Meyer's smile, work ethic made us better

The first story I was ever assigned to write for The Elkhart Truth, 37 years ago this month, was one that required a fast turnaround, after word came in that longtime Elkhart Memorial swim coach Stan Robinson was retiring.

“Get to it, kid, and make sure you hit deadline.”

That’s what was reverberating in my head, a kinder version of those words also being told to me out loud.

I was going in ice-cold, though. I barely knew Robinson’s name, let alone how to reach the man, let alone in possession of any background on his career.

Tick, tick, tick.

It was exciting – what I signed up for – but, c’mon, where was my soft landing in my new job? I thought I’d be mostly an observer on this day, type up a few leftover results from the weekend, pitch a feature idea, meet new people, prepare for my first game cover later in the week.

Nope, not today.

I became a pinch panicked, wanting to do well.

Assistant sports editor Rick Meyer calmly approached, let me know the best way to reach Robinson at school, handed me a file folder and smiled that reassuring Rick Meyer smile.

Robinson’s name was on that folder’s tab, boldly hand-printed in red as neatly as anything can be hand-printed. Inside were past stories on Robinson, scissor-clipped as neatly as anything can be scissor-clipped. If I recall, there was even a printout of Robinson’s year-by-year record.

Welcome to Rick Meyer World.

That file was a treasure trove, the kind, it turned out, that Rick compiled not only on Robinson, but on virtually any Elkhart County sports figure who had been around any amount of time. He also had files sorted by school, by sport, by year, you name it, each as pristinely maintained as the next.

I’ll never figure out how he had the time or patience to build them all so meticulously.

Rick Meyer immediately made my first story at The Truth much easier.

Then over the years, he made my world much better, professionally and personally.

Sure, he was the most organized human being I’ve ever known, in any facet of life.

More importantly, in a newsroom full of people possessing such qualities, Rick was as capable, conscientious, compassionate and friendly as anyone.

Rick Meyer died Thursday in Noblesville.

He was a man of great spiritual faith, a great family man, and a man of charitable deeds.

His wife, Debbie, is a wonderful person.

Kirsten Casteel, the oldest of Rick’s three beloved adult children, confirmed news of his passing on Facebook.

“Mom and Dad have been married 52 years and they share an incredible love story that was evident throughout every day they had together,” Kirsten wrote in part.

Some already knew this, but Kirsten also shared that Rick had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in late 2021.

A vicious irony for the man Bill Beck described as “the sharpest mind in the newsroom.”

Rick started at The Truth in 1974 as a reporter. He later became the longtime assistant sports editor and was with the company 31 years in all.

Bill arrived in 1980 as a sports stringer, became a full-timer in 1984 and stayed another 32 years, 15 as sports editor.

Other than late, longtime sports editor Denny Kraft, Bill spent more years than anybody working closely with Rick.

“Ninety percent of that newsroom was trained in journalism in college,” Bill reminisced Saturday. “I didn’t go to college, didn’t have a professor. My professor, my teacher, was Rick Meyer. I got help with writing from a lot of good people, but I learned how to be a true journalist from Rick. He taught me how to design (pages), how to think about things. He was a guiding force for me. He helped all of us learn how to be good reporters in a really good newsroom.”

Bill and I marveled over the weekend when we realized that Rick was only sports editor from 1996 to 2001.

It simply seemed much longer to both of us.

It was Rick, after all, who steered our department into a new frontier when we added a Sunday edition in 1988. He selflessly headed the layout desk virtually every Saturday night, the rest of us alternating in varying fashions between field assignments, helping on the desk or getting a night off.

Except for a rare Roundtable, a column that rotated among several of us, Rick almost never wrote by the time I arrived in 1987.

Yet, in 2001 – seeking more traditional hours in order to have more time with family – he made a remarkably seamless transition not only back to writing, but as a news-side reporter.

Rick attacked that job the same way he had attacked being a boss. His stories were informed, thorough and fair.

In 2005, Rick demonstrated his versatility again when he left Elkhart to become a marketing writer and editor for a law firm in Indianapolis. He spent the final 11-plus years of his career there before retiring in 2017.

Rick never seemed to care about recognition, but would revel in the success of others.

Often serious, Rick nonetheless loved to laugh and had a clever sense of humor.

It preceded my Truth arrival, but I’ll share one legendary example, one I wouldn’t if Rick hadn’t already acknowledged it and joked about it in a public forum several years ago.

There was a part-timer who cared a great deal about getting things right, but just couldn’t retain certain style points. Each week, he’d invariably ask on deadline if “end zone” is one word or two.

Finally, one night, Rick stopped his work, spun his chair toward the inquiry, threw one elbow up on his desk, then the other, then raised one finger from each hand. It’s up to you to figure out which fingers, but rumor is, the guy never got “end zone” wrong again.

Rick could take a joke, too.

One time, colleague Terry Mark and I kind of lost our minds during a lunch hour.

A Cleveland Little League team that Rick was coaching was suffering through a last-place season. We knew, because The Truth published Little League standings.

Rick cared, because Rick always cared, even if it wasn’t necessarily about wins and losses at that level. I recall once watching him ponder toward the ceiling as he made out a lineup before leaving work. He then changed his mind, whipped out his white-out in his ever-neat manner and switched a couple hitters around.

Anyway, Terry and I crafted a fake story sharing that parents were petitioning for Rick’s ouster – like a story you might see in The Onion. We quoted players who said Rick’s 3-hour, 3-a-day practices, on game days, were too much; and quoted parents who said they would be fine with that if Rick would actually win a game.

We were pretty full of ourselves. When I nervously shared a printout with Rick, he managed to laugh, too.

Rick and I actually became closer in some ways after he moved to the Indy area, though in hindsight, I now ache that the contact became far too sporadic.

We met up at college and pro sporting events four times and had a blast each time.

We reunited a few times on his trips back to the Elkhart area, including in 2017, when I escorted Rick, a sensitive man of nostalgia, and Debbie through the closed-down second floor of the Communicana Building that used to be the newsroom.

He had to wipe away some tears.

Rick always, always asked about my family, his interest genuine.

He and I corresponded a few times by traditional mail as well. He’d send neatly scissored clippings – naturally – of articles from down south that he thought I might be interested in.

He’d always write “Blessings” before signing his name.

You got that right, Rick. I was richly blessed to know you.