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Minkkinen concedes that Smith is, by reputation, a superior designer who distinguished himself at the Sun-Times Media Group’s daily in Joliet before coming to the Sun-Times. But Steckles was a mystery to him. Not to me, however. A couple years ago I had a couple of long phone conversations with Steckles, who described himself to me as a restaurant owner in Saint Kitts who served Cooke as the Ed McMahon to his Johnny Carson. “I help out wherever he needs me,” said Steckles, and whenever Cooke doesn’t, Steckles lays low. “I don’t miss it when I’m lying on a beach in the Caribbean,” he said about the newspaper biz, “But I always enjoy doing it when I get the chance.”
“Michael realized James is a major talent,” Steckles told me back in 2006. “He has all the flair of a terrific graphics designer but also a great sensitivity for newspapers.” In another conversation, Steckles called Smith “absolutely brilliant,” and said that by the time he got to Waukegan Smith had pretty much wrapped up the design work, leaving it to Steckles “to pull together editorial.” Pretty clearly, Steckles thought of himself and Cooke and Smith as a wonderful team, and apparently Cooke thinks the same. Gerald Minkkinen says Cooke kept Steckles “under the radar” as a Sun-Times “consultant,” and when the guild pointed out that the guild contract didn’t provide for consultants, he put Steckles on staff last fall in a guild job. I caught up with Steckles briefly Tuesday and he allowed that “I haven’t really had a title” other than consultant. But for the time being I could call him a “copy editor for the Showcase” if I wished, though that will change “under the new scheme of things” to something he can’t yet disclose.
