Jim Vance

“It was a night in 1968 during my first couple months on the job. I was assigned, by whatever means necessary, to get an interview with Muhammad Ali, who was rumored to be coming into Philadelphia by train. He detrained not at the normal 30th Street station but at a little-used stop just north of there. I guessed right and was the only person on the platform when he got off. He not only granted the interview—he suggested we sit and talk, off camera, for more than half an hour, with Bundini Brown (his trainer) constantly urging, ‘C’mon champ, we gotta go!’ And Ali replying, ‘In a minute, man. In a minute!’ When he finally did leave, I just sat there for a few minutes, and it occurred to me I might really like this gig.”