them occasionally to prove that I have had a vice president title in my career.

Then, one of my bar tenders from the Richmond Arms Pub contacted me for help with his new business. Mike Byrd had started a restaurant, which he decided to call The Byrd’s Nest. My first suggestion would have been to choose a better name, one more befitting a dining establishment. Mike wanted me to write some unspecified marketing materials as well as liner notes for his menus. When I told him about my Rockford Rule of $200 per day plus expenses, he countered with an offer to provide complementary dinners on a regular basis at The Byrd’s Nest as compensation for my services. I declined and left him to fend for himself.

One PR gig that did pay off for a couple of years saw me writing content in a quarterly newsletter for a small Houston engineering company. The engineer’s marketing consultant distributed the newsletter to promote the firm’s projects and professionals.

I also wrote some copy for radio ads pitching the services of a small Houston blinds manufacturer. My client on this contract had a one-person ad agency so small he had no office. He always wanted to meet at a strip club called the Silhouette Lounge so he could deduct the drinks and dollar tips on his taxes.

Another interesting quasi-PR assignment came from a Houston attorney who paid me $500 to write a test newspaper article about his injured client in a civil lawsuit. He didn’t want to publish it. But he wanted to show the lawyers for the defendant insurance company how bad they might look if the lawsuit went to trial. I never heard if it worked to trigger a settlement, but he never called again on any other cases.

Besides writing for national publications like Time and The National Law Journal, I also produced assignments for a number of small local publications. I made a rule of never treating them any different from the big names in my client list. I considered that a good habit to develop. Anyone willing to pay me for my services deserved the best efforts I could give. During the 1980s, many would-be publishing entrepreneurs tried to make their mark in Houston—much like the ladies at Ampersand—and I enjoyed reviewing their ambitious business models as a way to learn more about the industry.

My Exit Ramp

In my office 1996

Just as it had begun in a response to a change in my personal life, my freelancing career would conclude as a response to another life change. In 1980, I needed a more flexible work schedule to take care of my daughters. By 1995, both had graduated high school and left for college. Re-examining my professional goals in light of my newfound empty-nester status, I began to weigh the pros and cons of continued self-employment versus a return to a single employer.

Although I maintained my core clients of NLJ, JOC, Money and The Explorer, I had begun to see cracks in the magazine marketplace.  In retrospect, I can clearly see how the evolution of the Internet in the next few years would have wrecked my business model. But I can’t boast about being prescient enough to have predicted it in 1995.

The treadmill and the juggling of so many articles had worn me down, however, and I still did not feel secure despite nearly two decades of survival in the freelance market. Health insurance costs continued to increase for an entrepreneur like me with no corporate papa to pay half the tab on premiums. I had not taken a true vacation since the 1970s—and I would even tell one prospective employer I only wanted his job so I could have a paid vacation, only half in jest. 

With my daughters all grown up.

More than anything else, I suppose, I never had really matured past that sensation of feeling unemployed. Despite the years of multiple, regular returning clients and adequate income from that life, I still could not believe it could happen. Self-doubts left me wondering if I had just been lucky. Have I fooled all these editors? I asked myself, again only half in jest. Looking back with the perspective of time, I hold a lot more respect for my accomplishments as a freelancer today than I did in 1995, when I was still juggling and riding the treadmill every day. So, I began looking for an exit sign.

Although I officially closed my business in June of 1996, the following year looms as a sidetrack or time of transition back into mainstream journalism with an ill-conceived foray into public relations. It began with the offer of a full-time employment from an Atlanta firm that specialized in promoting attorneys, charging huge fees to write marketing material and secure media interviews for members of its client firms. I worked in Houston, writing summaries of cases pending at the client firms and occasionally pitching prospective new clients with the woman who ran the boutique operation in Atlanta.

In closing down my freelance business, I had another entrepreneurial idea that still leaves me chuckling at the audacity of my exit. After writing several business stories about entrepreneurs who had sold their businesses to move on, I wondered if I had a business I could sell. My client-editors had all hired me for my skills, so it seemed I could not guarantee any assignments for a prospective buyer. Given my disdain for the concept of freelance writing as a true business, I thought: “If I can get someone to pay me for whatever value I might have, it would be the icing on the cake of 16 years survival.”

But the failure of The Houston Post in 1995 moved a large number of qualified reporters into the unemployment line. They scrambled to find jobs at rival newspapers or bide their time with spot freelance inquiries. Some were even calling me for advice. Thus, when I accepted the full-time offer in 1996 from the firm in Atlanta, I decided to inquire if one of the qualified former Post reporters would be willing to buy me out. One of them expressed interest.

I proposed a nominal fee of $2,000 plus 10 percent of any fees generated by my leads in the next six months. In exchange, I agreed to contact my core editors on her behalf and introduce her as my successor. I also would refer all other inquiries to her in the future. We struck a deal, and my editors seemed pleased that I had not simply walked away. They all agreed to give her an opportunity to take the baton from my hand.

Within four months of closing down, however, I had come to regret it. I did not enjoy the PR work. More importantly, the firm suffered severe money management issues. Not only had I accepted a job for a little less income than I had been earning as a freelancer, but I started missing payments. In 16 years of service for a crazy quilt of different publications, I rarely had missed a check. Now dependent on one source of income, I sat three months behind and had to use savings for basic expenses.

So, in January of 1997 I turned to my old friend—the classified ads in The Houston Chronicle and answered one seeking an experienced journalist for a new kind of venture in something called “online news.” By June 1 I started work as Deputy Editor for Chemical News & Intelligence in the Houston offices of British publishing giant Reed-Elsevier. With good pay, health insurance and a 401K, it was a position I would hold until 2004 when I accepted my final job with McGraw-Hill’s daily oil industry newsletter Platts Oilgram News, which would see me through to retirement in 2012.

Next in Part Five: Observations, advice and an anthology of my articles