Thrity at Jamaica Literary Festival

Former BJ reporter Thrity Umrigar, whose career took a serious turn toward writing notable novels, will be participating in the biennial Calabash International Literary Festival on St. Elizabeth’s Treasure Beach in Jamaica.

The festival, founded in 2001, will begin Friday, June 1 and run through Sunday, June 3. This year’s theme is “Calabash Lit Up.” Double play on the word “Lit,” of course, as in literature and bright lights.

Luminaries there with Thrity include Ishion Hutchinson, the current Joseph Brodsky Rome Prize winner, “The Sopranos” actor Michael Imperioli and British poet Malika Booker.

Female poets laureates Jamaican Lorna Goodison, Canadian/Acadian Georgette LeBlanc, American Tracy K Smith and Carol Ann Duffy from the United Kingdom will read from their work.

Also in Jamaica for this event will be HBO “The Wire” series creator David Simon and his wife Laura Lippman, author of 23 books; Warsan Shire, who wrote poems featured on Beyoncé's visual album “Lemonade;” award-winning hip hop artist Akala; and a tribute to trombonist and composer Don Drummond.

Former BJ photographer Ott Gangl and wife Ann are celebrating their 63^rd wedding anniversary. They live in Uniontown.

They were married in Akron’s St. Bernard Church by Father Wolfe, who performed the ceremony in German, Ott’s native language, because the priest wanted to practice his German.

Ott exudes: “It’s still a blast being married to that girl.”

“Blast” and “Ott” belong in the same sentence.

Ott is equally at ease at a raucous Oktoberfest Festival, in a roomful of models during a photo shoot or going naked while photographing a nudist colony.

Ott worked his way through Ann’s family of females before winding up with her.

Let Ott explain:

“I came over on the same converted Liberty Boat from Germany as Ann’s cousin on April 20, 1952. So while visiting I was introduced to the family with three young and beautiful daughters.

"I dated the older one for a while and then went to the middle one, Ann, to whom I got enamored while sitting in their living room waiting for Mary to fiddle with her makeup.

"After Mary dumped me I didn't miss a beat to date Ann. We got engaged in 1954 and a year later we got married.”

Ott surviving ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia as the 12-year-old child of German parents in World War II.

Ott and Ann haven’t switched from the accelerator to the brakes yet.

Principal fires heralded teacher for not-good-news articles

What do you do when you’re principal of a school whose newspaper and yearbook adviser with 34 years of experience in 3 states has been labeled the best in the country and whose students have won more than 175 national and state awards in one year?

Fire her, if you’re first-year Prosper, Texas High School principal John Burdett.

Her crime? Making the school look bad. Happy news only, Burdett demanded.

Lori Oglesbee-Petter was at the helm when articles about a canceled movie night and a change in the 10^th grade curriculum were cited for “making the school look bad.”

Additional editorials were banned.

Judge for yourself by going to http://www.splc.org/article/2018/05/prosper-high-school?utm_sq=frmz99wcbg&utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=society+of+professional+journalists&utm_content=articles

Hedge funds buy newspapers, bleed ‘em dry

Hedge funds are buying up newspapers and draining them of every last dollar they can get before letting them wither on the vine.

That’s the conclusion of veteran newspaper analysts.

GateHouse, which took over the BJ’s assets, Alden Global and Chatham Asset Management, which has a strangehold on McClatchy, once owner of the BJ, were cited as prime examples.

Part of the strategy is to dump highly paid, unproductive reporters and make those still in the newsroom take up the slack.

Some newsrooms were reduced from 200 to two dozen editors and reporters.

Read the full article by clicking on https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-05-22/the-hard-truth-at-newspapers-across-america-hedge-funds-are-in-charge

4^th novel for Bill O’Connor

Former BJ movie critic and Franciscan friar Bill O’Connor has published “St. Leo,” the second book in his planned trilogy.

Bill O'Connor during two stages of his life

The first was “The Era of Long Thoughts,” which had the Beacon Journal newsroom as its setting, but with an alias. Since once of the characters was Guy Daynor, and most of us who watched Donn Gaynor go through his paces on the copy desk for decades, that wasn’t tough to figure out.

"St. Leo" “traces the results of a story written by the protagonist of the first book,” Bill tells me.

“St. Leo” is available from Amazon and on Kindle.

Bill’s previous novels are “Bums and Hershey Bars,” which began as a master’s thesis at Bowling Green State University, published in 1965, and “The Legend of Horn Mountain,” an adventure story written for those in their early teen years, set in Montana where Bill lived for more than a decade and was dean of students at Montana State University in Northern.

Long after growing up in South Philadelphia, Bill joined the BJ in the spring of 1979.

Bill did his undergraduate work at St. Francis College and got his master's degree at Bowling Green.

He and his Swiss miss wife Elsbeth (since 2002) throw almost Gatsbyesque parties at their Rambling Way home in Bath Township.

They both have four adult children from previous marriages.

Bob Downing camps out at family wedding in Park Ridge, Illinois 

Downing folds up his tent for final time

Bob Downing wrote:

 “I have written nearly 765 outdoorsy travel columns over 20 years for the Akron Beacon Journal/Ohio.com , and this is the last one.”

Bob retired from Ol’ Blue Walls in 2016, but continued writing his outdoors column.

He was hired in March 1972 by Pat Englehart as a State Desk part-timer while attending Kent State University. Bob was hired full-time in June 1972 and was assigned to cover Portage County.

He began his college education at Northwestern University, Engelhart’s alma mater, but graduated from Kent State.

Downing’s wife, another Pat, is a teacher/speech therapist. They have three children.

I think Bob’s final outdoors column in the BJ is worth reading. It shows what BJ readers will be missing when another one folds up his tent and leaves.

Click on https://www.ohio.com/akron/lifestyle/bob-downing-looks-back-on-20-years-of-traveling-in-the-wild-and-elsewhere to read Bob’s farewell outdoors column.

Oplinger still busy

Former BJ managing editor Doug Oplinger is project manager for Your Voice Ohio.

He said it involves “a lot of travel” and discussions with groups around Ohio for a better understanding between Ohioans and its media.

Doug Oplinger

Doug has assembled quite an advisory board.

The advisory board includes:

Ashley Alvarado, Manager for Public Engagement at Southern California Public Radio/KPCC, based in Los Angeles, California.

Jake Batsell, associate Journalism professor at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas.

Carrie Brown, director of the social journalism MA program at City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism in New York City.

Elizabeth Dunbar, a reporter for Minnesota Public Radio News in St. Paul.

Sam Ford, a media consultant and an instructor at Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green, Kentucky.

Joanne Griffith, senior producer for Marketplace Weekend in Los Angeles.

Fiona Morgan, Journalism Program Director at Free Press in Durham, North Carolina.

The stated goal of Your Voice Ohio is “a collaborative effort by news organizations across Ohio to better respond to the needs and aspirations of all Ohioans.” 

There’s an increased focus on helping “communities of color, rural communities and low-income communities.”

Your Voice Ohio’s funding is provided by the Knight Foundation and the Democracy Fund.

Actually, Doug said, "I have two jobs." The other is contributing to the Kettering Foundation's Connections articles.

Dayton-based KF's focus is on how citizens can improve their democracy. It was founded in 1927 by Charles F. Kettering. 

Doug became BJ managing editor in 2007. 

He climbed a long way from the days when he was the baby-faced kid in a John Deere cap who showed up at the State Desk when Pat Englehart, Harry Liggett and John Olesky were running the show (well, mostly Pat; Harry and I were in charge of following Pat’s edicts and cleaning up the debris from his tornadic personality).

Doug was a free-lance stringer. He is a graduate of the University of Akron with a master’s from Northwestern University. Coincidentally, that was where Englehart got his degree before whirlwinding into the BJ.

Oplinger lives in Green with his wife, Diane. They have three children: Jaclyn, Danielle and Justin.

I chatted with Doug at calling hours for the late BJ photographer Paul Tople at Ciriello & Carr funeral home where I also met Lakewood native Patrick McManamon, who succeeded legendary Terry Pluto as the BJ’s sports columnist. 

And more than a dozen other former co-workers at Ol’ Blue Walls, including cartoonist Chuck Ayers.

Another book by Glenn Proctor

Glenn Proctor, who once prowled Ol’ Blue Walls at the BJ before Newark Star-Ledger (New Jersey) and Richmond Times-Dispatch management and retirement, has a new book out, “750 Questions Worth Asking Yourself or Significant Other.”

Glenn Proctor

The tome by the newspaper “firebrand,” to quote others, is described as a guide to “compatibility and self-discovery” in relationships. 

For the women’s viewpoint he consulted life coach Paula Lesso, relationship coach Lori Ann Davis and fashion, image coach Alice Flowers and early editors Natasha Morris and Courtney Price Davis.

Glenn has written other books about relationships, single parenting and foster children and the nation’s progress from covered wagons to self-driving automobiles.

The Marine Vietnam veteran taught at Kent State and Washington and Lee universities. Glenn lives in Charlotte, NC, with wife Terri.

You can buy Glenn’s latest book at https://outskirtspress.com/bookstore/details/9781478792284  and https://www.amazon.com/750-Questions-Asking-Yourself-Significant/dp/1478792280/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1525552424&sr=1-1&keywords=glenn+proctor

Numbers don’t lie, unfortunately

In the BJ article announcing Bill Albrecht as GateHouse Media’s publisher at Ol’ Blue Walls, I did some reading between the lines.

Out of the Beacon Journal’s 245 employees (165 full time), 216 received job offers from GateHouse. Some newsroom design desk

employees were told they will have jobs into September.

That means at least 29 were discarded.

So there are 216 in the building where 80 were part-timers before GateHouse. At my retirement in 1996 there were about 900 working at 44 E. Exchange Street.

Since newspapers nationally have lost 95% of their staff since 1990, the decimation continues. Sadly.

Those still at the BJ are my heroes. They are doing an admirable job under extremely difficult circumstances.

Kelly Tremaine, Northeast Ohio Group vice president for GateHouse, will add the Beacon Journa/Ohio.com to his duties. He is in charge of maybe a dozen daily and weekly newspapers in Summit and Portage counties for GateHouse.

Most of the advertising will be processed for the 150 GateHouse newspapers out of Austin, Texas. Those in the BJ’s advertising department before the Gatehouse purchase probably will be gone by September.

Wednesday calling hours for Tople

The calling hours for legendary BJ photographer Paul Tople will be 2 to 8 p.m. Wednesday, May 16 at the Ciriello & Carr Funeral Home, 39 South Miller Road, Fairlawn.

Paul’s Funeral Mass will be at 11 a.m. Thursday, May 17 in St. Hilary Catholic Church.

Paul Tople

Paul passed away Friday, May 11.

He was an Eagle Scout. And, as all who knew him say, and a good scout throughout his life.

Betty Lin-Fisher wrote a tribute to Paul in the BJ that is well worth reading.

Click on the blue  https://www.ohio.com/akron/news/local/retired-award-winning-beacon-journal-photographer-lifelong-boy-scout-volunteer-paul-tople  to peruse Betty’s excellent chronicle of Paul’s lifetime of achievements in career and as a person.

Paul’s obituary:

Paul David Tople

Died: Fri., May 11, 2018

---

Visitation

2:00 PM to 8:00 PM, Wed., May 16, 2018
Location: Fairlawn

---

Mass of Christian Burial

11:00 AM Thu., May 17, 2018
Location: St. Hilary Catholic Church

Paul , 70 years old, went to be with his Lord and Savior after his battle with cancer May 11, 2018 surrounded by his family.  

Paul was born in Barberton and was a life-long resident of the Akron area.  He graduated from Norton High School and Kent State University with a degree in Photo Journalism.  

When Paul’s parents gave him a photograph processing kit for Christmas when he was 14 years old, he thought that was the “dumbest gift” ever.  His mother and father weren’t photographers, and he had never taken a picture in his life.  He had no idea at the time that the kit would serve as a symbol of his destiny.  

After working his way through college by photographing weddings and working part-time at the Barberton Herald, Paul graduated from Kent State University in 1970.  While at Kent State, he worked for the School of Journalism, Mass Communication’s Chestnut Burr magazine and yearbook, as well as the Daily Kent Stater.  

After graduation, be began a notable career as a photographer at the Akron Beacon Journal.  During his 42 years at the newspaper, he was a member of distinguished news teams that won three Pulitzer Prizes.  During his career he photographed the May 4th Kent State Shooting, was awarded the William Taylor Distinguished Alumni Award, the Kent State Man of the Year and Friends of JMC Photographer Award.  

Paul was awarded the Eagle Scout in 1965.  He continued scouting throughout his entire life and was awarded the Silver Beaver award.  

Paul was preceded in death by his first wife Teresa and his grandson Michael.  He is survived by his beloved wife Sally; his two sons, Edward (Jennifer) and Michael (Jamie); his sisters, Susan (Steve) Flener, Pat (Ron) Greenbank; his brothers, John (Julie), Tom (Patty) Tople, his sister-in-law, Connie Kyttler and grandchildren.

Calling Hours will be 2:00pm - 8:00 p.m. on Wednesday May 16, 2018 at Ciriello & Carr Funeral Home. (39 S. Miller Rd. Fairlawn, OH 44333)  

Mass of Christian Burial will be at 11:00 a.m. on Thursday May 17, 2018 at St. Hilary Catholic Church.  (2750 W. Market Street Fairlawn, OH 44333) 

Private Inurnment Greenlawn Cemetery

In Lieu of other remembrances donations can be made to Sharon Township Last Alarm Foundation or your favorite charity.  (C/O 39 S. Miller Road Fairlawn, OH 443333)

At the top of this montage are artists’ renditions of just a few of the many people who no longer work at the BJ.

Identified so far:

TOP ROW Marilyn Miller, ???, ???,  Carol Leibowitz, ???, ???

THIRD ROW Paula Schleis, ???, Dave Scott, Olga Reswow, Bob Downing

SECOND ROW ???, ???, Rich Heldenfels, Ed Meyer, Bill Lilley, Jewell Cardwell, Linda Omobien, Colette Jenkins Parker.

FIRST ROW Dennis Gordon, Kim Hone McMcMahan, Phil Trexler, Bob DeMay, Larry Pantages.

At the bottom of the montage is a photo taken a few years ago of  BJ photographers gathered at the home of Ott Gangl. Today, Phil Masturzo is the only one still working at Ol’ Blue Walls.

In 2001 the BJ lost more than 500 years of experience in one day.

In 2006 the BJ shed 42 staff members to save $2.3 million a year. On one day 24 left with 335 years of BJ service.

In 2008 there were 18 departures with 273 years of BJ service.

Since 2001, the BJ has lost more than 2,000 years of newspaper experience.

In 2009 newspaper layoffs soared to 12,840 unwanted employees.

In 2012 alone there were 1,859 newspaper jobs eliminated in America, including 600 in one day by Advance Publications in New Orleans and Alabama.

When I retired from the BJ in 1996 there were nearly 200 in the newsroom. Today, there are fewer than 65 in the entire building.

Are newspaper employees on their way to becoming an extinct species?

What does that portend for democracy in America if there is no one to keep the political and business foxes from pillaging the henhouse.

Decimating newspaper staffs very profitable

Vulture capitalist Randall Smith found a way to make newspapers profitable. Slash and burn the staff.

Smith is controlling owner of the Denver Post, St. Paul Pioneer Press, San Jose Mercury News and the Orange County Register.

From 2012 to 2017, Smith reduced the Post staff from 184 to 99, close to half.

The Pottstown Mercury went from 73 to 10.

The Norriston Times-Herald went from 45 to 12.

The Pioneer Press dismissals which reduced the staff to 60 brought a $10 million profit.

Smith, through Alden Global Capital and Digital First Media, racked up $160 million in profits in 2017. By shedding all that newspaper talent.

Read the full article at https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/05/13/denver-post-profits-newspaper-industry-218360

Latshaw remembrance packed ‘em in

The Celebration of Life service for former BJ printer Dick Latshaw Saturday, May 12 at the Allenside Athletic Club on Manchester Road in Akron drew so many that I had a difficult time finding somewhere to sit and eat and chat about Dick.

Dick’s widow, Pat Latshaw, was there. They were married for 57 years. So was Linda McElroy, widow of Harold McElroy, who drove both of them from Pawleys Island, South Carolina where they lived two blocks away on the same street for nearly two decades. They were married for about a half-century.

Retired printer Sid Sprague, who also lived near them on Pawleys Island, moved to Loveland, Colorado with his new bride after his first wife died. Sid was the first to move to Pawleys Island (from Cuyahoga Falls) around 1997 or 1998. Then Harold and Linda McElroy moved around 1999. Dick and Pat moved to Pawleys in 2000. They all lived on the same 3-blocks-long street. 

Also at Saturday’s tribute to Dick was Mike Kerchan, who went from BJ printer to maintenance after Composing was shut down and still is working there. It was part of Canadian David Black’s deal with Gatehouse Media, which bought the BJ assets, that the former printers continue to keep their jobs, as John S. Knight voluntarily promised in writing in return for bringing computers into the building to put out the paper.

Garfield High graduate Dick passed away March 11 on Pawleys Island.

Paul Tople at photographer Ron Kuner's retirement

Photographer Paul Tople, Kent State grad involved in three BJ Pulitzers, passed away today after a brief stay at Cleveland Clinic’s Akron General Justin T. Rogers Hospice Care Center on Ridgewood Road in Akron.

His widow is Sally Tople.

The three Pulitzers were for Kent State, Goodyear and Question of Color. Paul won so many Cleveland Press Club first places that they should have named the award after him.

Paul’s BJ friends have tales that highlight his qualities:

Bob Springer recalls Paul’s reassuring presence during news events:

“The day Jeffrey Dahmer was murdered in prison in Wisconsin, Paul and I ran out to Medina Line Road to see if Dahmer's father was home. He and Dahmer's stepmother were both home. It was an emotionally awkward interview. 

"I am so glad to this day that Paul was with me. His compassion, gentleness and demeanor really drew out the best of the Dahmers in a difficult circumstance. Thank you, Paul."

James Carney reveals Paul’s sensitivity:

“So one day we had a big snowstorm and school was cancelled. Paul and I went out looking for a story. At Big Bend skating pond we found it. An older gentleman was skating figure 8s alone on the frozen pond. Just him and the pond and us watching. 

"Turned into a great little sense of place story with a beautiful Tople portrait of the man skating.”

Susan Gippin remembers Paul’s personal touch:

“I don't remember going on assignment with Paul often. But I do remember when I was ginormous with child in 1989, Paul knew I wanted a photo to show my daughter when she grew up.

“One day, he took me back into the inner sanctum of the BJ photo studio and shot a few frames.

“A few days later, he showed up at my desk with a perfectly composed black and white photo of me in maternitywear sitting crosslegged on the floor -- giant belly and all.

“I still have that photo. And fond memories of sweet, thoughtful Paul."

Mike Cardew, later a BJ photographer, recalls being welcomed to the club by a giant of a man:

“Paul was the first photographer from the Beacon Journal I met. It was Easter and I was finishing up as the intern for The Cincinnati Enquirer. We were at Lucasville covering the riots.”

Paul’s first wife, Terri Kyttler Tople, passed away in 2008 after battling systemic lupus for decades. They had been married for 36 years. She taught learning disabled children in Akron public schools for 18 years.

Paul later married Sally, previously Ted Schneider’s wife.

Paul’s son, Mike, is married to Jamie Tople. Paul’s other son, Ed, is married to Jenny.

Paul took the BJ photo of photographer John Filo and Mary Vecchio, subject of the 1970 Kent State/National Guard shootings that brought Filo a Pulitzer, at their 2009 May 4 reunion on the Kent State campus.

Norton High graduate Paul was a senior at Kent State in 1970. He was working part-time for the Beacon Journal and was associate editor of the Chestnut Burr, the Kent State yearbook. The BJ used his photos of the shootings on May 4. In 1977 he was promoted to BJ assistant chief photographer under Bill Hunter.

Paul was on the Stater staff with Stu Feldstein, Terry Oblander, Chuck Ayers, Rich Zitrin and copy editor Paula Stone Tucker. All of them wound up working at Ol’ Blue Walls. 

Ken Krause, former BJ sports editor who lives in Medford, Massachussetts, forwarded these Tower Topics articles that further illuminate Paul's remarkable personality: