Journey through storied past
Columnist Phil Potempa offers rundown on local connections, big names.
On Wednesday, March 16, 2016, I wrote the following narrative, as a greeting to Tribune readers:
“Welcome to Of Notoriety, a column chronicle you can count on to stay informed about the interesting people, places, entertainment, events and exciting offerings for this ever-growing readership, eager to know what’s happening throughout the area. In my 24-plus years as a journalist in Northwest Indiana and Chicagoland, I’ve written thousands of published columns.
And with my pen and pad in hand and a keyboard within arm’s reach, I’m smiling that this proud reporting tradition continues with today’s column launch in time for this weekend’s Palm Sunday worship services and the story of the Resurrection. It’s a perfect inaugural column topic, focusing on the local man, Chris Denton, who is walking in the stage sandals of Jesus for the annual epic production of ‘Jesus of Nazareth’ at Family Christian Center in Munster.”
Here we are five years later, and once again, it’s just a few days before Palm Sunday Weekend. When my columns joined the Chicago Tribune content and print editions of The Post-Tribune (my weekly Sunday From the Farm column relaunched here as well — less than two months later — in May 2016), it was after more than two decades of already connecting with readers at previous newspapers, including The Times of NWI, The Vidette-Messenger and The South Bend Tribune. Over the decades, iconic Elizabeth Taylor is one of the popular names who has repeatedly graced in my columns, as is the case once again, today, with a fun local connection I’ll reveal as linked to one of her eight husbands.
Our Post-Tribune continues to have a long and celebrated journalism history, just like the other Hoosier masthead ink and newsprint counterparts in our readership area.
Founded in 1907 as The Gary Weekly, it served steel industry readers and Gary, which by 1930 was ranked as the fifth largest city in Indiana. Within a year, by 1908, the weekly became a daily and changed its name to The Gary Tribune, with the newspaper’s founders J.R. and H.B. Snyder then purchasing The Gary Evening Post in March 1910 from Gary mayor Thomas Knotts. By July 1921, the two papers were merged, and today’s Post-Tribune was born as a weekday evening edition and weekend morning paper.
It was in August 1966, when the Snyder Family heirs sold the publication to Northwest Publications, Inc., a subsidiary of Ridder Publications, and the word “Gary” was dropped from the front-page banner as readership expanded throughout Northwest Indiana.
The Post-Tribune I grew up with emerged in 1974, when the newspaper became part of the Knight-Ridder media chain. In June 1986, the final afternoon edition was published and The Post-Tribune became the morning newspaper we know today. In later years, it was sold and operated by Hollinger International as part of The Sun-Times Media Group in 1998.
Then in 2014, this newspaper joined today’s parent company umbrella under The Chicago Tribune Media Group.
The Post-Tribune, like The Chicago Tribune, has continued the time-honored tradition of showcasing various columnist bylines to encourage opinion and discussion about a wide range of topics. Syndicated Hollywood columnist Jimmie Fidler originally anchored the pages of The Post-Tribune from the 1940s through the 1960s. In more recent decades, movie critic Roger Ebert, entertainment wag Bill Zwecker and news and pop culture columnist Richard Roeper are some of the noted bylines to appear in The Post-Tribune alongside longtime local columnist personalities like Mike Hutton, Jerry Davich, Blaine Marz, Bob Kostanczuk and critic Jim Gordon.
One Post-Tribune columnist, who used to appear in the newspaper as a nationally syndicated columnist, is Dr. Robert Wallace, who also boasts humble ties to Gary and Northwest Indiana. I first met Dr. Wallace in 2005, when we served as guest speakers in the ballroom of the Radisson Hotel at Star Plaza at the 23rd Annual Northwest Indiana High School Luncheon hosted by the Inter-Club Chamber Council.
Dr. Wallace began penning his syndicated advice column for teens titled “Tween 12 and 20” in 1976, originally distributed by Copley News Service, today it appears in 300 newspapers and publications under the stable of columnists and features from Creators Syndicate.
Born and raised in Gary with Irish immigrant parents, Dr. Wallace graduated from Horace Mann High School in 1954 and Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois, in 1958 with his bachelor of arts degree, before his master’s degree in education from Northern Illinois University and then a doctorate in educational philosophy from Western Colorado University. His columns sometimes include local references to “football games at Gleason Field” and “running cross country at Cressmoor Country Club in Hobart,” as well as his Gary school days as a pal of Emerson High School football star Alex Karras, who eventually played for the Detroit Lions and became a TV sitcom actor.
Early in his career, Dr. Wallace spent time as an English teacher and basketball coach at La Quinta High School in Garden Grove, California, and he told me during that time, he met a memorable student who later found unlikely fame.
“It was years later that I received a letter from my former student Larry,” Dr. Wallace told me.
“He said he always remembered my class, and that I had made an impression on him. He also thought he should reach out to me because his little known name had suddenly made international headlines, since he, Larry FORTENSKY, had just become the eighth husband of actress Elizabeth Taylor, with the couple married at a wedding held at the Neverland Ranch of her friend Michael Jackson.”
Fortensky died at age 64 in 2016 and Taylor, died a decade ago this month at age 79 in 2011. But Dr. Wallace is very much alive and well at age 88, living in Galesburg, Illinois, where he continues to write his syndicated teen advice column answering hundreds of letters received each week, with the help of his typist wife Mona and the support of their children Deborah and Robert. Jr.