Newspaper Delivers a Sobering Viewpoint

The darkest hour is always just before the dawn.

And it appears to be a long, appears to be a long,

Appears to be a long

Time before the dawn.

--From “Long Time Gone,”

a song by David Crosby

Milt Schwartz’s story is one of tragedy and pain. It is marked by words and deeds that are regretted--but that can’t be undone. It may be too late to fix things, but he did stop drinking. And he founded Sober Times.

Since March, 1987, when its first issue rolled off the presses, Sober Times has been a publishing success story. The special-interest newspaper now has a circulation of more than 36,000. It has 15,000 readers in San Diego, 20,000 more in Los Angeles and 1,000 subscribers in 26 other states and Canada.

Its headquarters is the living room of a home in North Park. Its staff is the family--mother, father and sister--of a recovering drug addict and alcoholic whose life story might make a chilling autobiography.

Schwartz, 40, isn’t surprised by the success of Sober Times or its bandwagon effect. It extols a philosophy and a way of life. Schwartz calls it a mirror of commitment--the commitment to live free of chemicals.

“With me, it was alcohol first and then cocaine,” he said. “And then, about three years ago, I crossed an invisible line. I lost my family, my job, everything I had. I’m only now trying to rebuild.”

Experts Like It

The publication is generally well-liked by experts in the field, many of whom are interviewed in Sober Times’ 24 pages, published monthly. Sober Times is a welcome staple at meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), one of many places where it is distributed free. It also goes to hospitals and libraries. Annual subscriptions are $12.

“What stands out to me is that it appeals to anyone interested in recovery, whether they’re in recovery or working in the field,” said Barbara St. Amant, program director of Next Step, a national training and educational outlet for children of alcoholics based in Mission Hills. “It provides a basis for networking and connecting.

“It’s good for recovering people to get accurate educational information about chemical dependency, and Sober Times seems able to do that. Clients of ours have started to ask for it,” she said. “It lists lots of events happening in the tri-county area (Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego). It stimulates interest and encouragement. It’s healthy. It gives people a place to reach out, whether it’s a self-help group or a professional.”

A recent issue of Sober Times included: a celebrity interview (a regular feature); tips on taking a sober vacation; the relationship between alcoholism and depression; comments from a doctor on chemical dependency; alcoholism and its effect on women; news about a residential treatment home for recovering alcoholics and plenty of ads, all pointing to recovery.

Schwartz said the first issue was eight pages and cost $800 to print. The monthly budget now exceeds several thousand dollars. Sober Times is supported entirely by advertising, Schwartz said, adding with a chuckle that ads for cigarettes and “booze” are declined.

If any part of Schwartz’s approach is subject to criticism, it may be his celebrity interviews, which take up most of the front page of any issue. Schwartz interviews most of the subjects himself. They have included former professional football star Thomas (Hollywood) Henderson, rock singer David Crosby and actress Suzanne Somers.

“I like Sober Times and think it’s a good way for sober people to get information and contribute their thoughts,” said Garet Bedrosian, a licensed clinical social worker whose primary clients are recovering alcoholics. “Any way of getting information and thought out to people of a like mind is a good idea.

“But I have mixed feelings about the celebrity interviews. One of the traditions (of AA and other 12-step programs) is to be anonymous. In some ways, people can use someone who has a name, a position, as a role model. I have conflicts with someone breaking their anonymity to do that. And a few break it in an obnoxious way.”

A Tender Area

Schwartz conceded, even in revealing his own grim past, that shedding anonymity is a tender area. (He won’t, for example, admit to attending meetings of AA.) He said the biggest danger is of someone casting himself as a role model and then losing sobriety in some embarrassing public incident.

Even so, Schwartz has managed to get people to open up. He got David Crosby to explain in detail the Texas prison cell where Crosby “got clean.” Crosby, whose autobiography, “Long Time Gone,” is forthcoming, told Schwartz that drugs and drink do nothing but harm creativity--counter to what many claimed in the 1960s.

Schwartz did a spunky interview with Billy Carter, who said, “I was just a good ol’ boy drunk.”

Schwartz noted a recent poll in Rolling Stone magazine in which more than 60% of its 1.7 million readers acknowledged that drugs no longer hold any appeal.

“It’s really true, as the song by Huey Lewis says, that it’s ‘Hip to Be Square,’ ” Schwartz said. “But this isn’t faddish. It isn’t just a trend. People of my generation have had enough of drugs and alcohol. There’s a real serious backlash happening now. We had to stop doing drugs or die. I don’t think any of us really wanted to die.”

This soft-spoken man with a crew cut grew up in Baltimore, where his father was a copy editor in the sports section of the Baltimore Sun. His father, now 72, writes the headlines for Sober Times. His mother handles the business end, and his sister contributes articles.

Schwartz remembers a charmed childhood, when he met baseball’s Brooks Robinson of the Baltimore Orioles and football’s Johnny Unitas of the Colts. Neither of Schwartz’s parents is alcoholic. If they were guilty of anything, he said, it was simply of not enough tough love--they helped him out of every single jam he found himself in.

Schwartz started drinking at 15.

“And you know,” he said, “life just hasn’t been the same since.”

Hit Bottom

Schwartz bottomed out three years ago--and decided to seek treatment--when he woke up dazed on the living room floor of a home he was trying to burglarize. He needed money for more cocaine. At the time, he was putting about a gram a day up his nose.

Schwartz has been married and divorced twice. He has a 7-year-old daughter with whom he is now on good terms, as he is with her mother. Schwartz sees his daughter about once a month and blames not getting to see her more on having been a drunk. These are part of the sins he can’t undo.

The Father’s Day card on the mantel in Schwartz’s home, which is owned by his parents, reads: “Daddy, I want to be just like you when I grow up.”

“Alcohol ripped me apart, made me crazy,” Schwartz said. “I went to seven different colleges and universities. I became unemployed and unemployable.”

Schwartz was executive director of the Queen Mary when he hit his personal nadir. He quit his job, left his wealthy second wife and went to Las Vegas with no money and a gram-a-day cocaine habit.

“I lost it all, I mean everything,” he said. “At the time I quit, I was 2 inches from Skid Row. If my parents hadn’t been there, I don’t know what I’d have done. I don’t know why my wife put up with me for as long as she did. It was all my own fault.”

He admitted himself to the Pathfinders Alcoholism Service Center, a San Diego recovery home. He went through a seven-day detoxification “with a bunch of other low-bottom drunks and learned a lot about alcoholism.” He got the idea for Sober Times while sitting in a room at Pathfinders.