Former Newsday reporter Dick Zander dies

Dick Zander knew a good story when he heard one.

The former Newsday political reporter, editor and columnist was still early in his career, covering the 1961 Nassau County executive race, when he overheard a party official berate Republican candidate Robert Dill, telling him "I'm running things" and to "shut up."

The 120-word item on the embarrassing exchange, recalled Zander's friend and colleague Tony Insolia, helped catapult Dill's opponent, Eugene Nickerson to the slimmest of victories.

"That had more impact than any story he ever wrote," said Insolia, who later became Newsday's editor. He called Zander "a newspaperman to the core."

Richard R. Zander, who came to Newsday in 1956 and was instrumental in growing its state Capitol coverage during the 1960s and '70s, died Friday at his Bradenton, Fla., home from complications of congestive heart failure, said his wife, Amy Zander. He was 82.

He came from a family of journalists: his father was a Chicago newsman and his mother had a popular crime column in the Daily News. After a stint in the U.S. Marine Corps, Zander followed in their footsteps, beginning with the Bridgeport (Conn.) Herald in 1955.

"He had terrific journalistic integrity," said Amy Zander, his wife of 56 years. "He was a presence."

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Zander, a Roslyn Heights resident who later lived in upstate Averill Park, wrote upon his retirement in 1990 from Newsday, that he tried to "act as a civics teacher in an effort to let people know how things work."

Colleagues said his talents ran much deeper.

"He brought great insight, he had great contacts, and knew how to piece a good sentence together," said Alan Eysen, a former Newsday political editor and columnist.

Frank Lynn, a former colleague who went on to cover politics for The New York Times, said Zander was effective because "he was skeptical of politicians, but not cynical."

Former Newsday government and politics reporter Irving Long, who competed with Zander while at the Long Island Press in the 1970s, recalled hours-long carpools to and from Albany, where they'd debate the respective merits of jazz legends John Coltrane and Dizzy Gillespie and governors Nelson Rockefeller and Hugh Carey.

"You could almost get an education riding back and forth to Albany with Dick Zander," Long said. "He was a gentleman and a great journalist."

Zander, a jazz lover, signed off as a Newsday staffer by writing: "I borrow from Duke Ellington. As he would have said, dear reader and dear fellow worker, 'I love you madly.' "

But his final words in Newsday appeared in a 2000 column remembering the late Gov. Malcolm Wilson: "One can envision Malcolm Wilson meeting St. Peter at the Golden Gate. St. Peter might ask, 'How'd you get here, Malcolm? How come it took you so long?' To which this kind, erudite, politically savvy gentleman might reply with a phrase that he used more than once, 'It was a felicitous concatenation of circumstance.' "

After retiring, Zander was public information officer for the New York state Court of Appeals and was president of the state Legislative Correspondents Alumni Association.

Besides his wife, Zander is also survived by two daughters, Judith Zander of Melbourne, Fla., and Jessica Page of Palos Verdes Estates, Calif., and two grandchildren. He will be cremated, and a memorial service will be private.