Royko, Mike (1932-1997)

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Royko, Mike (1932-1997)

Pulitzer prize-winning journalist Mike Royko was born on September 19, 1932 in Chicago, the city in which he lived most of his life, and it was as a distinctively Chicagoan journalist that he earned nationwide fame. Royko's journalism awards included the Ernie Pyle Memorial Award, the Heywood Broun Award, the H.L. Mencken Award, the National Headliner award, and the Pulitzer Prize for commentary; however, his readers did not need any award committees to tell them that Royko was a great journalist.

Royko had a sporadic formal education, dropping in and out of school. But he received another form of education by working for his father Michael, a tavern owner, at a young age, and by holding several other jobs. The last degree he earned came when he graduated from Central YMCA High School. Royko then joined the Air Force and was stationed near Seoul, South Korea, during the final months of the Korean War. While in the Air Force, Royko was transferred to O'Hare Field, Chicago. There, he became editor of the base's newspaper. This was his inauguration into newspaper work.

Royko's first job as a civilian journalist was with the Lincoln-Belmont Booster. He became a cub reporter for the Chicago Daily News in 1959. In January 1964, the paper made him a full-time columnist. The Daily News closed down in 1978, but Royko got a columnist position at the Chicago Sun-Times, which was owned by the same company as the defunct News. In 1984, Royko left the Sun-Times for the rival Tribune ; he despised Australian press baron Rupert Murdoch, who had purchased the Sun-Times. At all three papers, Royko wrote a column whose distinctive style set a new standard for journalistic commentary.

Like other opinion journalists, Royko would comment about the news of the day; however, he would approach his topics with a common-sense perspective that often eluded fellow columnists. For instance, in an April 26, 1981 column, Royko dealt with a Washington Post reporter who had won the Pulitzer Prize for a story that turned out to be fake. The story claimed that a man was getting his girlfriend's eight-year-old son addicted to heroin. Other columnists were talking about how horrible it was that a journalist had faked a story, but Royko brought up a different issue: What if the fake story had actually been true? Royko argued that the Post should have reported the alleged dope-pusher to the authorities, even though the reporter had claimed that she had promised the man confidentiality: "What would the Post have done if it had discovered that a congressman knew that an eight-year-old child was being murdered, but had given the killer his word he wouldn't reveal his identity?… what does [the publisher of the Post ] have to say about her editors covering up the murder of an eight-year-old child?"

Royko often used his column to expose injustice. For example, a Royko column of December 10, 1973, described a Vietnam veteran whose face had been mutilated by an enemy rocket. The veteran, who was forced to take his food in liquid form, wanted surgery so that he would be able to eat solid foods. The veteran thought that the Veterans' Administration should pay for the operation, but the VA said that the damage to his face was not a "service-connected disability." Royko discussed the VA's position as follows: "How can this surgery be for anything else but his 'service-connected disability?' Until he was hit by a rocket, [the veteran] had teeth. Now he has none. He had eyes. Now he has none. People could look at him. Now most of them turn away." The day after this column ran, Royko was able to report that the VA would pay the faceless veteran's medical expenses after all. "It shows how efficient a government agency can be—a year late—if its inefficiency is suddenly splashed across a newspaper."

Royko's columns also featured fictional characters who discussed matters of political or cultural importance. One such character, Slats Grobnik, was portrayed as a native of the same area of Chicago as Royko. A column on March 31, 1972, described the young Slats Grobnik's reason for not believing in Santa Claus: "Anybody who can get in and out of that many houses without being seen is going to take stuff, not leave it." Another piece of Slats Grobnik's wisdom (from a column of January 11, 1984): "Everybody says that work is so good for ya. Well, if work is supposed to be so great, how come they got to pay ya to do it?"

Royko published one book (apart from several collections of his columns). That book was the bestseller Boss, which was published in 1971 during the reign of Chicago Mayor Richard Daley, whose career the book described. Royko described Daley as the political ruler of Chicago, a man who focused on developing the business district but who neglected the inner city. As portrayed by Royko, Daley was an honest man whose political machine was staffed by less-than-honest men. Royko said that Daley's "moral code" was: "Thou shalt not steal, but thou shalt not blow the whistle on anyone who does." While discussing how members of Daley's machine profited from certain shady deals, Royko reported (but did not claim credit for) a suggested change in Chicago's civic motto. According to the suggestion, the old motto, "Urbs in Horto" ("City in a Garden"), should be replaced with "Ubi Est Mea" ("Where's Mine?").

A 1981 movie, Continental Divide, featured a character based on Royko. The Royko character was played by Royko's friend John Belushi, of which Royko noted: "[A]s much as I like Belushi personally, I think the producers might have made a mistake in casting my part. I think Paul Newman would have been a better choice, although he's older than I am. And in appearance we're different because he has blue eyes and mine are brownish-green." Royko died in his native city on April 29, 1997, in Chicago's Memorial Hospital.

—Eric Longley