In the old days, before political correctness was introduced into our vocabulary, if not our individual mindsets, my cultural and sports “heroes” were always old white guys. My hockey heroes: Maurice Richard, Jean Beliveau, both dead, both white. Same with my favorite movie stars, except I will add Billy Bob Thornton, who is not dead, but is white and old, and still living the dream. Favorite comedians: Jonathan Winters and George Carlin, dead and white. Favorite musicians: Van Morrison, Neil Young and Tom Waits, all decidedly white, male and old. And don’t forget authors: The list is an endless display of old or dead white guys: Tolstoy, Victor Hugo, Leon Uris, James Michener, Kingsley Amis — stop me!
Keeping with that motif, I just finished reading Dave Barry’s “Class Clown.” Dave would be the first to admit that he is old, white and male and so is more than qualified to be in my Favorite Authors Club. But being an old white guy is not enough to make the cut. You also have to have written at least one novel I have read. Now, if I had a Favorite Humor Essayists Club, Dave Barry, old and white as he is, would make the cut.
Dave Barry is best known for his stint writing a humor column for the Miami Herald, which was syndicated in hundreds of newspapers, one of which must have carried the first piece of his I ever read. And continued to read for years.
After a long stretch where he dropped off my radar — likely starting right around the time he stopped writing a column at the Herald — I noticed recently that he has a column on Substack (actually, I think the hip way to say it is he writes a Substack, but I’m not really clear with the lingo), so one of my old white guys is now back in my life on a semiregular Substackian way.
Did you know it’s thanks to Dave that we have “Talk Like a Pirate Day,” where we all get to say “Arghh” and “Avast, ye maties” for 24 hours? Dave didn’t invent it, but if you read “Class Clown,” you’ll find out who did and Dave’s part in it.
Early chapters in the book cover his early life and his early newspaper career, until comes the big day when two different papers offered him a job, the prestigious Philadelphia Inquirer and the Miami Herald. Which one will he take? He relays the story like a thriller, as though we’re all out here chanting, “It’s a no-brainer, take the Inquirer offer, Dave, take it, take it, take it!”
From that point on, “Class Clown” recounts his time at the Herald, largely the highlights of his time there embellished with the inclusion of columns he wrote at the time. Very funny stuff, especially his coverage of various Republican and Democrat primaries and conventions, where he doesn’t stab anyone in the back, but sure gets in a lot of jabs. This is when I found out, because he says so right there in the book, that he is a libertarian. Now, Dave’s job is to make stuff up, and I figured he was making that up, until later in the book when he repeats it. Once, making it up; twice, the absolute truth. But how did I not know he is a libertarian?
I think I am going to create a new category of heroes: favorite libertarians. Only old white guys can apply. Dave checks off every box, so he’s a shoo-in, right beside Murray Rothbard and Lew Rockwell.
If you like your humor gentle and witty, Dave’s your man, old and white.
Here’s another old white guy to sing for us this week, Jackson Browne …
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