–submitted by Linda Maremont
Award-winning journalist and author Doug Moe was the keynote speaker featured at the 52nd Annual Madison Area Service Club’s Luncheon held at the Sheraton Hotel. A lifelong Madisonian and graduate of UW-Madison, Moe has worked as a journalist and author for almost 40 years. As a daily newspaper columnist for The Capital Times and Wisconsin State Journal, he wrote some 4,000 columns. Prior to his newspaper career, he was a writer and editor of Madison Magazine.
Doug shared some of his more memorable experiences over the course of his journalistic career. Contacted by a sports agent to write NFL defensive end Lyle Alzado’s biography, Moe’s book was aborted over a controversial chapter regarding Alzado’s anabolic steroid use. He was invited to join a transplant team flying to central Illinois to harvest a liver, then returned to witness the transplant operation to the new recipient the following day. Doug had the opportunity to interview the progeny of several notable figures including Lana Peters, the daughter of Joseph Stalin, and Reeve Lindbergh, daughter of Charles Lindbergh.
His wide-ranging experiences also included less well-known subjects such as Richard Trentlage, professional jingle writer responsible for the famed Oscar Mayer wiener jingle, and Don Featherstone, the artist most widely known for his creation of the pink plastic flamingo (Madison’s city bird).
Throughout his career, Doug has also “written books on the side,” two of which are currently being considered for movie or documentary production — “The World of Mike Royko” (a Chicago Tribune Choice Selection of the Year); and “Lords of the Ring: The Triumph and Tragedy of College Boxing’s Greatest Team,” runner-up for the Derleth Award for best non-fiction book of the year by a Wisconsin author. He is currently collaborating with former Wisconsin Gov. Tommy G. Thompson on Thompson’s autobiography.
Rotary Club of Madison, Wisconsin 