Our Chicagoan friends could do much worse today than go wish a happy birthday to one of the few true American legends still among us: happy birthday sir!

He's an amazing man!

Happy birthday, Studs!

In 2001, I attended a friend's wedding in Chicago, and at the reception my eye kept being drawn to a small, wizened man at a nearby table. Only when he gave a brief speech wishing happiness on the couple was I sure that it was indeed Studs Turkel.

It was a strange treat to see such an icon eating cake, cracking jokes. He even took a few gingerly spins on the dance floor.

My date, tired and eager to get home, hustled me out of the reception before I worked up the nerve to ask Studs for a dance. It's one of the great regrets of my life. Judging by his bonhomie, he might have said yes.

So happy birthday, Studs. And promise you'll dance with me next time.

he was the unequivocal hero of the only teacher in my high school who ever got fired (in the history of the entire high school) for showing-up drunk to class one morning.

that guy kicked ass.

A great man indeed.

He is definitely awesome. I saw him a couple weeks ago. He's pretty much deaf, so his speech is starting to degrade; he's pretty hard to understand at times. But man, he can still tell a story!

Happy Birthday to Mr. Terkel. Oh man, I love Studs Terkel. I remember back when I was still in J-school, "long ago," he was there as one of the speakers for our school's ongoing roster of special guests. I was enthralled listening to him speak because he was the type of storyteller/writer/character combo that I wanted to be when I grow up.

P.S. Following story only being mentioned because it's semi Terkel-related.

A couple of weeks later, Robert Siegel of The Onion came to speak at our school, I didn't have work or class so I got to stick around and talk to him. I jokingly told him, "Dude, I didn't even stick around for Studs Terkel." Siegel responded in kind with a, "Oh, yeah? I'm honored! Yea, no need to stick around to talk to Studs Terkel. He's just a legend."

I had an issue with me so I asked Siegel if he could sign it. He scribbled a message before signing the issue. He did the whole thing with a really deadpan face so I figured he'd written something like, "Thanks for coming." I don't have that issue with me at the moment, so I'm paraphrasing, but I burst out laughing when later on I saw he had written something to the effect of, "Studs Terkel sucks anyway."

Wow, he's still alive. That's pretty cool. I like his birthday cake, epitaph and the red socks/black shoes combo (I wear it myself sometimes). How did people at his party know to come wearing red & black...do those colors mean something to Studs?