Properly Subversive/Sherman R. Frederick
In the winter of 1976, I walked into the newsroom of the Las Vegas Review-Journal fresh from the U.S. Navy and a brief stopover at the Northern Arizona University School of Journalism.
I arrived full of confidence. But, I found out quickly that as a cub reporter – technically a college intern – I would not be assigned to a team taking a fresh look at the JFK assassination or investigate the rumor that Jimmy Hoffa is buried under the 13th green at the old Dunes golf course. Instead, my first shifts as a journalist consisted of rewriting press releases, formatting obituaries and hours of listening to the cop radio.
As it turned out, however, working night cops in Las Vegas in the 1970s was about as good a crash course in journalism as any kid could get. There were three daily newspapers in Vegas at the time. We fought tooth and nail to beat each other to the stories of the night. It was the quintessential “scoop or be scooped” environment.
I have many stories to tell about those heady days. Today I’ll tell two. Both never made it into print.
KANSAS TOURIST
On one of the first nights I was left alone to hold down the newsroom, I caught chatter on the cop radio of a naked man, bound and gagged, in the lobby of a downtown casino.
A call or two followed up with a quick trip to Metro’s night headquarters revealed that a visitor hooked up with a prostitute who took him to a room where a robber lay in wait. It was, in cop parlance, a “trick roll.”
I gathered the details and set about writing what would be my first real story in the R-J. Here I should add that in those days the Review-Journal, unlike today, had a small staff and a very big news hole. Stories were edited with a shovel. We had so much space to fill, editors usually took every word a writer could write.
So, I wrote the story in great detail. Where they met … how the robber jumped out of the bathroom to bind the naked tourist’s ankles and wrists. After the robbers fled with his wallet in hand, the man hopped through the hotel hallway before hitting the top of the steep stairs leading to the lobby.
From there he inchwormed himself down, step by step, and flopped into the lobby.
It must have been a sight and I told it well, if I do say so myself.
I took it to the lead editor at the time, Mr. Roy Vannett. He read it and asked:
“This guy an elected official, a pastor or somebody like that?”
“No. He’s a tourist from Kansas.”
“This ain’t news, kid. Happens all the time,” Mr. Vannett said.
The story never made it into print and I never forgot the distinction made that night. The minor assault and robbery of a regular person is not news, even if they do wind up in the lobby of a crowded casino buck naked. But if it were the mayor of Chicago or the Episcopal bishop of New Mexico, then by all means give me all you got. (I’m not making judgments here, especially about Roy Vannett. He became a friend and mentor. I expect I’ll write more about him one day, too. For now, I’m just explaining the news culture of Vegas in 1976.)
TARZAN AND I
The second story came a few months later under similar circumstances. I’m on the weekend cop shift when I hear that there is a man running through a neighborhood screaming like Tarzan. I swing into action – pardon the pun – to get the scoop.
A man ran through a neighborhood, darting from bush to bush and Italian Cyprus to Italian Cyprus, periodically letting out a loud and remarkably authentic Tarzan scream. People called Las Vegas’ finest, who eventually caught the guy and had him in the back of a patrol car at the scene.
At the cop shop, the Metro desk sergeant confirmed all of the details and said: “But this ain’t news, kid. Happens all the time.”
“Whaddya mean? This guy’s got a prominent neighborhood alarmed. They’ll want to know what happened when they pick up the morning R-J.”
“They all know what happened. This is Johnny Weissmuller and he lives in the neighborhood.”
“Seriously, this is the real Tarzan?”
“Yep, but he’s not himself anymore,” the sergeant explained. “He gets away from his caregiver periodically and thinks he’s in the jungle. It’s sad. Everyone in the neighborhood understands. When it happens our patrol officers know to pick him up and take him home.”
It’s a service, not a crime, he said.
I took the information nonetheless and formulated the story in my head while driving back to the newsroom. Johnny Weissmuller – THE Tarzan – is on the downhill slide of life, cooped up in a suburban Las Vegas neighborhood. Every once in a while, however, he escapes his captors and returns to the wild.
TMZ of 2024 would be all over that story.
But this was 1976 and my 20-something self kept thinking about the difference between what people want to know and what people need to know. Maybe the Metro desk sergeant was right.
Meanwhile, back in the newsroom as the shift drew to a close at it came time to file stories for the night, Mr. Vannett yelled from across the newsroom:
“Hey, kid! Any news? We’re going to press.”
“No,” I shouted back. “It’s quiet!”
And I heard Johnny Weissmuller in his Tarzan voice whisper in my head: “It’s too quiet.”
POSTSCRIPT
I’ve had that Johnny Weismuller story in my reporter’s notebook for 47+ years. I’m glad to finally get it out.
ONE MORE THING
– Everything I know about the Kardasians I learned against my will.
(This column first appeared in Sun City Life. Sherman R. Frederick is a longtime Nevada writer and a member of the Nevada Press Association’s Hall of Fame. He can be reached at ShermFrederick@gmail.com.)
Sherm— Thank you ! for sharing
i met weissmuller a few years earlier and became friendly with him. he seemed to appreciate that i remembered his other famous role as Jungle Jim. in those days few celebrities lived here; most were even listed in the telephone white pages and all i ever called answered their phines personally.