by Bill Vogrin on July 09, 2023.

Growing up on 16th Street in Kansas City, Kan, I was lucky to be surrounded by a group of kids about my age who all went to my grade school and attended our church at St. Peter’s Cathedral.

But I had only one best friend: Joe Tomelleri.

As far back as I can remember, Joe T was in my life. We hit it off as kids and have remained best friends into our senior citizenship. In fact, we text almost daily. And whenever I’m in Kansas City to visit, I stay with Joe.

Social media has helped reunite me with friends from my youth who had drifted off. But the bond with them is more casual.

In high school, I made more friends and of all those people, I remain closest to Ray Hanf. I credit Ray with helping me through some tough times when I transferred from Rockhurst High School to Bishop Ward and faced some vicious bullying.

Ray also was the first person to teach me I should be a lot nicer to people. He would stop me when I was being a rude prick and call me out for it. It was a lesson I needed to learn and it took me a while to let down my defenses — and hold my sharp tongue — and allow people to get to know me.

It is so obvious, simple and yet, for me, such a hard lesson to learn that I spent my parenting years always urging my children to “Be Nice!”

In college, my closest bonds were made in the journalism school at Kansas. It was a group of smart, passionate, risk-taking, courageous and fun people and I cherish them to this day. 

And I’m still in touch with several of them. I’m talking about Bill Menezes, Elaine Strahler, Dan Martin, Grant Overstake, Lois Winkleman, Barry Massey and a few others. Here is a group photo from 1980 in the offices of the University Daily Kansan.

My years at KU were magical. They were the most carefree, exciting, fun years of my life and much credit goes to each of these friends.

Bill M lives in Denver and we’ve been able to get together for Kansas City Chiefs games and KU basketball over the years.

The rest of the bunch I typically see on Facebook. It’s a treat when I can see them in person and usually we pick up where we left off years ago. And that is the best thing, maybe the only good thing, about social media. It has allowed me to reconnect with people I cared about a whole lot.

Finally there are the friends I’ve made in my years at The Associated Press, the Colorado Springs Gazette and at Colorado Parks and Wildlife.

In 1994, when I arrived at the Gazette from the AP, I sat down next to a guy who had only recently arrived from the Los Angeles Times. He had worked for United Press International, or UPI, the arch enemy of the AP. We immediately hit it off, teasing each other and bonding over our work, our kids, our failed marriages, our new married lives and more.

His name is Rich Tosches and he remains one of my best friends ever.

When I think about my friends over the years, I can’t help but get a little misty at the friends I’ve lost.

My mentor, Lew Ferguson, the AP correspondent in Topeka, tops that list. I learned more about journalism, and life, from Lew than I could have ever imagined. 

He was a great journalist, teacher and friend. He saved my job when my sharp tongue nearly got me fired. And we remained close until his death in 2017. In fact, I was driving across Oklahoma hoping to see him one last time — and I was within an hour of his hospital — when he died. I struggled mightily to get through the eulogy I wrote for Lew. (I joined Lew and Barry Massey, in the bow tie, in the Topeka bureau from 1982 to 1987.)

Another former AP colleague was Bob Zimmer, who worked as the AP correspondent in Champaign, Ill., when I became the correspondent based in Peoria in 1987. Bob and I became great friends over the years until his untimely death at age 46 in 1992. At his service a few days later, I gave my first eulogy and it was difficult.

Yet another AP pal who died far too soon at age 44 in 2006 was Paul de la Garza, who was correspondent in Carbondale in southern Illinois and worked with Bob and me. Perhaps Bob, Paul and I bonded so tightly because we were comrades in arms — roving correspondents reporting to the mighty AP Chicago bureau.

Paul and I had some epic adventures, none more spectacular than in 1996 when Garza (as I called him) scored two tickets to the Chicago Bulls playoff game against the New York Knicks. I flew out from Colorado Springs, met him at the Chicago Tribune, where he worked then, and the night was on! Without revealing too many details, the adventure included crashing into the office of legendary Tribune columnist Mike Royko, beers at the Billygoat Tavern and general craziness. 

I am convinced we’d all still be tight friends had they survived.

Finally, I have to mention Dave LaRue. What a guy. Just the nicest person I’ve ever known. Dave would do anything for you. I met him through Peter’s sports teams. His son, Aleksei, became one of Peter’s best buddies. Dave and I became instant friends and we attempted to coach the boys in soccer, basketball and baseball, early on.

After the real coaches took over, Dave and I just were friends. He died from ALS in 2010. He was just 48. I miss him all the time. He was just THE NICEST GUY.

And that’s the lesson here. Friends come and go in your life. Some will shock you when they disappear. They will leave you wondering if you misjudged them. But your best friends will remain so, for life. And you need to make sure you make the effort to maintain those relationships because those friends will not be here forever.

Oh, and one more lesson: Be Nice!