My name is Dan Barry and I've been a reporter and columnist at the New York Times since forever.

Today I'm going to read a few stories by my colleague and friend Jim Dwyer.

I knew Jim Dwyer before I knew him because I had read his columns over the years

and I admired his writing and his commitment to justice.

Jim's columns often focused on the every person.

He made a name for himself by writing exclusively about the subways.

He wrote about the people who worked for the subway system, who rode the subways,

and he understood more than anyone else how the subways connected the city.

He would tweak the noses of the powerful, whether it was Mayor Ed Koch, Mayor Dinkins, Mayor Giuliani,

Mayor Di Blasio, it didn't matter.

And in 1995 Jim won a Pulitzer Prize for commentary for his columns about New York City.

The columns at their best were prose poems.

You could smell the apartment or the tenement. You could smell the subway. You were there.

Jim and I had several connections. For one thing we were both narrow backs,

which means that we were the children of Irish immigrants.

And the term which is derogatory to some people means that you do not have the shoulders

as broad as your parents or the people that were back in Ireland, that you weren't as strong.

Over the years we would sit in the cafeteria and chat. I would always approach him

and he would say Daniel and I would say James.

And we would sit down and commiserate about the inner politics at the New York Times or about the news of the day in New York City.

And often we would talk about Ireland. He did a pretty good county carry accent or broke.

I never really tried or resounded silly.

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