PK-LIVE NEWS

Margo Howard was the person you'd hope to be seated next to at a dinner party, to hear her purr anecdotes and observations about all the other guests.

When it was reported this week that Margo had died at the age of 86, a lot of coverage was understandably about the years she wrote the Dear Prudence advice column for Slate, and then another called Dear Margo. Advice was her family business, after all; Margo's mother, Eppie Lederer, spent nearly 50 years writing the widely syndicated column Dear Ann Landers.

I met Howard when I was a young Chicago reporter, and she was a glamorous Chicago columnist. There is a famous story about a party of Chicago journos who repaired back to Howard's place one snowy night, where she invited them to plop their snow-crusted coats in her bedroom. While she heated up some cocoa, I'm sure. A guest who apparently did not know her family background pranced out, howling, "Margo, Margo, how delicious! You have a picture of Ann Landers in your bedroom!"....