This may come as a surprise, but James Barron, despite being a font of quirky, classic New York tales, is not, in fact, a lifelong New Yorker. Some city purists may scoff, but Mr. Barron has made up for his first 22 years by spending the last 40-some finding the stories that even born-and-raised New Yorkers may never have heard.
There was the time, for instance, that he went to see “Carmen” at the Metropolitan Opera and was so captivated by the cars and trucks that crisscrossed the stage that he just had to know how they worked. Or the morning he saw an ancient Crown Victoria taxi on the street and set out to track down what was then the oldest cab still carrying passengers. Or hearing about — then, visiting — the city’s oldest private dwelling.
“I’m thinking about, ‘What are the things New Yorkers care about?” said Mr. Barron, who has written the New York Today newsletter, a weekday roundup of news stories and only-in-New-York tales, since 2021.
Mr. Barron has worked for The New York Times for more than four decades. He joined the paper as a copy boy the week after he graduated from Princeton University in 1977; it was the job that prompted his move to New York. Aside from a few years reporting from Albany, Long Island and Detroit, he’s always covered — and resided in — New York City.
In a phone conversation from his home office on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, he shared with me where he finds his ideas, what he enjoys about his assignment and a few of his favorite reporting experiences. These are edited excerpts.
You’ve been covering New York for more than four decades. What keeps you excited about the city?
There’s so much here! I’ve had a long and lucky career, with experiences ranging from doing breaking news stories, which get you familiar with where things are and who’s in power, to features, like cooking alongside the chef Daniel Boulud. When they say there are 8 million stories in the Naked City, I have to believe it’s true.
There’s so much news out of Manhattan right now: Harvey Weinstein’s New York conviction being overturned, Donald J. Trump’s hush money trial …
Right? It’s hard to remember when so many national stories were going on simultaneously in any one place, let alone New York.
Yet you always manage to discover unexpected angles. Where do you find your ideas?
I hear about things different ways — from people I know; sometimes I get tips from people I’ve written about before, so being around New York for so long pays off. And sometimes I just notice things, like the cars in “Carmen.” If I hadn’t put in time just being in the city, I wouldn’t see some of the stories that I see and decide to write.
What makes for a newsletter story?
I’m writing for an audience that prides itself on knowing everything. Sometimes, that means finding things they won’t get anywhere else that make them feel like they’re in the know. Sometimes, it means doing something a little different that will say, “However many stories the Metro desk publishes in a day, there’s always more you can say about New York.”
How far in advance do you plan pieces?
The one I did the other day about mushrooms grown from food waste I had heard about last fall and had had it on my list since. The people who grow them were moving to a new space, so we’d put it off until now. That may be the one that had been on my list the longest.
How often are you reporting and writing the newsletter all in one day?
Every week is different. Today, as I often am, I’m writing the newsletter entirely live, in one day. I’m writing one off something I heard about yesterday afternoon and decided, “This is so good, I’m going to do it.” I can do that because earlier in my career, I put in time on rewrite — essentially, in-office reporting via phone — and from that, I learned how to write quickly.
When is your daily deadline?
I try to have the written elements ready by about 6 p.m. We have a news assistant on the Metro desk, Melissa Guerrero, who compiles the latest New York news, which I read over and adjust as need be. Then it goes through two rounds of editing and gets scheduled to go out at 5 a.m. Mercifully, I don’t have to be up at 5, unless I am.
Are you someone who writes quickly or someone who will go back and endlessly edit yourself?
Both. [laughs] Some stories I write smoothly from beginning to end, while others you have to tease out.
What were some of your greatest hits?
I wrote about Thomas Edison’s piano and the bite marks he left on it — he was deaf, so he’d bite the piano to feel the vibrations. And I did one about a pet pig at a Brooklyn firehouse. Oh, and the time I stood in the path of a driverless bus.
Anything else you’d like to add?
My colleagues in Metro are invaluable in making this newsletter possible. Early on, I got Melissa Clark to taste apples that were grown on top of the Javits Convention Center. The other day, Florence Fabricant tasted the mushrooms that had been grown in food waste. Steve Lohr, from Business, did an interview about job training. Nobody I’ve asked to help on this has turned me down. My colleagues have my back.
The post He Scouts Out the Stories You’ll Find Only in New York appeared first on New York Times.