Pat Englehart video from two decades ago

BJ newsroom retiree Tom Moore provided a copy of the video he made two decades ago while visiting the late State Desk Editor Pat Englehart at his Ocala, Florida home. Pat coordinated the Beacon’s coverage of the 1970 killing of four Kent State students and the wounding of nine others by the Ohio National Guard. That brought the Beacon a Pulitzer Prize.

Pat’s widow, Marge, continued to live in their Ocala, Florida home for seven years after Pat died Oct. 29, 1995. Marge moved into the 200-acre Elks National Home in Bedford, Virginia in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains on U.S. 460 between Roanoke and Lynchburg.

Pat began his career at his hometown paper, the Zanesville Signal, in 1947. After his graduation from Northwestern University School of Journalism in 1952 he worked in Fairmont, West Virginia, and Evansville, Indiana, before joining the BJ wire desk in 1954 under future executive editor and publisher Ben Maidenburg.

Patrick Theodore Englehart was born August 25, 1925 and grew up in Zanesville. He lived in Mogadore for decades where he was Mogadore Lions Club president and Village Charter Commission chairman.

Pat and Marge, a former teacher, had four children -- Peter, Phillip, Mary Pat and Andrew.

Pat was a Navy veteran of World War II. His ashes are in the Florida National Cemetery in Bushnell, which is about 20 miles south of Ocala.

Because of YouTube time limitations, click on the top URL line below for the first part of the video and then click on the bottom URL line below for the second part.

http://youtu.be/fZXoF9ST504

http://youtu.be/NuFL6QfJGiQ

Last typewriter factory shuts its doors

A bit of history happened recently: Indian typewriter manufacturer Godrej and Boyce in Mumbai, India, stopped production after 60 years of manufacturing. Godrej is believed to be the last company anywhere in the world that manufactured typewriters. In recent years, most of the typewriters sold were for Arabic languages. The company's general manager, Milind Dukle, says, "We are not getting many orders now."


Read more in Atlantic magazine

Dick Latshaw takes a trip down memory lane

Retired printer Dick Latshaw, who lives on Pauleys Island, South Carolina near BJ business department retiree Harold McElroy, provides memories, music and photos of the 1940s. Click on the headline if you're interested.

Pell wrote about days of old Linotype

Here's a classic Tom Moore saved from his old website. The story was written by Bob Pell


The Old Days of the Linotype Machine

By Robert R. Pell
(He played a MEAN keyboard)
It was in February, 1948 that I got my first feel of printers' ink. I was hired by the Elk Printing Company in Clay, West Virginia, as an apprentice ... incidentally, my pay at the beginning was $5.00 per week and the work consisted of sweeping the floors, cleaning the stones, putting the spacing and furniture back in it's proper place and distributing type back to the California job case.

The Linotype machine was something that you just moved on to when you had the time and one was unused. Fortunately for me, one of our operators took a job with a Charleston daily paper and that left a Linotype machine free. It was mostly self learning.

The operator in a small shop had to do everything. The distributor was a bar across the top of the machine that had a number of combinations that matched the combination of the matrixes (mats) that cast the letters. After the assembled line went through the machine and the line was cast, the mats were carried back to the top of the machine and slid along the distributor bar until the combination matched the mat's, then it fell into it's proper channel ... or it was supposed to.

Sometimes they would get crossed and jammed up and stop the distributor. The operator then had to climb up and clear all of the mats out of the way and slide them onto the bar to get it going again. The metal (lead) pot had to be kept at a certain level and temperature. It was up to the operator to see that lead was added when needed. He also had to clean the space bands and do most of the maintenance that was required on the machines.

When the small shop operator arrived at the Beacon Journal, it was like a different world. If anything went wrong with the machine all he had to do was push a button and that rang a bell in the machinist's cage which told them which machine was having trouble and someone came out and fixed it. If the pot was too hot, they adjusted it, if the pot was too cold, they adjusted it, if the distributor stopped, they started it. All that was required of the operator was to set type.

Each operator had to put a "slug line" with his name on it at the beginning of each galley of type that he set to identify who had set that particular galley.

When a new operator came in, he was naturally nervous so occasionally one of the "old timers" would pick up the a couple of the new guy's slug lines and give him credit for a couple of galleys of type because the new operator's lines were being counted. If I remember correctly, you had to produce 300 lines in a 7-1/2 hour shift. There were "market operators" who started later in the day and stayed for the Stock Market report.

When the markets started coming in, apprentice boys would carry them to the operators and the type back to the bank to be proofed and read. When the operator had finished the three or four pages of markets that were left for him, he would yell "BOY", and an apprentice would bring more pages and pick up the type for
proofing.

In the early '70's the change was made from the Linotype keyboard to the Typewriter keyboard with the introduction of the Tele-Type Setter (TTS). Most of the operators had gone to typing school to learn the keyboard, so we made the shift and started punching paper tape for the tts machines. The tape, with it's series of holes in different combinations for each letter, were then put on the Linotype machines and the type was automatically set with an operator overseeing two or three machines.

By the end of the '70's, the Linotype machine was nearly phased out and replaced by what we called "cold type". The Beacon Journal kept one machine for display purposes and it was in the Composing Room for quite a few years. Before I retired they had moved it out and I don't know where it went. I hope they still have it.

And in case you haven't guessed already, that's a young, young Bob Pell plying the magic fingers to get the lead out.

Tom Moore on his friend Bob Pell

By TOM MOORE

Bob Pell.

A tall and lankly, string bean of a fellow (he reminded me of that country comic named “String bean.”

I of course knew Bob on the job… an outgoing pleasant fellow who always spoke as I would pass the machine he was operating.

You might say during the working days, ours was a nodding acquaintance…but after retirement, sitting with him at the retiree lunches, we hillbillies hit it off and became good friends.

When I owned a Subaru, I would take it to Bishop Motors in Wadsworth for service. I’d get there at 8 in the morning and Bob would be waiting in his pickup and we’d have breakfast together…many, many times.

I had purchased my first digital camera and had brought it to a luncheon. Bob liked it so well, he bought one similar. And he used it, sharing duties of taking photos of BJ retirees.

Bob made great use of his computer….I was always getting great jokes from. I tried to return the favor.

He loved to travel and he’d send me the photos he took and I’d post them on the website I had.

We had a fun time when the new blimp was rolled out at Wingfoot Lake. He picked me up that morning and we drove to the area and then boarded a bus.

All that morning we roamed the hangar area, getting photos of the new blimp and her three sisters.

I’ve always felt a kinship with the printers—and more so with Bob. Maybe that comes from spending so much time in the composing room as makeup editor.

You could never associate with a greater bunch of folks -- and Bob was right at the top of the list.

Here's an update from William Levenson

Sanford Levenson's son Bill of Washington, DC, sent us a note earlier, but here's more he is sharing:

Thank you for the wonderful tribute to my dad and your posts on this site. I knew about his work at the Beacon when I was growing up, but having the title of copy desk editor is most meaningful when you read tributes from his fellow employees at the Beacon where he spent almost his entire working career. He used his professional skills as a journalist and editor as a volunteer in our synagogue, Beth El Congregation, where for many years he was the editor of the monthly bulletin and yearbook. I remember many times my dad bringing the bulletin proofs home and laying out the bulletin on our kitchen table. In later years he used computer graphics to design countless programs for Beth El events and wedding programs. He always enjoyed doing this volunteer work and never got upset when people gave him last minute changes or additions. And as you would expect, any flyer or program he did had to be perfect before it was officially done.

I have been living in Washington, DC for several years and recently bought a condo. Although my dad was not well over the past year, he really wanted to visit and see my new place. He and my Mom came to Washington, DC for a visit this past weekend. He got to see my new place, and being the handyman that he is, was able to make a couple minor repairs to some small things despite his weakened condition. I thought of a couple DC sites that he would appreciate seeing. On Friday we went to the new Newseum, which is well worth a visit. Outside the Newseum, there are reprints of front page newspapers, one from each state. We walked by these slowly and he liked seeing how different front pages were set up (they are also online at www.newseum.org under Today's Front Pages). He also liked seeing the history of news gathering over the years. We had lunch that day at the National Press Club, which I was able to get a guest pass so we could see where journalists in DC hang out.

We had a wonderful time when he was in Washington, DC this past weekend, and I am really glad he got to see my new condo and meet some of my friends there. He was fine until Sunday night, when he started to not feel well and lost all his strength. My Mom and he drove back to Akron on Monday. After a long battle with cancer, he went to Hospice on Wednesday morning and died several hours later.

As you know my Dad worked almost his entire career at the Akron Beacon Journal, whose initials are ABJ. Sandra and Sanford Levenson's children are Bill, Joel, and Anne, or in a different order, Anne, Bill, and Joel, or ABJ. Growing up, as you can imagine, we thought this was a very interesting coincidence!

Bill Levenson
Washington, DC
bill_levenson@hotmail.com

Sandy, you did it to me again

A tribute to Sanford Levenson by the BJ Retirees blog guy:

Sandy did it to me again. I was wondering, waiting, watching for any new word after I got the first urgent message from Olga Reswow in the newsroom that Sandy Levenson had died.

Was it possible he could have died on Wednesday and the funeral was already planned for Thursday? I had my wife looking through all the old Tower Topics and Sidebars for a good mug shot of Sandy. I called the newsroom to see who was writing the obit. It was apparently a young reporter who answered to say they just heard about it.

With Sandy it was always this way. I was always up against a deadline, wondering how we could manage–but Sandy always came through at the last minute.

Sandy never had a hot shot title at the BJ. He didn’t get in the front row of the photo of those who helped win the Pulitzer prize for coverage of the Kent State shootings. But he was there doing his job. He was among those great craftsman who at one time or the other edited the old Beacon Magazine.

He was a brilliant copy editor. Tom Moore, in his memories of Sandy, tells how Sandy could take a half dozen stories and weave them together. But I doubt if Tom got to the truth of the matter. The truth is probably that he and Sandy were alone on the desk. It was deadline and Moore was wondering what to do about the main story of the day. There was a ton of copy. He tossed it to Sandy who probably said. “I don’t know. Give me a minute.” And they made the deadline by a few short minutes.

The glory of those like Sandy is not in job titles, maybe not even in important work.

I can explain it best by Sandy’s earliest years as an old State Desk reporter at the Beacon Journal when he was responsible for filling the Region page for the Barberton area edition. He had to write a column, shoot a photo and write two or three stories each day to fill the page.

On most days, Sandy would have his column, a photo and a couple of rinky-dink stories ready. But you had to have a play story, something you could put a big headline on,

“Nothing’s going on,” he would tell me. “Nothing’s happening. I have to make a few calls.”

I would shout across the room to his desk 50 feet away, “Do you have anything?”

The clock was ticking and I was starting to wonder what story I would have to play from one of the other region pages to fill the hole. I look frantically toward Sandy again. He is on the phone. Finally, I get that hand single from Sandy with a twinkle in his eye meaning. “I have a good lead on the line.” The good lead who provided some relief for us often was Mayor Kenny Cox who seemed always to come up with a genuine news tip when we needed one.

So, as usual, we made the deadline with a few minutes to spare.

That is the real, unglamorous world of news.

So, as I might have expected, Sandy died on a tight schedule of the Fourth of July and the Jewish Sabbath

I can imagine God saying, “What’s the story? We have been waiting for you. But, well done, good and faithful servant.”
~liggett

Memories of Sandy Levenson by Tom Moore

By TOM MOORE
The downside of getting old:

Losing good friends and colleagues.

Sandy Levenson was both. He was a newsman who never saw a story he couldn’t edit or a headline he couldn’t write.

On deadline. Fast with no fuss.

A gentle man with a ready smile and a soft voice. He was a big, big asset to the BJ when he joined the staff.

I worked closely with him for many years. A lot of times, on Saturday nights when the Beacon was an afternoon paper, only and he and I would be left for the late trick. And in a short staff situation, he wound up as my only copyeditor. And that was a BIG, BIG plus.

Back in the days when we really published a paper that tried to give readers the best from every angle—we had several wire series…Chicago Daily News, New York Times, Knight Ridder, Associated Press among them—I would hand Sandy a dozen stories on the same subject and tell him I needed 15 inches or 20 inches…combining all those services to get the best story.

And nine times out of 10 the completed story was out to the composing room in nothing flat. And if he thought it couldn’t be done in that space, he’d let me know.

I’ll always have found memories of working with him.

And I’ll remember when he would give me a ride home to North Hill after our night shift. He had one of those first small—and I do mean small—Honda’s.

Of course he was a bit hard of hearing, so on the passenger’s side of that tiny car, he had a big, big speaker mounted under the dash—one you’d expect to find in your den.

So that speaker would be giving us music and he’d be talking over it and looking at me for my replies…as we sped along dark North Street…the car would swerve a bit and the tires hit a curb and bounce off!

Man, what a ride! You haven’t lived without talkng such a ride. I must confess I did feel a bit perturbed, but I said nothing and continued to bum that ride. After all, he was Sandy and I thoroughly trusted him…hoping that we wouldn’t wind up hoping the curb and winding up in the dog pound.

Then there’s the story he told about that little car. He was stopped at a red light when suddenly he started moving forward even though he had the brakes on.

Looking back, he found a big cement truck giving his car a nudge. Seems the driver was so high up, he couldn’t see the little car in front of him, and so he was inching up to the light!

And one Saturday night, Sandy, Dave Boerner, retired, who was news editor then, and I were working when the phone rang. Dave answered it.

He listened a moment or two and then barked: “go to bed!”

He hung up.

Then phone rang again. I answered it. It was a kid’s voice asking for Sandy.

I handed the phone to him. He listed for a minute, then turned to Dave and asked: “Why did you tell my boy to go to bed?”

Of course Dave thought he was talking to one of his kids.

Sandy came to our monthly retiree luncheons when ever he could. (The second Wednesday of every month at Papa Joe’s in the Valley.

And that group keeps getting smaller and smaller.
And now one more is gone.

Sandy, it’s been said time and time again---that old saw that when you were born they threw away the mold.

In your case, my friend, truer words were never spoken!

Memorable Story: A stubborn old barn

The blog occasionally posts Memorable Stories from either the past or the present.

This one is about this old dairy barn which stood on its stone foundation for more than 120 years and refused to surrender quietly when workmen started bringing it down.

This memorable story from the Times-Reporter in New Philadelphia, OH, even includes a video showing the final collapse of the old structure–but not its final end..

The old dairy barn, believed to have been built in the 1870s, will get a new life in supporting and decorating houses in Colorado, Utah and England. Its frame and siding were constructed from virgin old growth hickory, poplar, beech, maple and oak woods, which J&J Barnboard’s Joseph Smyth, who specializes in lumber acquisitions, said are desirable in the wood market.

Smyth said the density of virgin old growth wood is tighter than wood harvested today, and he expected to save 10,000 to 12,000 board-feet from the barn

Even the rotten wood that made the barn unsafe still has a future.

“The rest, the lumber that’s garbage, will be placed into piles for the owner to take care of,” Smyth said. . “The owner’s got a woodburner. He’ll wind up using quite a bit of it.”

Click on the headline to read the ful story by Julie Watts, the Times-Reporter web editor.
There’s also a video on the website.

An old letter from a Beacon Journal fan

Bill O’Connor found the following item on “Poynter Forums: Letters sent to Jim Romenesko” It is an old letter (posted on August 23, 2006) but it is a good one. Don’t know why some of us did not notice it earlier.

From JEFF BORDEN: I thought I'd become inured to massive cutbacks in the newsrooms of America, but word the new owners of the Akron Beacon Journal plan to eliminate one-quarter of the newsroom jobs hurts.

The Beacon Journal was my newspaper when growing up in Medina, Ohio. The plain-spoken eloquence of publisher John S. Knight, the passionate and provocative leadership of editor Ben Maidenburg, the hilarious columns by Mickey Porter, the acerbic television reviews of Dick Shippy. . .it was a newspaper with real snap and pop. It's not an exaggeration to say it led me to love the newspaper business and fueled my desire to pursue a career in journalism.

Given its relatively meager resources and its location in a smaller city coping with a post-industrial economy, the Beacon has maintained a surprisingly high level of quality over the years. Now, that commitment to excellence seems likely to vanish with the elimination of so many jobs.

I'm angry at Knight Ridder for capitulating to calls for a sale and even angrier at McClatchy, for washing its hands of papers in more troublesome markets after acquiring KR. But the anger isn't felt as deeply as the sadness and disappointment that John S. Knight's legacy has indeed been sacrificed on the "altar of the countinghouse."

Doug Oplinger: Ready to go to work

The very best thing about the BJ Retirees blog is its viewers who can provide a wealth of fond memories about the Beacon Journal staff. It is always joyful to trace the careers of BJ types over the years. It is difficult sometimes to pry out the stories because people are busy or don’t think what they have to say is significant.

One BJ type, who some of us remember as the kid from Springfield Township, has just been named managing editor of the Beacon Journal. And we are proud of him.

Doug Oplinger himself has been the chronicler of many careers as the perennial emcee of Beacon retirement parties. Doug really puts on a good show on such occasions–often wearing Murphey-style bib overalls to lend a reminiscent touch.

We are also proud of another BJ type who used to refer to himself as the Mogadore beat reporter and is still in the trenches as a stalwart of Cox Newspapers. Perhaps someday we can coax a good profile on Bill Hershey.

Hershey was asked to provide this memory from 37 years ago:

How Doug “Op” Oplinger’s
Beacon Journal career started
(without checking the clips)

I was covering a Springfield school board meeting in the fall of 1970 and noticed an earnest young man in the crowd. We introduced ourselves and he said he was a student – Doug Oplinger. I think he was monitoring the meeting for some student group. I told him to call me if he was ever at a school board meeting when news broke out and I wasn’t there.

I don’t remember how many months later it was but during a snow storm that shut down everything in Akron – at least we thought it did – I got a phone call at my apartment one night. It was Oplinger, reporting that the school board had fired the superintendent during a meeting held during the blizzard. Op, as I recall, got a front page byline the next day and the rest is history.

Remembering May 4, 1970

Even after 37 years, the shootings on May 4, 1970 at Kent State IUniversity are still making news.

There are several items of interest in the Commentary Section of the BJ Retirees web site:

+ A reprint of a "We Were There" feature by BJ photographer Paul Tople from the May, 1944 Sidebar.

+ An editorial from today's Beacon Journal which comments on a claim by Al Canfora that an old audiotape proves that a command was given to the Guardsmen to fire on students. The BJ and others who have listened to the tape say it was too fuzzy to prove anything.

+ The unveiling of a new memorial summarizing what happened. Unfortunately, we could not find a newspaper that reprinted the words from the memorial.

+ And finally a listing of online sources that provide many resources and photos including those from Tople and Chuck Ayers.

12 awarded Knight fellowships

Twelve U.S. journalists have been awarded John S. Knight Fellowships to study at Stanford during the 2007-08 academic year.

During their stay at the university, the fellows will pursue independent courses of study and participate in special seminars. The 2007-08 program marks the 42nd year that Stanford has offered fellowships for professional journalists.

The 12 U.S. fellows will join eight international fellows who were announced in March. Financial support for the U.S. fellows comes primarily from an endowment provided by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. Financial support for the international fellows comes from sources that include the Knight Foundation, the Lyle and Corrine Nelson International Journalism Fund and Yahoo! Inc.

Following are the 2007-08 U.S. fellows and their principal areas of study:

Rick Attig, associate editor, the Oregonian: environmental, economic and political issues of climate change.

John Daley, reporter, KSL-TV, Salt Lake City: leadership in the age of global warming.

Elizabeth Dalziel, staff photographer/Beijing, Associated Press: intersection of art and news photography.

Steven Dudley, Andean bureau chief, Miami Herald, Bogotá, Colombia: Latin America's shift to the left and its implications for U.S. foreign policy.

Paul Kvinta, freelance writer, Atlanta: the deteriorating health of our planet.

Andrea Lewis, co-host/producer, "The Morning Show," KPFA Radio/Pacifica Radio Network, Berkeley, California: the role of alternative journalism in contemporary American culture and democracy.

Eric Pape, contributing writer, Newsweek and Newsweek International: the arts of war: how traumatic inspiration can inspire art and healing.

Daniel Sinker, publisher, Independents' Day Media, Chicago: new publishing models for independent media.

Matthew Stannard, reporter, San Francisco Chronicle: Islam and the West: dueling narratives in religion, politics, history and war.

Ruth Teichroeb, investigative reporter, Seattle Post-Intelligencer: social change and the role journalism plays in fostering reforms in public institutions.

Helen Ubiñas, columnist, Hartford Courant: the disparate effects of poverty, race and family dynamics on individual outcomes.

Rick Young, producer, Frontline, Washington: globalization and the restructuring of American capitalism.

The program received 83 applications for the U.S. fellowships and 132 applications for the international fellowships.

U.S. fellows were chosen by the Knight Fellowships Program Committee: Eavan Boland, Stanford professor of English and director of the Creative Writing Program; Luis Fraga, Stanford associate professor of political science; Theodore Glasser, Stanford professor of communication; William B. Gould IV, Stanford professor emeritus of law; George Haj, deputy managing editor, Houston Chronicle; Ardith Hilliard, executive editor, The Morning Call (Allentown, Pa.); James Mallory, senior managing editor/vice president-news, Atlanta Journal-Constitution; Norman Naimark, Stanford professor of history; and Rita Williams, reporter, KTVU-TV, Oakland.

International fellows

Following is a list of the 2007-08 international Knight fellows, who were announced in March, and their principal areas of study:

Denis Burgierman, editor in chief, Superinteressante magazine, São Paulo, Brazil: freedom of the press and democratization of information.

Violet Gonda, producer and presenter, SW Radio Africa (London), Zimbabwe (Yahoo! International Fellow): development of media in emerging democracies.

Ezequiel Lopez Blanco, investigation and special coverage editor, Clave magazine, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic (Knight Foundation Latin American Fellow): economic power and a free press in Latin America.

Janine Perrett, editor/writer, The Business Network—a sponsored supplement to the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age (Melbourne)—Sydney, Australia: U.S. business trends and their impact globally, in particular on the media industry.

Robert Rakipllari, editor in chief, Panorama newspaper, Tirana, Albania (Lyle and Corrine Nelson International Fellow): sociopolitical trends in emerging Eastern European democracies, and their relation to the European Union and international organizations.

Susanna Schultz, infographic editor and news columnist, Svenska Dagbladet, Stockholm, Sweden: the state of environmental journalism in developing countries, and the history and current state of applied leadership.

Gabor Vajda, technology reporter, Index.hu, Budapest, Hungary: citizen participation, virtual universes and community sites—new challenges and new tools in online journalism.

Wang Wei, producer and anchor, Shanghai Media Group, Shanghai, China: freedom of expression, and comparison of American and Chinese media-ethics codes.

13 named Knight-Wallace Fellows

The University of Michigan Knight-Wallace Fellows program has named 13 American journalists for the academic year 2007-2008. Additional international fellows will be designated in June.

While on leave from regular duties, Knight-Wallace Fellows pursue custom-designed sabbatical studies and attend special, twice-weekly seminars at Wallace House, a gift from newsman Mike Wallace and his wife Mary. The group named for the coming academic year is the 35th to be offered fellowships by the University of Michigan.

Each Knight-Wallace Fellow receives all academic fees and a stipend of $55,000, supported by gifts from foundations, news organizations and individuals committed to improving the quality of information reaching the public.

Professor Charles R. Eisendrath, who directs the program, is a former foreign correspondent for Time Magazine with broad experience in print, broadcast and online journalism.

U.S. fellows and their study projects are:

Jamaal Abdul-Alim, education reporter, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, The Impact of Incentives on Student Achievement.

Carol Ann Alaimo, military writer, Arizona Daily Star, Challenges Facing the U.S. Military.

Kevin Clemens, editor at large and columnist, European Car Magazine, Solving America’s Automobile Related Transportation Energy Needs.

Tracy Davis, reporter, The Ann Arbor News, Globalization and World Ecology.

Steve Edwards, host, WBEZ (Chicago Public Radio), How Latino Immigrants Reshape American Politics, Economics and Culture.

Miles Harvey, freelance, The Missing Link between Men and Apes.

Colleen Kenney, reporter, Lincoln Journal Star, Applying Poetry Techniques to Narrative Writing.

Kate Linebaugh, reporter, The Wall Street Journal, Asia’s Wealth Gap: Capital, Consumption and Inequality.

Matthew Moyer, freelance photographer, Documentary Films and Building a Photo Agency.

Ronald Pereira Parsons, assistant managing editor and director of production, Yahoo! News, The Role of Automation and Technology in the Next Generation of Online Journalism.

Rochelle Riley, columnist, Detroit Free Press, How Multimedia Empires are Built.

Brad Schrade, reporter, The Tennessean, The Intersection of Money and Politics.

Sam Skolnik, reporter, Las Vegas Sun, The Rise of Problem Gambling in America.

10 get Knight-Bagehot grants

Ten Knight-Bagehot Fellows in economics and business journalism have been named by the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism for the 2007-2008 academic year.

The mid-career fellowships provide full tuition and a living stipend of $50,000 for experienced journalists to take graduate courses at Columbia’s schools of business, law, and international and public affairs. Fellows also attend special seminars at the journalism school led by scholars and business experts during the nine-month program, which begins in August. The program is open to journalists with at least four years experience.

This year’s fellows are: Jeremy Caplan of Time Magazine, Jose Eduardo Teixeira Costa of VOCÊ S/A, Dimitra DeFotis of Barron’s, Jim Edwards of Brandweek, Allison Fass of Forbes, Liza Featherstone of The Nation, Paul Glader of The Wall Street Journal, Greg Griffin of The Denver Post, Leoneda Inge of North Carolina public radio station, WUNC, and Bryan Myers of the PBS newsmagazine program, “NOW.”

Founded in 1975, the fellowships are named for John S. and James L. Knight, brothers who established the Knight Foundation, and Walter Bagehot, the 19th-century British economist and editor of The Economist. They are administered by the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and directed by Terri Thompson, a former associate editor of U.S. News & World Report and former reporter for Business Week.

[Source: Jim Romensko in Poynter Forums.]

Click on the headline to see brief biogs on winners.

Knight News Challenge winners due May 23

The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation will announce the first-year winners of the Knight News Challenge on May 23 at the Interactive Media Conference & Tradeshow in Miami, hosted by Editor & Publisher and Mediaweek.

The Knight News Challenge – a contest open to anyone, anywhere – offers $25 million over five years in awards for news experiments that use digital media to build communities in specific geographic areas. The first year’s winners range from individuals to corporations and were chosen from among 1,650 applicants after recommendations by a panel of experts in digital media. They will receive a total of $12 million, including several multi-year awards. Applications for the 2007 round can be submitted at www.newschallenge.org starting July 1.

A press release about the winners will be released on May 23, the day of the announcement.

Knight Foundation is a sponsor of the Interactive Media Conference & Tradeshow 2007, an annual forum for new media issues attended by media representatives from the business and editorial side. More information is available at www.interactivemediaconference.com.

The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation promotes journalism excellence worldwide and invests in the vitality of 26 communities where the Knight brothers owned newspapers. Knight Foundation supports ideas and projects that create transformational change. For more, visit www.knightfdn.org.

A picture from when I worked with Chuck Lally on the Beacon Magazine

Click on the picture to see full size.

It has also some notables from days of yore. I am standing on the left behind Chuck.

...Ott

Tributes to Chuck Lally on our website

Some tributes to Charles J. Lally and an earlier photo of him are now on the BJ Retirees website.

Click on the headline to go there.