Thanks for all the help.

This works except I keep getting these error messages along with output:

Use of uninitialized value at per2.pl line 5.
Use of uninitialized value at per2.pl line 5.
Use of uninitialized value at per2.pl line 8.
Use of uninitialized value at per2.pl line 8.
smith
rogers
richards
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Here is the script:

#!/usr/local/bin/perl -w

use strict;
my  ( @temp, %authors );
@temp = sort map { my @b=split; $b[2]; } `ls -l /directory/pth/here`;
foreach ( @temp )
{
   $authors{$_}=1 if not $authors{$_} and length $_; 
#I had to add $_ because the other way "$authors{$}=1" gave me an erro
+r
}
print "$_\n" for keys %authors;
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