There’s no way to ignore the barrage of articles about our industry lately. First there was Dean Singleton’s speech at the World Newspaper Congress: “I also wish for the past, but it’s not coming back. … In the future, there will be two categories of newspapers. Those that survive, and those that die … By my estimate, as many as 19 of the top 50 metro newspapers in America are losing money today, and that number will continue to grow.”
Then, I came across these two headlines in Newspaper Research Journal:
- “Survey Measures Burnout in Newspaper Sports Editors”
- “Study of City Editors Raises Concern of Job Satisfaction”
The St. Petersburg (Fla.) Times, which The Poynter Institute owns, has announced that it will be reducing its staff. The Chicago Tribune has said it plans to cut 60 newsroom jobs. During a recent three-day span, I received five phone calls from colleagues who fear they will lose their jobs.
Can we find hope?
I did last month when David Shedden, The Poynter Institute’s library director, sent a staff-wide e-mail about Nelson Poynter, the institute’s founder. Sunday, June 15, was the 30th anniversary of Nelson’s death.
Nelson devoted his life to journalism. He left his stock to found a nonprofit school dedicated to teaching and supporting journalism. His strategic thinking included all of what is happening to us today. He advised his employees to have “go to hell money.”
In a 1977 interview at the St. Petersburg Times, Nelson said: “I always kept about $1,000 in the savings account, which I called my ‘go to hell money.’ I felt I was a better staffer on any newspaper if I didn’t have to work for that newspaper. I think the most unbearable [job] would be to work for a newspaper that you hated, that you had no respect for.”
Consider Nelson’s perseverance and the number of jobs and risks he took throughout his career. He became a strategic thinker and innovator who devoted his life and earnings to journalism. Nelson:
- Worked as a reporter and editor for the school’s newspaper, The Indiana Daily Student.
- Worked during the summer of 1923 as a reporter for The Washington (D.C.) Daily News while still enrolled at Indiana University.
- Covered the 1924 Democratic convention for The Indianapolis Star.
- Was the news editor of The Japan Times.
- Earned his master’s degree in economics from Yale University.
- Served as an assistant general manager at the St. Petersburg Times.
- Bought the Indiana newspaper, the Kokomo Dispatch, and sold it within a year after losing his shirt.
- Became an advertising salesman for the Cleveland Press.
- Was the business manager of The Washington Daily News.
- Served as the editor and publisher of The Ohio Citizen.
- Became business manager of the Minneapolis Star Tribune.
- Returned to the St. Petersburg Times as general manager and became the newspaper’s editor in 1939.
- Was also the business manager for Ralph Ingersoll’s Publications Research company. (Poynter left the company before the first issue of the PM newspaper was published.)
- During World War II held a number of government positions: He helped organize the Foreign Information Service, which started the Voice of America radio service, and in one of his last assignments worked for the Office of War Information’s Bureau of Motion Pictures in Hollywood, Calif.
- Founded Congressional Quarterly in Washington, D.C., as an editorial research service about Congress.
- Became the majority owner of the Times and the Times Publishing Company when he purchased most of the company’s stock from his father in 1947.
- Pioneered at the St. Petersburg Times the use of photo composition, offset printing, and the bold use of color, graphics and design.
Do you suppose Nelson faced some of the challenges of today’s industry? You bet. Consider the following quotes, taken from various interviews with Nelson:
“As custodians of one of democracy’s essential freedoms we are guilty of technological backwardness. We have been remiss in discovering new tools to implement that freedom. As an industry we have done practically nothing to further basic research. … We have learned enough to know that we have learned little. We have learned that as an industry we are backward in research, and that we are not seizing the new technologies and discoveries of recent years. As an industry we must improve and expand — or we will dwindle and die.” Nov. 2, 1946
“Forty years ago when I was a freshman in college, I was told by newspaper veterans that journalism’s great days were fading, and that the future for individual proprietorship was foreclosed. … I am convinced that the readers today are ahead of most of their papers. This spells opportunity to young men and women with the gift of communication and the curiosity and compulsion to tell the many-sided story of the complicated world in which we live. … While I have watched newspapers fold and press empires die, I also have seen others rise. Imagination, energy, resourcefulness and courage have played a more important role than mere money in most of these ventures.” May 4, 1961
“The opportunity for gifted editors, writers, artists and photographers never has been better than in the golden age ahead. Editors and educators will work close together because it is evident today that the learning process is a continuing one. … New gadgetry will make it possible to have more publications that cater to audiences of specialized interests which multiply daily with the knowledge explosion. … It must be better written, and better edited, with pictures of greater fidelity, and delivered in a more convenient package.” April 1968
“It’s a great privilege to run a newspaper, it’s certainly been more rewarding than just having some stocks or bonds and living off the dividends or coupons. I guess I’m rather narrow-minded in that respect. I’d rather be a newspaper editor than the richest man in the world.” Jan. 12, 1977
Nelson never lost his optimistic belief in the future of our industry. He is, in so many ways, a symbol of hope for journalism.
