During his time at The Record Herald, he served as a reporter and editor, writing a popular daily column called "In Our County" under the pseudonym "Hank Hayseed".

His first big feature for the Post was a six-part exposé on gambling and election irregularities in Southern Maryland, which ran on the paper's front page and eventually led to two grand jury investigations.

It was picked up by the Hall Syndicate in 1958, who billed Koterba as a "modern Ernie Pyle" and had plans to send him to various far-flung US Armed Forces bases around the world to cover the life of the GIs stationed there.

The project came to an end in 1959 when Scripps Howard offered Koterba a job as their nationally syndicated Washington columnist, replacing Frederick Othman following his death in December 1958.

He was killed on 27 June 1961, along with four other people (including journalist Ned Trimble of the Kansas City Star) in a private plane crash off the coast of La Push, Washington.