Here's a look at combined BJ sections

Today was the debut day for combined sections in the Beacon Journal.

The new Community section B today was 10 pages. The front was dominated by Mark Price’s always well-read history piece. The title of This Place, This was not included. Other items on the front were Jewell Cardwell’s column, a Bob Downing story on a new store opening in the Cuyahoga National Park and the Scene spread over five columns an inch or so deep and a Champion windows ad across the bottom.

Page B2 had the long throw on Price’s story with a two-column photo and the Scene throw. There were two other stories about a Rubber City road rally and a ball to raise funds for the Cancer Society plus the Ohio Lottery numbers. There also were two ads on the page Page B3 included a column of Region briefs, Cardwell’s throw and a Bath story. There was an add for Wayne County Fair and the Movie Directory took up a space of 5 columns 11 inches deep.. There were two stories and the throw on Downing’s story on B4. Obituaries started on this page 3 columns full and the entire page B5. Business got all of pages B6 and B7. Pages B8 and 9 were the comics, Dear Abby, health column , comics astrology and crossword. The last page, B10, had the weather and TV grid with a Summa ad on the bottom half.

Missing from the A section (which should cause some reader reaction) was the Opp-Ed page. The editorial page, A7, got short shrift with a long story spread across the bottom. There was no Heldenfels column on A2. A huge chunk was devoted to a story and photos about a 9-11 memorial at Tallmadge and a repeat story by editor Bruce Winges explaining the combined sections. A3 through A6 had national and world news and ads.

Sports got 7 of the 14 pages in Section C sports and classified section, but pages C9 and C10 were only vertical half pages.

So there were actually 31 pages in today’s newspaper compared to 38 last week. Somebody might do a more accurate study in exact space devoted to news and amount devoted to advertising on the two Mondays. This is just an attempt to show how news space was used.

Last week’s local section only included six pages which included obits and weather so there was a logical reason for combining the section. However it should be noted that news content is cut back. Loss of the Op-Ed page with no people column or reviews on A2 make the news content seem skimpy.