I Am Not A Dunkin' Donuts Fan

I worked as a proofreader at the iconic New York alternative newspaper, The Village Voice, in  1982 and 1983. Back then Monday nights were special because around 7:30 or 8 o'clock the editorial staff were treated to a different national cuisine. I remember, for the first time, eating a pierogi, a sort of Polish dumpling.

At 8:30 or so, we got in a van and headed for the printing plant in Hackensack, New Jersey, working until seven the next morning, checking the page proofs for any last-minute errors that crept in before we went to press a few hours later.

Before arriving at the plant we would stop at a Dunkin' Donuts shop to pick up a couple of boxes of donuts. There might have been coffee purchased, too. Although my memory of that is kind of hazy, it seems unimaginable to eat donuts without something to wash them down.

I say all this because I recently picked up from the Little Free Library a book called Chowdaheadz: A Wicked Smaaht Guide to All Things Boston by Ryan DeLisle and Ryan Gormady, two Bostonians, with humorous illustrations by Kevin Mulkern, another Bostonian (Globe Pequot/ Rowman & Littlefield, 2017).

In this book I learned that Dunkin' Donuts began in 1950 "as a single donut shop in Quincy, Massachusetts" that "has morphed into a Massachusetts icon." The authors further state that "[t]he endless drive-through lines at every location at any given hour prove that Boston runs on Dunkin." (The book spells Dunkin' without the apostrophe. Store signage puts it in. I chose to follow the latter.)

This might sound sacrilegious to a Bostonian, but I don't like Dunkin' Donuts. They remind me too much of those terrible donuts sold at the Winchell's donut chain stores in the Los Angeles area. My go-to donut store is Krispy Kreme, of which there are too few in New York. I like their soft, sugary, and somewhat greasy texture, especially after they are freshly made.

So if I ever get a chance to visit Boston (don't call it Beantown), I would be hunting for a Krispy Kreme shop, not a Dunkin' Donuts one. And I would make sure to carry with me a copy of Chowdaheadz* as well as a good street map.

*The authors explain what a chowdahead is. It's "someone who lives, or has lived, in Boston and maintains a wicked big sense of regional pride."

Reminder: National Donut Day is celebrated on the first Friday in June. In 2024, it will be on Friday, June 7th.

The Village Voice Is 60

The Village Voice celebrates its 60th anniversary this year. The weekly New York-based alternative newspaper, which was once the editorial home of such notables as political columnists Nat Hentoff and Alexander Cockburn, cartoonist Jules Feiffer, film critic Andrew Sarris, and others, was co-founded in 1955 by Norman Mailer.

Disclosure: I worked there as a freelance proofreader in 1980 and again from 1982 to 1983.

When I worked at the Village Voice, a reader could buy it at a newsstand. Today, it's available for free every Wednesday in large red plastic curbside boxes all around the city. (In Harlem, I have often seen these boxes turned on their sides and used as seats by neighborhood men.)

Happy 60th anniversary, Village Voice! May you continue publishing for another sixty years.

Racism Should Not Be A Part Of Gay Pride

Letters to the Editor
The Village Voice
842 Broadway
New York, NY 10003
June 28, 1984

Dear Editor:

James Baldwin, in his interview with Richard Goldstein [Voice, June 26], hit the nail on the head when he pointed out that "the gay world as such is no more prepared to accept black people than anywhere else in society."

Racism, as Baldwin knows, is very much a fact of life within the gay community. It is evident in the discriminatory admission policies of gay bars and discos across the country and in the near total exclusion of blacks and other third world gays in gay magazines and newspapers. The "invisibility" of black gays and lesbians is what prompted me to write articles in the gay press pointing up the fact that blacks are a vocal and active part of the gay community. The white, middle-class male image being projected in these publications (and subsequently carried by the straight media) helps to foster the homophobic view in the black community that homosexuality as well as AIDS is a "white disease."

Until the white gay community is willing and able to accept black gays and lesbians as full and equal partners in the struggle against heterosexist oppression, they have no right to complain about homophobia. They too have become oppressors. That's not my idea of Gay Pride.

Sincerely yours,
Charles Michael Smith

This letter was not published.

Boxing: Artistry Or Savagery?

Letters
Village Voice
842 Broadway
New York, NY 10003
November 26, 1982

Dear Editor:

The corruption that Jack Newfield writes about in his piece on boxing ("The Men Who Are Killing a Noble Sport," November 30 [1982]) is not the only disturbing thing about this so-called "sport." It's also the gladiator mentality that keeps it in existence. I have long advocated for the abolition of boxing and the recent death of the Korean lightweight Duk-Koo Kim underscores that belief. When I heard on the radio that Kim had suffered irreparable brain damage and that he was close to death, it brought to mind Willie Classen who died under similar circumstances about three years ago.To Newfield I ask: Must more lives be lost? Must more families be left behind to grieve before a decision is made to put boxing--which Newfield calls a "noble sport" and I call legalized savagery--to rest?

What baffles me is how Newfield can justify boxing by calling it "artistry." Where is the artistry in two men knocking each other's brains out? Can't Newfield see that boxing is brutal and that it caters not only to the greed of those who promote it but also to the blood lust of those who watch it? Can't he see the hypocrisy of those who decry violence in the street but glorify it in the ring?

I hope ghetto kids who aspire to boxing careers will instead aspire to something far better and far nobler than fame, fortune, and possible brain damage and death in the ring. There are other options, Mr. Newfield, than the gym.

Sincerely yours,
Charles Michael Smith


This letter was sent to the Village Voice but was not published.

Adopting the Nat Hentoff Stroll

When I worked as a proofreader at the Village Voice in the early eighties, one of the regular sights in the office was Nat Hentoff, the noted first-amendment advocate and at that time a staff writer at the paper. He would frequently be seen aimlessly walking around the office with a manuscript of his column in one hand, a pencil in the other, going over his copy line by line. He was doing what I would later call the Nat Hentoff Stroll.
I have from time to time been seen doing the Stroll while reading through one of my articles. For me, it helped relieve the tension of the editing process and put me in touch with my muse.