It wasn't supposed to happen this way.
The way I dreamed it, Charlie Taylor wouldn't retire until after
I did.
He would always be there to tell me whether these columns fit in
Travel Weekly or not, to put headlines and blurbs on them, to write
the editorials alongside them.
He would be there in the corner office, nearly obscured by all
the back issues and other reading matter he kept lying about.
He would be there if I felt like talking baseball or basketball
or if something happened in the office and I needed him to help me
sort it out.
He would be in the news meetings to tell us when we were missing
the real story or our perspective about an industry issue was out
of focus.
He would be there to speak up when the editorial department or
someone working in it wasn't getting a fair shake.
He would be there when new people came to work, making sure they
were comfortable and offering advice in such a collegial way that
they knew they could come back whenever they liked.
He would be there to get on the phone with the reporters in the
news bureaus, to keep them apprised of events in the home office,
to probe about stories they were working on, to hone the
process.
But it isn't going to happen the way I dreamed it. After 28
years of devotion to this newspaper and the people who work for it,
Charlie's retiring to Vermont and taking a big piece of Travel
Weekly history with him.
He grew up in the travel business, learning the retail point of
view in his first industry job as a reporter for ASTA Travel News
in New York at the time that the magazine was produced by the
Society's own editorial staff. He rapidly became one of the leading
journalists in the travel trade press, moving to Washington in the
late 1960s and serving for a time with Travel Management Newsletter
before joining our Washington bureau in 1970.
He loved working in Washington but when we put out the call for
him to come back to New York to run the newsroom, he came back.
For nearly a quarter century, he has been Travel Weekly's
managing editor and its executive editor but the titles don't begin
to tell what he has been to so many people who have worked
here.
He has been their trusted colleague, their mentor, their
friend.
Those of us who have worked with him are the most fortunate of
people to have had him around all these years. His encyclopedic
knowledge will be sorely missed. His passion for the work and the
people are irreplaceable.
It wasn't supposed to happen this way but it has and we wish him
many years of health and contentment.