The Back Story:
Great looking
coupe of Speedway Illustrated’s Dr. Dick Berggren.
Dick began racing in 1967 and won 26
events before his driving career ended in 1981. He had raced
SuperModifieds, stock cars, and sprint cars.
He stopped racing after his racecar climbed a dirt bank at
Boone Speedway in Iowa, causing over 200 people to scatter to avoid
being hit.
Dick works seven days a week and often
wakes at 4:30 a.m. for weekend assignments. Still, Dick Berggren, ’66,
has what many people think of as a dream job. The founder and executive
editor of Dick Berggren’s Speedway Illustrated magazine, Berggren also
covers NASCAR (National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing) for Fox
Sports, assignments that place him front and center in the field of
stock car racing, the fastest growing spectator sport in the world. race
weekends, he arrives at the track early to beat the traffic and spends
time talking to crew chiefs and connecting with drivers. Once the races
start, Berggren moves into high gear to give viewers comprehensive
coverage from pit road. Afterward, he conducts interviews with
world-class drivers like Jamie McMurray, Greg Biffle, and two-time
NEXTEL Cup champion driver Tony Stewart.
His work covering motorsports also
regularly brings him into contact with fans, and the same question comes
up repeatedly. “They’ll ask, ‘How did you get that job and how can I get
it?’” he says.
Berggren’s television career took off
in 1981 with ESPN, where he served as a booth analyst and pit road
reporter. He also worked for CBS from 1994-2001.Berggren, who took a
different road to college than many high school seniors, credits his
experience at Southern with helping him build a successful career.
Fascinated with auto racing from the time he was a child, Berggren was
bored in high school and describes himself as “the worst student” back
then. Unable to get into college at first, he took a job as an office
boy at United Aircraft. He eventually was accepted at Quinnipiac
College, did well, and decided to transfer to Southern, where his
girlfriend, Kathy Kanehl, ’65, was already a student.
Berggren became engrossed in his
college lectures and quickly adapted to college life. He felt at home at
Southern. As he looked toward graduation, he began to contemplate his
next move. He realized that academic life suited him and decided to
continue his studies. “I was enjoying Southern so much,” he says.
With a good academic record, Berggren
applied to a few colleges that, coincidentally, were located near
racetracks. When he wasn’t accepted at those schools, he talked with
Marjn “Margie” Ehmer, now professor emeritus of psychology, who
suggested he apply to Tufts University. Ehmer then contacted the
chairman of the Psychology Department on Berggren’s behalf. Berggren
says that phone call meant a lot. When he visited the Massachusetts
campus, he was not only accepted, but he ended up with a teaching
fellowship. It was at Tufts, while working toward a doctorate in
psychology, that Berggren began driving racecars himself and also
developed his skills as a magazine writer and photographer. Berggren
went on to work as a psychology professor at Emanuel College in Boston,
while also writing for Stock Car Racing magazine. He loved writing for
the magazine, but was very happy working as a college professor, as
well. “I fell in love with the academic life,” Berggren says. When he
was asked to become the editor of Stock Car Racing, he first turned down
the invitation. The magazine eventually made an enticing offer that
Berggren felt he couldn’t pass up: double his professor’s salary. His
vision for the magazine grabbed readers, and the 62,000 circulation
quickly climbed upward.
Berggren worked for Stock Car Racing
for 22 years. In 1999, the same year he won the Writer of the Year award
from the National Motorsport Press Association, Berggren decided to
start a new magazine.
He admits that launching a magazine
was a big challenge, but after months of effort, Speedway Illustrated
was born. With a circulation of 140,000, the monthly magazine now has
the largest readership of any magazine in its category.
Between his responsibilities at the
magazine and for Fox Sports, Berggren puts in long hours at work, thanks
in large measure, he says, to the work ethic he acquired at Southern.
Plus, of course, he loves his job. “Nobody could put in these hours if
they didn’t like what they were doing,” he says.
He often brings his dog, Indy, to work
at the magazine, and his days vary widely, with much of his time devoted
to writing and keeping on top of what is going on in the sport. And for
those who aspire to combine their talents with their passion for racing,
Berggren often offers tips in the magazine for getting those sought
after “dream jobs.” Among them: work as a member of a pit crew.
His own boyhood dream of one day
owning a racecar has been fulfilled 10 times over throughout the years.
He still has his favorite: a 1970s sprint car. In his 25-year driving
career, Berggren achieved 26 first place finishes in the sportsman
division. He gave up racing competitively after a crash in Boone, Iowa,
when a car he was driving vaulted a dirt bank. No one was hurt, but
about 200 people scattered to avoid being injured.
Berggren says that one of his
strategies in life is to find good people and connect with them. “I’m
very pleased that people have stuck with me for a long time,” he says.
His philosophy seems to hold true outside of his career as well.
Remember that old girlfriend who brought him to Southern in the first
place? They live on the shore in Ipswich, Mass., and recently celebrated
their 42nd wedding anniversary. |