When Rock Bottom Gets Lower: From Alcoholism to Faith, Freedom & Hope with Harry Saltzgaver

Longtime journalist Harry Saltzgaver shares the raw truth behind his journey from functioning alcoholism to freedom, faith, and recovery. He opens up about relapse, a life-changing DUI, and the jail-cell prayer that became a turning point after 9/11. Harry shares how God removed his compulsion to drink, why making amends and vulnerability matter, and how sobriety led to a life of service. We also discuss Christian recovery, identity beyond career, community impact, and his memoir, No Walk in the Park: Newspapers, Booze, and God.

Harry's contact info:

Email - writerman47@yahoo.com

Website - saltymanpress.com

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Transcript

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Welcome And Meet Harry

SPEAKER_00 0:16

Welcome to the Hope Unlocked Podcast. I'm Kristen Kurtz, your host. I pray this episode is like a holy IV of hope for your soul. Help me please help me welcome Harry Saltzgaber to the show today. Very excited to have him here with me. I think he said his name right, which I was like, really like I'm gonna do this. Yes. We had a chance to chat just a little bit before we got started. And I know that he has a lot to share with us today. So before we get into your story and and where God has you today, would you just share a little bit about yourself?

SPEAKER_01 0:46

Sure, I'd be happy to. And first, thanks for having me on, Kristen. I really appreciate it. I grew up in Colorado, born and raised, and went to school back there and started, kind of fell into journalism, started working for a newspaper in the mountains of Colorado back in the late 1970s. And I've been a newspaper guy ever since. Came out to California in 1992. I've lived in Long Beach since then. And I ran a the weekly newspaper in Long Beach for 31 years as the executive editor there. And stepped down from that position three years ago now. But I still write a column for both the that paper and the daily newspaper in Long Beach called the Long Beach Press Telegram. Write a weekly column there. It's called A Pinch of Salt. Not overly uh creative, but it I've liked it.

SPEAKER_00 1:52

So and that goes back to your last name a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 1:55

Yes, a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 1:56

Very creative.

SPEAKER_01 1:58

But yeah, I've been blessed to be a recovering Christian for 25 years now. I've been a Christian for about 27 years, so that's that's something.

SPEAKER_03 2:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:10

Yeah, and uh married, have uh four kids, eight grandkids, and two big dogs. We love them all.

SPEAKER_00 2:21

That's amazing. Well, you have you've had a full life, and I want to I want to take us back to you you mentioned you fell into, did I hear

Falling Into Journalism By Accident

SPEAKER_00 2:30

you right? You fell into journalism. So how do you I I didn't fall into journalism? How do you fall into journalism? Tell us.

SPEAKER_01 2:36

Well, I fell into journalism. I was an English literature major.

SPEAKER_03 2:40

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 2:41

Minors in biology and philosophy, by the way.

SPEAKER_03 2:44

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 2:44

But I was an English web major and I was gonna go to grad school, but while I was waiting to get into grad school, I started writing theater reviews for a small mountain weekly in Colorado. It's called the Mineral County Minor in Creek, Colorado. And they had a great repertory theater. So I started writing theater reviews for the paper. And life got in the way of grad school in the form of a son coming along. So I ended up deciding that I would like to be a writer for my career. And it just so happened that the newspaper was sold to a great journalist from the Kansas City Times, and for some reason he thought I was a decent writer, so he asked me if I wanted to do it full-time, and I did. And he taught me the taught me the ropes, and fortunately it seemed to take.

SPEAKER_00 3:44

So that's amazing. Wow. So did you did you grow up writing a lot? Like did you find yourself I know I was still like young, start writing, and then they kind of it falls off, right?

SPEAKER_01 3:59

Yeah. No, I I was a writer, I was always good in terms of writing the papers for the English classes and that kind of thing. And even when I was going to college, I I wrote for the literature magazine, the literary magazine, you called it back then, and stuff like that. But I never really thought of it as a career until, as I said, that it did seem to kind of make a difference. And once I found out what newspaper writing was about and the way that you get to meet new people all the time and learn new things all the time, it's one of those careers where you never do the same thing two days in a row.

SPEAKER_00 4:44

And yeah, things like variety.

SPEAKER_01 4:47

I love variety and I love to learn. So even though I'm really, really old, I'm still learning today.

SPEAKER_00 4:56

So somebody's listening, they're they're listening on the podcast aspect today. You're saying you're really, really old. Now you have to tell how how old, really, really old.

SPEAKER_01 5:06

No, I'm 72, be 73 next month. And I've uh, as you said, I've had a life. Um I've gone through a few things, gone through some health issues, and uh and I really shouldn't be here right now. There's I should have died several times in my life, and God kept me around for some reason. So maybe that's this reason around here. Never know.

SPEAKER_00 5:32

I'm glad you're here. Yes. And I I really want to highlight, and if you guys, if if you listen to my podcast a lot, you know that I love highlighting men and women who are continuing on beyond what the world would say it's time to retire.

SPEAKER_04 5:45

Right.

SPEAKER_00 5:46

The world says retire at 65. And here we've got Harry. He's continuing on. He's on he's on a podcast, like he's sharing his story. I think that's pretty cool. So I do want to just ask another question. I know you mentioned that it sounds like I don't know what his name was of the newspaper that you know hired you on and really took you under his wing. Did you have teachers or mentors or family or anybody that was kind of calling you up into saying, like, hey, Harry, you're a really good writer. Like as a child, as a teen, did you have people like that in your circle?

SPEAKER_01 6:24

Yeah, I did. I had a high school English teacher uh who thought I was doing pretty well, and I liked him a lot because he taught English literature through Paul Simon. The Paul Simon writing of his songs as poetry, which I thought was interesting. I had a professor in college whose name was Virgil Hoff, and he was actually in both English and philosophy. And he and I got to really uh have an amazing relationship together, and he encouraged me and mentored me. And the editor I spoke of is his name was Steve Haynes, uh, still around. Became a little bit of a force in Colorado newspapers for quite a while. And I was just really fortunate to be able to learn the business under him. He taught me what credibility was all about. That's kind of my shining star. You know, I'm to maintain my credibility no matter what.

SPEAKER_00 7:29

Yes. Well, thank you, Steve. I think that's amazing that you know, when you have somebody that comes across your path that really takes you under your wing and and helps kind of lead you into that trajectory of really it sounds like what God, you know, one of your big gifts here for this world was to be a writer and and do all that you're doing. So take us into like those early years of your career and what did that look like for you?

On-Scene Reporting And A Rescue

SPEAKER_01 7:55

Sure. Well, early on, I was what you might think of as the movie version of a newspaper guy. I lived on coffee, cigarettes, and had a bottle of scotch in the bottom drawer of my desk.

SPEAKER_00 8:11

Did you really?

SPEAKER_01 8:12

Oh, yeah. Yeah, for real. Okay. This was indeed a long time ago. I started out, I was writing on a manual typewriter and turned in my stories on paper, and they had to typeset them. So that was a while back. Yeah. Uh so give you an idea that uh I was able to grow in that environment, and uh, we've had two weekly newspapers by the time I was got done. We I was fortunate enough to have a few very good stories on a few boards back then. And when I finally left the weekly newspapers, the last year I was there, we were named the best weekly in Colorado. And so that uh kind of I was happy with that.

SPEAKER_00 9:03

Yeah. Do you remember what you wrote about?

SPEAKER_01 9:05

Oh, I wrote about everything.

SPEAKER_00 9:07

Okay, but for those award-winning argument.

SPEAKER_01 9:09

Well, one of the one of the award-winning stories was a story about I lived at the base of Wolf Creek Pass in Colorado. It's a you know 11,000, 12,000 foot pass. You might have heard the song uh TJ McCall, Wolf Creek Pass, going over the Wolf Creek Pass, way up on the Great Divide. At any rate, the story I wrote about was a semi-truck went off the side of the road in the middle of, I guess it was April of 1981. And he went off the middle of the road. He had his family with him, and he went down the hill for about 150 feet, and he had a two-year-old girl, a baby, and his wife with him. When I got the call, that was back in the day of police radios. I got the call, I got up there to watch the rescuers work, and they got down to the truck, found the father and mother dead, and the baby dead, could not find the two-year-old. They searched around the truck. The two-year-old had been thrown out, thrown out of the truck, and was still alive. And they rescued this baby, pulled her toddler, pulled her out back up the cliff. I was there, I was the only newspaper guy there. I actually helped with the rope. You know, it's one of those things where you can't not help. And we saved the baby, and I was able to write that story, and it ended up uh winning National Award for Spot News that year. So it was quite the experience, and I bet it's just one thing, you know.

SPEAKER_00 11:00

Yeah, so did you I I'm just kind of curious. Were you, you know, now we have reporters who go with the video cameras, and you know, did that were you kind of doing a lot of that too? You're on the scene quite a bit.

SPEAKER_01 11:13

Yeah, yeah. I I thought fancied myself a photographer at the time, and I actually won as many awards for photography as I did for writing, but that was more a matter of being at the right place at the right time. I was not all that skillful of a photographer, but uh when you get when you get the right picture, it really doesn't matter if as long as you can click the camera.

unknown 11:39

Right.

SPEAKER_01 11:39

That was back in the days when we had film, so you don't you made sure you had the right picture before you clicked the camera.

SPEAKER_00 11:46

Yeah, and and sometimes you had to take multiple pictures to try to make sure you got one. Right, right. Go through a whole roll. That's incredible. So, you know, you're in your you know, kind of prime of your career,

Functioning Alcoholism And Identity

SPEAKER_00 12:00

and you've got scotch in your your drawer. And how were things going? Like, you know, just and you said you had a son. Was he pretty Yeah, I had a son.

SPEAKER_01 12:10

One of the reasons that I wanted newspapering is my son and his mother and I split up when I was two years old, and she left. So I was working on a newspaper, uh have the son every other weekend, that kind of thing. But that was really when I became a professional drinker, too. It was real easy for me to work during the day and then down a half pint or a pint after work, and that that was a good way to stop thinking about things for a little while. I thought at the time anyway.

SPEAKER_00 12:49

Yeah, so yeah. So were you able to function while you were working?

SPEAKER_01 12:55

Yeah, yeah. I I was what I call a a functioning alcoholic. Uh, you know, I could I could work during the day and then drink at night. I could even function the next day very well, you know, even through a hangover when I had to. There were a few times when I got caught after I'd started drinking, something happened that I had to go uncovered. And I was able to pull that off most of the time, I think. Most of the time. I got caught a time or two, but yeah, it was just just my escape.

SPEAKER_00 13:31

Sure. So, you know, hope unlocked. Were you at a place in your life that you just felt kind of hopeless?

SPEAKER_01 13:40

Yeah, yeah. I and I was my entire identity was wrapped up in my job. Um, you know, I was a newspaperman, and that actually, frankly, was the case for a long time. You know, um I was at the weekly for a little better than five years, and then went to daily newspapers in Colorado, and ultimately came back to uh California first uh on a daily newspaper, and then I went back to a community weekly. But during all that time, my personal life was a total disaster, and I just cared about getting the job done and uh really didn't have any great relationships. There was nothing in my life besides work, frankly. And that's that was my excuse for drinking. When I started in the newspaper business, I pretty much gave up drugs, which I was fortunate. So uh it is true, marijuana screws with your short-term memory. There's no doubt about that.

SPEAKER_00 14:50

So I thought that long term, like would you say it's even long term?

SPEAKER_01 14:54

Oh yeah, yeah. Marijuana is not good for your memory.

SPEAKER_00 14:57

Isn't it interesting that like well, we we don't have to go down here, but a lot of that that a lot of you know states are starting to legalize it, and I feel like it's like a gateway into so many things. Because I used to smoke it too, and and I'm sure.

SPEAKER_01 15:13

Yeah, well, and I will say I don't think it's as dangerous as alcohol is sure. So at least in terms of the recreational use, but both of them can lead directly to addiction. So yeah, there's no doubt about that.

SPEAKER_00 15:31

Yeah. So you you know, you're you're kind of working, drinking, kind of the the cycle, right? Sure. How did you come out of this loop?

SPEAKER_01 15:43

Okay, well, it that's kind of a long story. I wrote a book about it, so it's a long story. But I was what I call a trampoline drum. I would get to the point where I wanted to get sober for a woman, or I was forced to get sober because of a DUI. I went through that three times, I think, where uh I had parries of sobriety from six months to almost two years one time. And that two years was as I moved out here to call it uh California. But I went to AA, I said all the things that you say, I never really believed any of it, and I think I really had a problem with I was in control all the time. I I I was sure I could handle whatever the world gave me, and of course that's not true, but it took me a while to figure that out, and as I say, you know, I lost two marriages. I came out to California and got married again for the third time or fourth time actually, and uh I was trying to get myself together, I was sober, and then I started slipping again.

9-11, A DUI, And A Jail Prayer

SPEAKER_01 17:08

And I stop me if I go too long here, but the the story goes that in when 9-11 occurred, it was quite the trauma for everybody, but it was very much a trauma for a newspaper person. I put together what is still maybe my the best newspaper I've ever put together the week after, the week of 9-11, and talking about how the impacts of 9-11 uh hit our community, Long Beach hit our community, how we dealt with it. I was very proud of that newspaper. Yeah two days later I played in a chamber golf tournament and thought it was just fine for me to relax a little bit. Well, long story short, I ended up getting arrested on my way home from that golf tournament. Actually, I wasn't on my way home, I was on my way to pick up my wife's son from soccer practice. So that that's important because then I got arrested on the way, and I had what's called a jailhouse converted, I think. By that time I had been going to church and been calling myself a Christian for a couple of years, but I was going through the motions, I think, you know, and I did not think a whole lot of looking to the Lord, and I would say things like in the age, I know that I was powerless over alcohol, and I'd give this over to a power greater than myself, but I never gave it over to that power until that night in jail, I finally decided I better pray. I didn't pray to get out of the situation I was in. I prayed that he would take the compulsion to drink away from me. And I just found a peace there, and I you know I was still in jail and I still had to go through everything I had to go through. But from that day forward, I didn't have the compulsion to drink. I won't say I never wanted a drink, thought about it occasionally, but I definitely die. Yeah, I I did not feel like I was gonna die if I didn't have a drink. And that alcoholics out there will know that's the way you feel. So that's the only thing you can think of is to have a drink. Well, that was taken away from me. That was a miracle in my life. Uh a pure straight up. Really been what has driven my life since then. I really uh gave my life to Christ at that time. And I've been involved in community activities before then. I was a community newspaper editor, I had to be, but that really started me down a path of trying to give back and trying to help other nonprofits and help other people find their own way. Uh, I've been really blessed to have the opportunity to talk about those nonprofits with the newspaper, giving a wonderful platform for helping things like we've got a small outfit out here called Precious Lamb Preschool. And what it is is it's a preschool for homeless children, faith-based preschool for homeless children. Started in my church, and uh it has been around now for 25 years, and I was one of the first board members. We've really helped a lot of families get back on their feet because they were able to have a place to take their toddlers and have them get good care while they went out to either get their life back together or find a way to make a living, that sort of thing.

SPEAKER_03 21:48

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 21:49

Involved in a number of other nonprofits, Salvation Army. Uh the Salvation Army has an adult rehabilitation program that I'm very involved in. And it's an amazing faith-based recovery program. You know, things like that. I think that has been become my life's mission is to try to help people and help them understand that through God you can have a good life and you can make a difference. And so I said I wrote a book. The whole point of the book was to let people know that you could be you can find recovery through God and you can find a way to make a difference in this world through God.

SPEAKER_00 22:44

After you with your recovery so what what I'm hearing you know you you when I I'm just imagining you like in that jail cell right and even prior to the jail cell you were in kind of a prison of your own right absolutely even up to that point. And I know like when I was thinking a lot and before I got saved from addiction like a lot of kind of the focus was kind of self like I I did help people of course like and I I know I did over the years but it was more like kind of those thoughts of like like I'm hopeless or me like more me and then when when God like saves us and rescues us like I noticed that there were like I had that really quick like no more no more alcohol no more drugs I quit smoking two packs a day right away like miracle right and it it became I'm healed and now I want to go help others like it was just this quick thing that happened that he orchestrated so now you've come through and you're wanting to come back and help others which I think is so incredible because you know we do we have a choice where we can you know kind of stay on our own road and keep going forward on our own or we can do that and help people on that road with us. Right. So I think that's really incredible and and I've seen you know over the years as well with myself talking to others when we help others it it really takes all that focus and you know the lives of the enemy you know we were able to kind of turn things around for good right so I love what you shared and how you're able to help so many people now because not everybody does that either.

SPEAKER_01 25:13

No I I you know going from being completely self-centered even if you're out in the community doing things as a newspaper person from being completely self-centered to being other centered and still what I say I try to put others before myself and the scary part about that is it all comes back to you tenfold you know I since I'm really really old people have a tendency to honor my long career now. And I unfortunately in my online received a number of awards because of my service that service is not there to receive awards and I'm embarrassed by those awards but every time that happens it's another reason to tell my story to explain how God is the one who's actually doing this. It's not me doing it's me doing God doing it through me. Yes and uh so I continue to accept them so I can keep telling that story in in the acceptance features you know so so what is the name of your book? We don't we don't want to pass that by yeah okay the book's called no walk in the park newspapers

Writing The Book And Making Amends

SPEAKER_01 26:45

booze and God and uh I should have just said newspapers booze and God I don't think I had to say no walk in the park but I'm a wannabe golfer so I had to use that uh kind of a thing but yeah it's uh it also talks a little quite a bit about newspapering uh simply because I've been at it for more than 40 years now and really seeing the trajectory of newspapers, print newspapers in particular, community newspapers in particular, and how they've been such a great power for good and for evil but a great power for good and then seeing how their influence has slowly declined with the technology boom that we've seen with the internet in particular.

SPEAKER_00 27:40

Yeah and how like when did you publish your book?

SPEAKER_01 27:44

I published it uh in January.

SPEAKER_00 27:46

Oh just this January yeah so it's it's still fairly new yeah I as I said I retired from from full time from the newspaper about three years ago now still writing a column thankfully still have that platform but it took me a good two years after I retired to write the book and yeah it's it's it's short it's easy to read yeah and I again I wanted to just listeners so you were 72 at the time when you published your book you started the book when you were seven seventy yeah about then about seven yeah okay so don't ever anybody ever tell me it's too late yeah no one two seconds absolutely like you don't I had a gal on my podcast she was 82 when she released her first book and I was like yes so um was it a was it a challenging process for you like you're you're a writer you've been writing you know you've been doing things for many years was it a challenging process to write a book or what would you say to that you know it wasn't challenging to the writing part of it wasn't challenging what was challenging was the willingness to lay bare my faults vulnerability yeah yeah it that was hard for me and because you don't live a life of alcoholism without hurting people and I had to talk about how I hurt people because a recovery story is not a recovery story unless you can tell what you recovered from and the life of despair that is alcoholism and the recovery involves in making amends for all of those things that you did in in the bad days it uh it doesn't have the power the miracle of recovery doesn't have the power if you don't understand where you were there's a saying in alcohol you have to hit your bottom and the bottom of life is not a pretty thing and I I hit my bottom three or four times and strangely enough the bottom kept getting further down you know kept getting lower and lower.

SPEAKER_01 30:23

You'd think you hit the bottom and oh no there's still more terrible things you could do. But that part of it the writing was hard the actual writing was not too hard. I was able to write it kind of like I read my columns so it's like 600 800 words start to finish every chapter is written that way.

SPEAKER_03 30:46

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 30:46

So and you get the little nuggets and fortunately I was able just follow that process through and I wrote only had to go back and add a column or three a couple of times. So it wasn't too bad.

SPEAKER_00 31:02

That's amazing. And did you self-publish?

SPEAKER_01 31:05

Yes I did you did frankly I could have held on to it and tried to sell it more but I wanted to get it out there. Yeah um the bad part about being really old is you feel like time's getting short and I really felt compelled to get the story out there as soon as I possibly could and if God wants it to be published widely somebody will pick it up and publish it. If he just wants one person to read it that's good enough for me.

SPEAKER_00 31:40

But I do feel like it's it's such a full circle you know delivery you know I like to call them book babies and for you for so long you've been writing on other you know other stories other people's you know experiences and stories and now you have your story out there for the world to read.

SPEAKER_01 32:00

So way to go have you had any testimonials from people who've read your book that I've had a few yeah I've had a few and uh that's been really uh makes you feel good no doubt about that. I don't know if you're familiar with a guy named Paul Williams. He's uh but a generation or two past you he's more my generation he was a singer and songwriter in the 70s.

SPEAKER_00 32:30

Okay uh it was little Enos in Smokey and the Bandit I know that anyway he's uh got a uh he's a legend in the recovery community and he read the book and really gave me a wonderful review of the book and he and I have become friends and that's really the be all and end all of you know I don't need too many other people to say how wonderful the book is yeah I need more people to say it made a difference in my life that's why I wrote I love that I will you say that again I mean I feel like somebody just needs to hear that because I think sometimes you know people do things you know expecting maybe a a result that is other than what you just said.

SPEAKER_01 33:23

Right. No I I think it's important and I'm looking for people to say that reading the book made a difference in their lives you know whether that's just oh I'll go to church and think about that a little bit more or I'll pray and see if maybe God will do the same thing to me.

SPEAKER_00 33:43

Yeah right now he will if you have yes that's the key right yeah that's uh well what what's coming down the pipeline for you maybe in the next year I like to ask people sometimes like obviously you've been stretched in your life but is there other things that the Lord's stretching you into in this coming season you know I I don't know I always look forward to what's next.

SPEAKER_01 34:09

Yeah and as I said uh you know I really enjoy still writing my column and

What’s Next, Contact, Final Hope

SPEAKER_01 34:16

opining on the things that are going on in the community yeah and trying to make a difference out here in Long Beach it we're getting ready for the 2028 Olympics. Uh Los Angeles is the host of the 2028 Olympics and Summer Olympics and Long Beach has 11 events in summer Olympics so it's gonna be it's gonna be fun the world's focus I think yeah yeah hopefully I can play a little part of that and maybe wave the book a little bit while I'm at it.

SPEAKER_00 34:54

Right. Yes exactly well this is a great way to get the word about out about it as well. So what is the best way for people to get in touch with you if they'd like to reach out there are a couple of ways the best way is email and this egotistical my email I'm sorry but it's writerman47 yahoo.com there's also a website where you can find all of my books I've actually published three uh it's called saltyman.com saltymanpress.com okay and you can find it there awesome and uh there's not very many salt cavers in the world so all you have to do you're the first you're the first it's great it's great to have you'll find me it's a great it's it's great to have a unique name I I imagine well I am gonna have all of his contact information in the show notes so please reach out if you have any questions for him I'm sure you're always happy to talk to people I imagine absolutely so as as I shared before I I I really do this seed cast I actually call it a seed cast for the one so as we're you know just sitting here talking I would love for you to just get in mind maybe somebody who's been listening in today and do you have any other just words of encouragement or words of wisdom for them today before we wrap up the only thing I'd say is it doesn't matter how far down you are there is a way to get up and that way is that power greater than yourself we call him God we call him Jesus Christ. And he's there waiting for you okay thank you well you've been a joy to have on thank you for vulnerably sharing your story not only on here but in your book you guys will have to be sure to go get his book so I am going to close with our hope unlocked anchoring verse which is may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope. So thank you Harry for being on today and thank you for being a brave voice who's setting so many free thank you Christian I really appreciate your ministry. Thank you. Thank you. I'll be back with another episode next week thanks listeners.

SPEAKER_01 37:15

Okay.