An old Denver Post story

This week a reader submitted a couple of comments that are not going to make it to this blog. And that same reader caused me a hearty laugh, because I remembered a conversation from about 1984 with an employee of The Denver Post. I was at a networking event and had introduced myself in a group.

One woman said, "Oh, I know your name. You send us a lot of letters." She was the employee who screened Letters to the Editor and decided which ones got published. She told me they were a little light on letters and said she'd publish one, if I'd send it in.

A few days later one of my favorite topics hit the front page, and I mailed in my letter. Colorado was about to lose $6-8 million in Federal highway funds because too many drivers were speeders.

In my letter I suggested that law-abiding drivers just fill up all lanes on I-25 and drive at the speed limit. That would slow down the speeders and avoid the loss of the money from the Feds.

About a month later I ran into this woman again. When I told her that some of the responses to my letter had been rather bitter, she said, "Oh, you should have seen the ones I couldn't print!" She invited me to stop by the paper and read them, but I never did.