Anthony Day, newspaperman

TONY DAY was a great paper waster.

As a newspaper writer in the days of typewriters, he snatched many a sheet of copy paper, complete with carbons, out of the machine because the story just wasn't reading the way he thought it should.

"Writing was a painful process for him," said Joseph R. Daughen, retired Daily News writer who worked with Tony in the Washington Bureau for the old Evening Bulletin.

"He was forever throwing copy away," Daughen said. "He was always trying to improve what he was writing, but the truth was his final draft was not much better than his first. He would drive editors crazy."

Anthony Day, who spent 12 years at the Bulletin before moving on to the Los Angeles Times, where he was the highly regarded editor of the editorial page for 18 years, died Sunday of complications of emphysema. He was 74 and lived in Santa Fe, N.M.

Tony took over the L.A. Times editorial section when it sorely needed a new approach. He succeeded in giving the paper a respected voice in national affairs.

During his time in Los Angeles, he edited a column by former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. On Tony's death, Kissinger said in a statement, "Although he was a constant critic of the administrations in which I served, I always considered him a critic of exemplary fairness, ability and honesty."

Tony was a nightside reporter for the Bulletin in the late '50s. His future wife, Lynn Ward, was also a nightside reporter. Lynn shared an apartment in Center City with her friend, Valerie Sigelin, an art teacher. Tony and other nightsiders would adjourn there after their shifts for early-morning drinks and snacks. He married Lynn in 1960.

He was living in a small and cluttered Center City apartment himself in those days. When he moved out, Bob Brothers, later the Bulletin picture editor, moved in.

"The price was right," Bob said, "$50 a month, and a short walk to 30th and Market streets.

"Those were the glory days for the paper when it was the largest evening paper in the U.S., with a daily circulation of 750,000.

"Tony was so quiet you never knew he was in the newsroom. His passion was to get the story right."

Joe Daughen first met Tony outside the Wynnewood home of Max Kravitz, who had been shot and bludgeoned to death by his wife, Ethel, in July 1958.

The Kravitz murder was sensational news. But Tony wasn't cut out to be a police reporter.

"That was strange territory for him," Joe said.

After his stint as a general assignment reporter for the Bulletin, he was transferred to the Washington bureau. He covered the Vietnam War and other foreign news before settling in to write about quieter national affairs.

John Farmer, former national editor of the Bulletin, shared seats on presidential campaign planes with Tony when John was with the old Newark Evening News.

"He was a very quiet, witty guy," said John, who now writes about politics for the Star-Ledger of Newark "I trusted his judgment. He wasn't the greatest writer, but his judgment was terrific. He never got anything wrong."

When Otis Chandler, publisher of the Los Angeles Times, offered Tony a job as the Times' chief editorial writer in 1969, Tony moved West and never looked back.

He was promoted to editor of the editorial page in 1971. He left the position in 1989 and became a special correspondent, writing on cultural issues and their impact on the world. In later years, he wrote scholarly book reviews for the paper.

Tony's late father, Price Day, was editorial page editor of the Baltimore Sun and a Pulitzer Prize winner.

Tony was a 1955 cum laude graduate of Harvard, where he majored in the classics. He returned a decade later as a Neiman Fellow.

Besides his wife, he is survived by a son, John; three brothers Joe, Tom and James, and a grandchild. He was predeceased by a daughter, Julie.

Services: Were being arranged. *