A STORIED HISTORY: Damon Runyon, 1880-1946
Rocky Mountain News
Published February 27, 2009 at 12:05 a.m.
Damon Runyon
1880-1946 * Columnist
Damon Runyon was one of the most famous reporters to come out of Colorado a hundred years ago. He started his newspaper career at 15, covering a hanging in his hometown of Pueblo, and went on to work for New York newspapers and write Guys and Dolls.
In the beginning, though, he hopped from newspaper to newspaper across Colorado, staying only until his editors had their fill of his hard-drinking, hard-living ways.
He signed on at the Rocky Mountain News in 1906, when he was still going by his full name of Alfred Damon Runyon, and when the paper's owner, Sen. Tom Patterson, was looking for weapons in his full-tilt battle against Denver Post owners Frederick Bonfils and Harry Tammen. Runyon teamed with the paper's cartoonist, Frank Finch, to travel across Colorado and write stories about the towns and the people along the way. Their wildly popular collaboration was titled "Me and Mr. Finch."
In the columns here, Runyon and Finch visit Denver Day at the Colorado State Fair in Pueblo with their next stop at Longmont's Pumpkin Days.
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