By STAN TINER, editor, The Sun Herald
At ASNE, March 26, 2007
Too many American newspapers and their editors have descended into a darkness of spirit and a despair that is palpable. Weighed down by the seemingly unending declines in circulation, revenue, and stock value, we face a depression of circumstance that is reminiscent of this nation’s prospects at the dawn of Franklin Roosevelt’s Presidency. When FDR approached the podium for his first inaugural address in January of 1933, Americans were in the depth of the Great Depression, and they had no clear vision of how to rise from that awful gulf.
Mr. Roosevelt’s words were candid and frank, and taken in their fullness quite remarkable for their wondrous construct. Almost three quarters of a century later, every person in this room, I am sure, and almost every American, can recite one phrase that lifted the nation and helped set her feet on the path to recovery: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself”. What a simple and powerful thought. Of course when you reflect on the dozen years that were to follow, you would have to say it was not exactly true that fear was the only thing to be feared. The words and deeds of evil men were rumbling across Europe and the Far East, and in time they would engulf this nation and the world in a conflagration unlike any we had seen, causing the deaths of countless millions, and the displacement and degradation of many millions more.
And for Americans, the road to hopefulness and economic prosperity was traveled one day and one mile at the time cheered on by the President whose fireside chats continued to offer encouragement to a nation and a people.
That is the journey I hope we will travel today – one that starts with the stirring message of FDR. But at the outset, I would observe that for newspaper editors, fear thus far seems to be winning.
If you come here today expecting to hear more depressing news, I suggest you have come to the wrong place – for this day we are going to cast off the sackcloth and ashes, we are going to forget the four horsemen of the apocalypse, and the voices of gloom and doom, and we are going to celebrate the wondrous past, present and future of journalism and the opportunities for public service that we are blessed to have as editors of American newspapers, with the emerging power of our websites, and all other platforms available to us, which extend our reach and possibility far beyond that of any preceding generation.
Are we challenged as never before, have we had to learn to multi-task and to carry heavy loads we never thought possible, have we had to learn new technology, and have we had to do more with less than editors in the recorded history of our profession – you betcha. But there is something liberating in knowing that not only have we survived all of this, but for those who have survived, we are smarter, more capable, and more nimble than we thought possible. That which does not kill us makes us stronger, and all of we brothers and sisters of ink on paper and the internet, video, podcasts, and niche publishing are powerful managers of news content and information. Never forget that!
Today we are going to take a journey down memory lane, not just for the purpose of nostalgia, but because it is in the lessons of the history of journalism that we gain insight and hope for the future. American editors, especially small newspaper editors, I believe, have grasped the secret of how newspapers can survive, even prosper, in these days where so many struggle, and where chaos sometimes seems the rule.
A great deal of study and theory has been applied to the explanations that rush forth in a great torrent about the failure of newspapers. Some of these deny the possibility of newspapers in the brave new world where we are headed. Not so quick, my friends – I urge you to not go easily into the darkness of those predictions. While the genius of the crowd is important, so too, I submit, is the genius of the solitary editor who knows and cares for his or her readers and communities – whether it be a small town such as Joe Murray’s Lufkin, Texas, or Ken Paulson’s larger territory – the USA.
In my mind Joe is the very embodiment of what a small newspaper editor should be. He grew up with the smell of hot lead in his nostrils and ink in his blood, brought home every evening by his father, a linotype operator at the Lufkin Daily News. So the boy grew up with the ambition to edit the paper and in the fullness of time, his dream was realized. Joe had reached the pinnacle – he was editor of the Daily News, with all of the challenges and disappointments and long hours that the reality of all dreams include, along with the triumphs and joys.
So on a day off, he stopped by his office to read mail before enjoying some down time, when a citizen of the town stood in Joe’s doorway, hat in hand, inviting him to go down to the local funeral home to see the body of his dead great nephew.
“They beat that boy’s brains out, literally,” he said, telling Joe how the boy had died at Marine boot camp.
It was the last thing Joe Murray wanted to do that day, but he felt a certain duty to go and look at the body in a casket. There was something in the earnest story of the dead boy that touched the humanity inside his big heart and awakened the journalist in him, and so the editor went down to see for himself.
The nation was in the midst of the rising surge of soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen to Vietnam and under great pressure to recruit more and more human treasure to spend in that war. The Marines had recruited the young man from Lufkin whose body Joe had gone to view. And the horrible sight the small town editor saw seemed to confirm the uncle’s version of events.
When he left the funeral home, the editor of the Daily News was already on a mission that would reform the United States Marine Corps and earn the newspaper the Gold Medal Pulitzer Prize for Public Service.
Together with young reporter Ken Herman, Murray and the Lufkin Daily News wrote a hometown obituary of Lynn “Bubba” McClure that told how the boy had repeatedly failed entrance exams taken in Lufkin before “passing” the test in San Antonio. “Bubba” McClure died after being required to fight a series of pugil stick battles with bigger and stronger opponents, with the final and fatal blow the one to his head.
The story of the boy’s death led to congressional hearings and changes in recruiting and training in the United State Marine Corps, all because a small town newspaper editor did his duty as he saw it, and pursued truth.
The stirring stories of newspaper editors making a difference and using the power of the press to help illuminate the people did not end 30 years ago in Lufkin, and they are not confined by any means to small newspapers.
I can think of no better example of a current editor listening to his internal voice than Ken Paulson of USA Today.
When Katrina crushed South Mississippi and flooded and destroyed much of New Orleans, American newspaper and broadcast journalists came and reported for a while, and then most moved on. I once wrote that the story of a missing Alabama teenager in Aruba actually received more cable network coverage than the terrible plight of those who survived Katrina, and no one has challenged that statement.
Indeed the focus has so dimmed on that topic that the number one question I’ve been asked at various newspaper meetings I have attended is, “Are you back to normal?” The answer to that is a resounding no, and we will not be for years. The long-term issues of public health – both mental and physical - are profound, as are gigantic insurance questions that have impacted the recovery significantly, as well as housing matters. I suspect it will shock you to learn that about 80,000 of our people are living in FEMA trailers 19 months out from Katrina with little prospect of other housing for many of them today.
I always issue an invitation to editors to come and see the story of Katrina for themselves. There is no way you can imagine the scale and scope and depth of this disaster unless you witness it yourself. A few, including Dave Zeeck, our current ASNE President, have come, and Dave rolled his sleeves up and worked with our newsroom for a week. Now that is leadership, and we are grateful for all who have come.
When I issued the invitation at last fall’s ASNE Board Meeting, Ken Paulson immediately said he would come, and he did. During the APME meeting in New Orleans in October, he made the tour of New Orleans and South Mississippi, and what he saw convinced him his newspaper should do more – much more.
“This is an American tragedy,” Ken said at the time, and he promised that USA Today would commit its journalism to telling the story much more deeply than it had.
Before long, Ken returned to the Katrina zone with his publisher, editorial page editor and virtually the entire leadership of his newsroom in tow, along with an army of reporters, photographers, and webfolk. They have not left us since, and because this solitary editor had a boots on the ground experience, he was able to “see” the story and now his fine paper is telling the continuing saga of Katrina to Americans more comprehensively than any national news organization has done.
I thank Ken for his commitment, as it represents the kind of passion for good journalism that is making a difference in this country.
What he has done is really no different than what you in this room do every day in serving your communities and your readers. You know them, you know the problems that confront them in their daily lives, and you seek to solve them, while illuminating the good they do, and celebrating the joys and achievements that affirm life in those towns.
In looking back on my long career as the top editor of five American newspapers, I am reminded of one of my best moments, though it took my Cub Scout son to prod me to do the journalism that made a difference. I was the editor of the Shreveport Journal, whose readership included the little town of Blanchard where I grew up and attended elementary and middle school, the same public school attended by my three children.
After a PTA meeting one evening, my eldest son’s scout leader said with some humor that Mark, then about 11, had told him that I was going to “save” the little white frame library at the Blanchard school. New laws required all school buildings to have a bathroom and a wheelchair ramp, and the library board had decided to close the Blanchard Library and consolidate at another school to save the cost of those additions.
As we drove home, I told Mark what the scout leader had said and reminded him and his younger brother and sister of our long-established rule that we would never use the power of the newspaper for any personal end. We simply could not do that. With a clearness of mind and pureness of heart that was impressive, he came quickly back with this rejoinder – “Isn’t that what newspapers do – save libraries and help people out?” In that sentence Mark had captured the essence of why I had become a newsperson in the first place – to do good – to help people out.
Chastened by this, and emboldened by the reminder, I did my homework. It turned out that the little Blanchard library not only was one that carried fond memories for the Tiners, it was also the most utilized in the Parish (county) boasting a higher per capita use of materials than any other library. I set out on a mini crusade to save the library. People in the community kicked in with contributions to pay for the bathroom and wheelchair ramp, and the board relented in their plans to close the library. The last time I looked, the little white frame building had a new coat of paint and was still dispensing books to the people of the town, and to students like Mark, who thought that a newspaper could save a library. He is here with us today. Would you stand, Mark?
So what would happen if newspapers went away? Who will save the libraries, and write about the people trying to survive disasters, or tell of the injustices sometimes perpetrated by government or corporations, and all the others who need the spotlight of watchdog journalism shined on their actions?
After several years of almost nothing but negative reporting dominating news coverage of the future of newspapers, there is a glimmer of hope seen in recent publications that suggest the viability of our industry – usually with the caveat that we will survive as a hybrid, combining interactive news with print, as the former expands and the latter contracts in importance.
Robert Kuttner, writing in the current issue of the Columbia Journalism Review, says that while American newspapers dedicate nowhere near the resources to research and development as Microsoft, Google, and Yahoo, we have emerged as formidable web innovators. “And so far nobody has succeeded in replicating the range, depth, and quality of a newspaper in a web-only daily. You can click on Google News for a quick snapshot of breaking stuff, but most of that content originates in newspapers,” Kuttner says.
Content is and has always been our not so secret weapon, and our not so secret advantage. Our journalism and our journalists know how to gather the news and verify it. Despite our very public failures over recent years, I am confident in saying the overall quality of our daily reports are the best they have ever been. Today’s journalist is smarter, more committed to the high values of our profession and works harder than any generation to come before. They deserve better than they get, and I salute them for the amazing way in which they have adapted through the difficult times of this transformative period.
In their Elements of Journalism, Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel write that “In the end, the discipline of verification is what separates journalism from entertainment, propaganda, fiction or art.”
Agreed, gentlemen. Discipline and verification and all of the other “stuff” that has been taught in the classrooms and the newsrooms for all of the years of our memory and longer, the values and ethics, belief in truth, and the righteousness that it purchases – the green eyeshade editors and the worn leather soles of reporters who dig in isolation for that thing called news – all of those, and more, that is our splendid advantage.
We can do this thing – no, I am certain we will do it. We will climb out of this valley of the spirit because we have to do it – democracy depends on us, and our journalism is the glue that holds this place together, only our newspapers and websites can provide the news of every town and every community in our nation as we have done so well so long.
Back in the day, back at the beginning of this old editor’s career, there was excitement in waiting to hear the hum of the press, even feeling its vibration within me. There is no less of a sense of awe and accomplishment when sunherald.com shows its electronic face on my Treo with a scoop that has beaten every other news organization in the whole wide world. Before – not so long ago – we had one shot at being first – before the press run started. No longer. Every minute, every second is full of possibility for we newspeople. I don’t like to say platform agnostic – it doesn’t sound right to me – but I will say I embrace with every fiber of my being, that all of us here have been liberated to tell our stories and show our pictures as never before. We do not flee before the new technologies that are here or the ones to come; we will take them into the essence of our profession and make them our own. That is evident on the badge you wear today – ASNE proudly proclaiming of its editor members – “Leading America’s Newsrooms”.
Whether we are known as newspapers in the future or something else, newspapers are our legacy, and their power and value are not diminished by time.
Where we were once slow to embrace change, we are now adapting and innovating and improving our news gathering capacity at warp speed.
I don’t see any dinosaurs in this room, I see racehorses running toward a future with the bloodlines of great editors who came before.
To those who hold the pursestrings of our future, I will say this one thing of which I am certain – we cannot cut our way to prosperity. We can only report our way to success. All of the cutting, all of the marketing in the world will not carry the day. It is content, content, content. We have it – and the capable folks to gather that content in our own newsrooms. They are our advantage, our key to victory.
Which brings me back to Mr. Roosevelt and his admonition to Americans who faced daunting times and uncertain prospect – but whose greatest danger was fear itself. I have sensed fear in our ranks for a while, and if we listen to the voices of doubt which are a chorus, we could easily be persuaded that all is lost.
I say to you here and now, do not be distracted, do not fear the future – for if you hold true to your historic mission, we will do more than survive, we will prevail. Because I know you, because I have seen your grace under the pressure of deadlines and the strain of hard times, I am optimistic and even bold enough to say you will prevail. You simply must.
