AI ILLUSTRATION: Former San Francisco Chronicle book editor William Hogan is pictured in 1980, surrounded by signatures from some of the writers who corresponded with him over the decades. More than 200 letters from 129 writers are being added to the rare books and manuscript collection at the Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley, on Friday, Sept. 25, 2026. (Illustration by Glenn Gehlke/Local News Matters with ChatGPT. Images via San Francisco Chronicle and Hogan family archive)

In 1979, I first met William Hogan, longtime book editor of the San Francisco Chronicle. I was fresh out of SF State, the 21-year-old managing editor of his hometown weekly, the Mill Valley Record.

I idolized him. Because he was a big deal at the biggest newspaper in Northern California. Because, when he was my age, he took a train to Monterey to drop in on John Steinbeck. Because he was a soft-spoken, genuinely humble man who liked to help young writers.

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