Author: David Shama

Charley Walters is looking for news and willing to compete with other reporters 24-7 to be first with a scoop.  The St. Paul Pioneer Press columnist recently talked with Sports Headliners about his career including his passion for beating everybody else on a sports story.

Walters has worked for the St. Paul daily newspapers since the 1970’s and for about 25 years has been writing his popular notes column with headings like “Don’t Print That,” “Behind the Lockers,” “A Little Birdie Says,” and “Psst.”  His commitment to report the news once had him hiding behind a Christmas tree to learn about a baseball player’s contract.  He also hid behind a rock outside Winter Park waiting for Vikings general manager Mike Lynn.

About three years ago Walters was sitting in his car on a bitterly cold January morning at 5 a.m.  Equipped with binoculars and laptop, he was looking for confirmation that Tim Brewster would be the next Gophers football coach.

Years ago Walters and another St. Paul newspaper reporter, Charles (Buck) Hallman, made a middle of the night visit to Lou Nanne’s house.  “We go over there at 3:15 in the morning, his house in Edina,” Walters said. “Hallman is knocking on the door.  I am standing with him. …Louie finally comes to the door and starts cussing us out and says, ‘What are you guys doing here?’  Charley says, ‘We want to find out who the next North Stars coach is going to be.’ ”

By 4:30 a.m. Nanne, the North Stars general manager, gave in and told the persistent twosome that Bill Mahoney would be named coach later that day.  Hallman and Walters broke the story when it was published in the afternoon edition of the St. Paul Dispatch.

Sometimes Walters receives a news tip from unexpected places.  Walters got word on the Timberwolves being sold and moving to New Orleans from a source who was sitting in a bathroom stall when he overhead two guys talking about it.

The bathroom tipster could also be referred to as one of Walters’ “little birdies.”  How many does he have?

“Flocks of them,” Walters said.  “I’ve got them everywhere.  I’ve even got them at the Minneapolis newspaper.  I’ve got people there that for some reasons would rather have some things in my column than another one.  There’s people all over the place that if they trust you and respect you, they will answer questions and help out.”

Walters said he has the phone numbers for 3,500 contacts.  He’s been collecting those numbers since journalism school at the University of Minnesota.  It was there that he received some advice from teacher Steven Hartgen that Walters has long remembered.

“I was sitting in the front row because I don’t hear that well, and it was reporting 1101,” Walters said. “The first day of class Hartgen came in there and said, ‘I am going to give you students Hartgen rule No. 1. …Here’s my rule, whenever you are interviewing anybody, asking anybody a question, at the same time be asking why is this son of a bitch lying to me?  So that’s probably the best advice I’ve had in my 35 year newspaper career in St. Paul.”

How did the column assignment all start?  Walters was covering the Twins about 25 years ago when the sports editor asked him if he could also write a notes column once a week.  Several months later Walters agreed to leave the Twins beat and become a full time columnist.

Writing now for the Pioneer Press and the newspaper’s Website, Walters is reporting news most days of the week.  “This is all about energy, not ability, really,” he said.

Energy, competitiveness and willingness to do things like knock on doors in the middle of the night.  “You gotta be kind of nutty to do that kind of thing,” Walters said.  “You’re always snooping.  Your days are 24 hours.  You go to bed with a couple of phones next to your nightstand.  You’re always looking for news and you’re always on call.  You always want to write things that other people might not be able to get first.  You always want to be first with news.”

Once a pro baseball player, Walters sees similarities between the competitive drive needed in both athletics and reporting.  “It’s fun trying to get things in your column… that the other people have to repeat the next day,” he said.  “That’s the thrill of that, and that’s like having a big scoreboard.  Every day you can pick up the Minneapolis newspaper and other media…and the Internet, and all that, and you can look at it as a big scoreboard and you can say who won and who lost.  This is still for me a chance to be very competitive and I enjoy it.”

Walters grew up in northeast Minneapolis.  He was signed by the Twins after a tryout and had a short career as a pitcher in the organization including six games in the major leagues.

It was during spring training of 1969 that he got the Shooter nickname seen even today on his Internet column.  That spring Walters was throwing the ball past major leaguers including Detroit Hall of Famer Al Kaline who he struck out on three pitches.  Twins outfielder Bob Allison called him Big Shooter and St. Paul newspaper man Arno Goethel reported it back home.

When Walters realized his future wasn’t playing baseball, he pursued his other dream, sportswriting.  He graduated with a journalism degree from Minnesota in 1974.  “I’ve been able to do the two things I wanted to do ever since I was a kid,” he said.  “So, pretty lucky.”

As a youngster Walters delivered newspapers for the Minneapolis Tribune.  Before his customers received their papers, he had to read the sports news himself.  “I couldn’t wait to open up the package (of papers), sit on the corner and read the sports section,” he remembered.

When Walters was in grade school his parents gave him a portable typewriter for Christmas.  That typewriter launched his Neighborhood News publication.

Walters spent his summers playing baseball with a dozen or so other kids. After the games he would go home, write a story about them, and then make copies of the Neighborhood News.  His four younger siblings delivered the publication to the homes of kids who played in the baseball games.

Years later Walters found himself reporting on something far more important than sandlot baseball.  His investigative reporting and initial efforts contributed to the Pioneer Press winning a Pulitzer Prize for its coverage of the academic fraud in the Gophers basketball program in 1999.

That was serious stuff, but Walters recognizes that much of what he writes isn’t all that important.  Not compared with real life and the world’s problems. Yet he is grateful for a career that placed him in the company of so many interesting people including athletes he admires like Joe Mauer and Brett Favre, and also his own newspaper colleagues.

Among the characters he’s known is Don Riley whose popular sports column “carried the St. Paul newspaper for 40 years,” according to Walters.  Riley wrote a colorful, controversial column and he was as interesting away from the typewriter as he was in front of it.  “Everything you heard about him is generally true,” Walters said.

Riley wasn’t good at recalling names, even those of his newspaper colleagues.  “I worked next to Don Riley for 15 years,” Walters said.  “I was either Ace or Tiger.  I don’t know that he really knew my name.

“One day he (Riley) got on an elevator and was going down from the sixth floor of the newspaper (building).  The elevator stopped on the fourth floor and two people got on.  They both knew Riley but he didn’t know their names, and they didn’t know each other.

“So the elevator proceeded down.  These guys said, ‘Hi, Don.’ … Riley, feeling compelled to respond, said to them, ‘Hi, Ace.  Hi, Tiger.’  Then as the elevator went down, he said, ‘Ace, meet Tiger.  Tiger meet Ace.’ ”

Walters laughed, as he so often does, when telling that story and others.  Recognizing humor is a Walters’ habit and it helps him relax as does an occasional glass of wine and conversation with his wife, Dr. Paula Kelly, a local pediatrician.  The family also includes three children.

Next month Walters turns 63.  He loves his work and will continue his career for awhile.  “If I could write my column until 70 I would be thrilled because it’s a lot of fun,” he said.

That’s not to say he won’t write longer.  And why not?  He’s got all those “birdies” to help him.