F.X. Toole

We can hardly believe it ourselves, but somehow Fresh Air has just reached its 20th anniversary as a daily national show. (We were a daily local program in Philadelphia for about 12 years before that.)

He died September 2 at age 72 of complications from heart surgery. Two years ago, he published his first book. It's a collection of short stories about boxing called Rope Burns: Stories from the Corner. For 20 years, Toole was a cut man, stopping the bleeding so fighters could go on to the next round. Toole wrote for over for 40 years, but it was the publication of his first story last year in a small literary magazine that caught the attention of a book agent.

Last year at age 70, writer F.X. Toole published his first book, a collection of short stories about boxing called Rope Burns: Stories from the Corner (in paperback, Ecco press). For twenty years, he's been a cut man, stopping the bleeding so fighters can go on to the next round. Toole has been writing for 40 years, but it was the publication of his first story in a small literary magazine in 1999 that caught the attention of a book agent.