"Have you seen the bear yet?"
I was sitting at my desk in the Capitol press room, waiting for 35 county clerks to return my calls, and turned, unsure whether I was the subject of this question. There sat Dick Wheeler, eyebrows raised, mischievous smile creasing his face.
"Oh! Umm, I don't think so." The bear?
"You got a minute?" I nodded. "Follow me."
He led me out of the press room and around the rotunda to the Assembly chambers, past a door marked PRIVATE, and sure enough, there it was. A grizzly reared to its full six feet, jaws wide, claws bared. We turned to each other and laughed.
The bear was the first of many intricacies of the Capitol architecture Dick let me in on, and I was lucky to be there to listen. When The Wheeler Report linked to one of my stories, it was the first time I felt certain in my decision to be a reporter.
Dick, who passed away Friday, had become a personal symbol for what I admired about old-school journalists -- a quick wit, an encyclopedic knowledge of his beat and a zero-tolerance policy for bullshit. While his gait may have slowed over his 40 years in the Capitol, his clear blue eyes didn't miss a thing.
Some have described him as a curmudgeon, but it is in the best possible sense of the word -- he did not pity fools. When disgruntled customers would call to complain about his website, he would routinely tell them, "The owner is not in. Call back later." When a committee clerk refused to give him access to files that were open record, the elder statesman of Madison politics coolly outlined every facet of the clerk's incompetence, with a fair share of cuss-words tossed in.
But for the three months that I knew him, he became a grandfatherly figure, as many in the Capitol press corps came to view him. Though he could be prickly to outsiders, he helped reporters (even interns) indiscriminately, and was happy to divulge his privileged knowledge of the state's political plumbing. Many won't realize it, but Wisconsin is worse off without him.
Emma Roller was The Daily Cardinal's editor-in-chief for the 2010-'11 school year. Please send any feedback to opinion@dailycardinal.com.
