There was food, of course.
But mainly there were laughs, full-throated, belly-grabbing laughs, the kind that come from years and years of shared experiences with colleagues.
And friends. Good friends.
Thursday was a get-together for the ages, a rare chance for six former colleagues at The Sun to gather again. It became a walk down memory lane. The location was LongHorn Steakhouse in Tewksbury. Around a table sat 213 years of Lowell newspaper experience.
Not great at math, but that means the six of us spent an average of 35.5 years at The Sun, all but 24 coming in the newspaper's sports department.
I was The Sun's assistant sports editor for 22 years. That means, compared to my lunch guests, I was a blow in.
I was joined at the table by Chaz Scoggins (44 years), sports editor Dennis Whitton (40), Dave Pevear (37), Dan Phelps (36) and Carmine Frongillo (34). Dan moved into the news department before my arrival in 1998, but was always a close friend of the "sports guys."
As for Dennis, Chaz, Dave and Carmine, these are the guys I spent more than two decades with. Friday night football nights. Saturday night deadline crunches. All-Star banquets. We began as colleagues. We ended as friends and for that I'm forever grateful, even after most of us ended as corporate cut casualties.
The Golden Gloves. The Lowell City Golf Tournament. UMass Lowell. The Lowell Spinners. The Lowell Lock Monsters and Devils. High school athletic directors. High school coaches. The memories flowed and the years peeled back. Not everyone could make it, unfortunately, including high school historian Rick Harrison, a Sun sportswriter for 43 years.
The Sun was lucky to have these guys. Trust me. There we no egos. The readers benefitted. We had a great team and it was a pleasure to go work.
How many high school phone calls were taken? How many game stories were written? How many Red Sox, Patriots and Bruins games were covered? How many college hockey games? How many pages were designed?
How much institutional knowledge of Lowell and the Merrimack Valley resided at the table? It boggles the mind.
I'm glad I'm not starting in the newspaper business today. I'm even gladder I worked with these five men.
From left, Dan Phelps, Barry Scanlon, Dave Pevear, Chaz Scoggins, Carmine Frongillo and Dennis Whitton take a stroll down memory lane.
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