How Dougie Met Alan

If you haven’t yet read the many tributes Barron’s has collected this weekend for Alan Abelson, I suggest you find some time for it. The entire Roundtable is in there as are the colleagues Alan spent decades inspiring and some fellow Wall Streeters and readers as well. Barry and I are in there, too. Alan has done a lot for Barry’s visibility over the years, citing him for the first time almost a decade ago. As for me, I’ve read almost every column Alan had written for at least the last decade, he’s definitely been one of my biggest influences.

Anyway, of all the encomiums in the issue, I liked Doug Kass’s the best.

Here Dougie tells the story about how he met Alan and his career as a an analyst / commentator was subsequently launched…

It was early 1992. I was still recovering from a July 1990 harness-racing injury that left me in a wheelchair and a full-body cast. I was going stir-crazy at home and decided to write a research report on Marvel Entertainment Group, a recently minted initial public offering majority-owned by Ron Perelman.

I had been reading Alan Abelson’s column in Barron’s since the early 1970s, when I was an M.B.A. student at the Wharton School. I dutifully read Barron’s by 7:00 a.m. each Saturday, and I have been running to buy it every Saturday since. I decided to show my critical analysis of Marvel to Alan.

Upon its completion, and when I could physically leave my New York City apartment, I ventured into a van with my nurse and went to Alan’s office on the 16th floor of the Dow Jones building in downtown Manhattan…

Keep Reading:

Colleagues, Wall Street Friends and Readers Remember Alan Abelson (Barron’s)