Connecting - Aug. 22, 2023

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Connecting

Aug. 22, 2023

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Colleagues,

Good Tuesday morning on this Aug. 22, 2023,

Congratulations to Noreen Gillespie – AP’s global business editor - and all the best to her as she embarks on new life's chapters.

In a staff note Friday, Michael Giarrusso, deputy head of newsgathering, Global Beats, announced that she is leaving AP on Aug. 25 (Friday) and taking on a new role at the intersection of tech and journalism (with more details to come on that in September).

“Noreen Gillespie has been central to many of the biggest AP news innovations over the past two decades,” Giarrusso said. “She has been a change agent through overhauls of U.S. News, Sports and Business. She helped shape our approach to partnerships with some of our earliest successes in grants.

“She has led the coverage of huge storms, tragic shootings, Olympics and financial crises, while always encouraging reporters to chase the viral moments that stand out and make readers laugh. She has done it all with enthusiasm, empathy and a willingness to roll up her sleeves and take on any task that will improve the AP’s coverage.

“Her impact will not disappear. The Business and Education teams are on healthy trajectories thanks to Noreen. She has built a strong, diverse leadership bench. She has high standards, and all of us who benefited from her guidance will carry her lessons with us.”

Here’s to a great day – be safe, stay healthy, live the day to your fullest.

Paul

A walk down AP Memory Lane

The AP was well represented at the Aug. 21, 1982, wedding of Ellen Nimmons and Jim Fitzgerald in Northfield, Mass., on a farm where Ellen’s mother was born. This photo is a walk down memory lane for many of us – some pictured who are Connecting colleagues. Jim died in 2017 and Ellen retired last November as a global news manager on the Nerve Center.

The photo shows, from left: Martie Barnes, Mike Silverman, Roger Petterson, Bill Ahearn, Charlotte Porter, Jerry Schwartz, Fred Standish, Bobbie Seril, Jean-Claude Bouis, Brian O’Hanlon, Ellen Nimmons, Jim Fitzgerald, Jack Stokes, Julie Dunlap, Lindsey Washburn and Rick Hampson.

New-member profile: Peter Bregg

Peter Bregg and Nick Ut in Vietnam - 50 years ago

Peter Bregg - At 17 years of age, I joined CP, Canada’s wire service in Ottawa, as a copy boy for the summer. By fall I had developed an interest in photojournalism. I was lucky as a news photographer where that “gotcha!” moment gets you front pages. I would point the camera and someone would fall. After a year of learning by hanging out with CP staff photographers, I was hired. Pierre Trudeau became Prime Minister six months later. He was a great subject and I think that helped me a lot in getting those front pages.

In 1973 I went to Vietnam with Canadian soldiers sent to monitor the withdrawal of U.S. forces. Working out of the AP office, I was lucky to meet some of AP’s greats – among them Horst Faas, who headed the photo crew, and Nick Ut, who had made the famous “Napalm Girl” photo but not yet announced as Pulitzer winner for that photo. George Esper was there and Edie Lederer - who continues to produce great stories for the AP. One of the above photos shows Nick and I 50 years ago this past February.

A year later Hal Buell, the best photo boss one could ask for, hired me to go to Boston. A year later I was moved to Washington where I worked with a great team led by Chief Photographer Bob Daugherty. To paraphrase Will Rogers, I never met an AP person I didn’t like.

I left Washington after 3 years to go back to CP in Ottawa as chief photographer. In 1984 Hal hired me back to go to London and work as deputy to Horst Faas. The bureau chief was Myron Belkind. A great bureau chief who I met years earlier when traveling to India where he was bureau chief in 1970.

Below is a brief bio:

Peter Bregg C.M. began his career as a copy boy in 1966 with Canada’s wire service, the Canadian Press. During the past five decades, Toronto based photojournalist Bregg has traveled to more than 80 countries. Bregg served with Associated Press from 1974 to 1978, Boston and Washington, and 1985 to 1989, London and New York. After leaving the AP he returned to Canada and worked as chief photographer and photo editor at Canada’s newsmagazine, Maclean’s. He was the official photographer to Prime Minister Brian Mulroney in 1984-85. He ended his career after teaching photojournalism from 2009 to 2021 to senior journalism students at Toronto’s Ryerson University Journalism School.

During in his spare time in the past 20 years Bregg has travelld as a volunteer for a variety of NGOs to Africa, Middle East and Central America providing photos for their promotion. Since 2016 he has been to Iraq twice and once to Afghanistan. To date he has traveled to Africa over a dozen times since 2002 photographing HIV-AIDS related stories, water for WaterCan, eye doctors with ORBIS, Child Soldiers documentary with General (ret’d) Romeo Dallaire. Peter Bregg has won numerous awards including a World Press Photo Award, NPPA Regional Photographer of the Year, Canadian Press Photo of the Year, Canada News Photographers Association Awards, a Canadian National Newspaper Award, and White House News Photographers Association Awards.

In 2014 Bregg was the honoured recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Canadian Journalism Foundation. And in 2016 he was awarded the Order of Canada.

AP Archives hits one out of the park

Norm Abelson - What a great piece of work in yesterday's Connecting on the Babe Ruth anniversary by Francesca Pitaro and the AP archive team. What a needed relief from the usual dis-spiriting news of the day. What a lighting of memory.

It sent me reeling back in time to my wonderful baseball experiences at Boston's Fenway Park, where The Babe got his start (and where to their everlasting shame, the Red Sox committed an unforgivable act of infamy by selling him to the Yankees).

In those long-ago days, if a kid had a couple of bucks, it covered subway fare, a ticket to the bleachers and at least one hot dog. You want to talk about excitement, anticipation? There was Ted Williams squaring off against the Yankees' Joe DiMaggio. Not to mention Joe's brother, Dom, in the Red Sox outfield. Or the team of Bobby Doerr and Johnny Pesky guarding second and short-stop. A kid knew most anything great could happen out there on the field. But even if it didn't, it was still about just being there, in a world of games, seeing the best of the best.

A lot of years later, my son took me to a Sox game. The players were great; the Sox pitcher got an amazing 20 strike-outs. Somehow, though, it didn't feel the same; something was missing. Maybe it was a ten-year-old kid named Normie.

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Lindel Hutson - Thanks to Francesca Pitaro for cobbling together the wonderful words and pictures on the legendary Babe Ruth. I did not know the Babe had a pet calf named Flossie.

Also interesting was the byline of Mary Elizabeth Plummer on the story about Ruth's wife and Ruth wanting to become manager of the Boston Braves in 1935. I suspect she was one of very few female AP reporters in 1934.

Mrs. Ruth told Plummer she would travel with him to make sure the Babe had proper rest and nutrition. Maybe she should have stayed home. The Braves had the worst record in the majors in 1935.

AP photo cited by Washington Post

Seattle Mariners center fielder Julio Rodríguez laughs as teammate Teoscar Hernández douses him as they celebrate a 9-2 win over the Baltimore Orioles in a baseball game Friday, Aug. 11, 2023, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)

An outstanding AP photo spotted by colleague Michael Rubin was among the Washington Post’s “Photos of the Week” as selected by the WaPo photo editors. It was taken by Lindsey Wasson, AP photographer in Seattle.

Connecting sky shot

Malcolm Ritter - My wife Jane and I were stunned last week by this double rainbow over Casco Bay in Maine, which we viewed from the town boat landing in Falmouth. This photo was taken by Jane.

Connecting wishes Happy Birthday

Norm Black

Susan Gallagher

Jenny Volanakis

Welcome to Connecting

Stories of interest

The initial online search that spurred a raid on a Kansas paper was legal, a state agency says (AP)

By JOHN HANNA

MARION, Kan. (AP) — The initial online search of a state website that led a central Kansas police chief to raid a local weekly newspaper was legal, a spokesperson for the agency that maintains the site said Monday, as newly released video showed the publisher’s 98-year-old mother protesting a search of their home.

The raids on the Marion County Record and the publisher’s home happened earlier this month, after a local restaurant owner accused the newspaper of illegally accessing information about her. A prosecutor said later that there was insufficient evidence to justify the raids, and some of the seized computers and cellphones have been returned.

But video released by the newspaper Monday shows just how upsetting the raid was to the mother of publisher Eric Meyer. The woman died the next day.

“Get out of my house … I don’t want you in my house!” Joan Meyer shouted at the six officers who were in the home she shared with her son. The surveillance video shows Meyer using a walker and dressed in slippers and a long robe or gown as she approaches the officers, swearing at them and demanding to know what they are doing.

She yells: “Don’t you touch any of that stuff!”

The raid on the Record put it and its hometown of about 1,900 residents in the center of a debate about press freedoms protected by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and Kansas’ Bill of Rights. It also exposed divisions in the town over local politics and the newspaper’s coverage of the community and put an intense spotlight on Police Chief Gideon Cody, who led the Aug. 11 raids months after the newspaper had asked questions about his background.

Read more here.

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A letter to readers of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

We've all read about the decline of local news. We've seen the reports that thousands of newspapers have vanished from their communities and that large swaths of America have become news deserts. Proud institutions that were once the lifeblood of major American cities have ceased to exist, while others are mere shadows of what they once were.

We know consumer behavior is shifting, we understand we're living in a digital world and we are all too familiar with how social media platforms have gutted the advertising business that was once the foundation of local journalism on the printed page, on the radio and on television.

And yet, despite all this, local news outlets continue to show up every day, ensuring we the people have access to truth, to facts and to the first draft of history.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution will always be there for our community, especially when the stakes are high.

This was an historic week, one that our team at the AJC has prepared for over the past two-and-a-half years. That's the power of local news.

Our legal affairs reporter Bill Rankin has worked for the AJC for more than 30 years, longer than the 26 his father Jim spent working for the paper. It is safe to say no reporter knows Georgia's courts better than Bill, although his colleague, Tamar Hallerman, has impressively kept pace with Bill's expert reporting, with her tireless work covering the Fulton County investigation. Bill and Tamar's reporting was bolstered by the AJC's world-class team of political reporters, which includes Greg Bluestein, Tia Mitchell and Patricia Murphy. Senior editor Shannon McCaffrey is leading our coverage.

Our work on this story began when Fulton County D.A. Fani Willis announced she was investigating election interference in February 2021. That announcement came just weeks after a recording was leaked to the AJC and The Washington Post of a phone call former President Donald Trump placed to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, in which he asked the Republican official to "find" 11,780 votes, enough to swing the state – and the election – in his favor. Since that time, the AJC has published about 300 stories related to the investigation.

But that's not all. Our coverage this week included timelines, biographies of the key players and access to key documents and primary source material. Our live blog updated every twist and turn of the story as the indictments were handed up in the early morning hours on Tuesday. Bill, Tamar and Shannon have devoted Season 10 of the award-winning Breakdown podcast to the Fulton County investigation and they recorded Episode 2 on the fly at 1:30 a.m.

Our aim was to ensure that we provided the most comprehensive resource on this historic story to our community and across the country.

The political responses to the indictments were predictable.

Former President Trump railed against the indictments in a fundraising email. Georgia's Republican Gov. Brian Kemp again pushed back on Trump, maintaining the election was not stolen and that there was no evidence of fraud. Trump loyalist, U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, lashed out at Kemp and said she couldn't rule out possibly running for the Senate in 2026 (potentially in a Republican primary against Kemp, should he run). She also said she would consider serving in Trump's cabinet, or even as vice president if the former president returns to the White House. Georgia U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock told Axios he believed no one was above the law and that Trump should not be treated differently than any other person.

We reported each of those reactions to provide you with a complete view of the political fallout.

Our job is to present the facts and to provide you with a thorough understanding of a complex legal process that will take months to resolve.

And we will continue to do that every day, as this story plays out over the coming weeks and months in the backdrop of a consequential presidential election.

That is the power of local news.

The AJC's mission is to be the most essential and engaging source of news for the people of Atlanta, of Georgia and the South. It is a mission we take very seriously, especially at a time when Georgia, again, is likely to play a pivotal role in deciding the next president of the United States.

In the coming weeks and months, we will embark on an ambitious journey to transform the AJC from a storied daily newspaper into a modern media company that serves as the beating heart of one of America's most vibrant cities. We're investing in more reporting resources, innovative new products and expanded video, audio and live event capabilities. As we transform, our responsibility to deliver the most essential news to you, our subscribers, will always remain our North Star.

We are grateful to our community for continuing to turn to us, on all of our platforms and the printed page, when it matters most. Thank you.

With gratitude,

Andrew Morse

President and Publisher

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

(Shared by Peggy Walsh)

The Final Word

A special in-person meeting after 24 years of emails (MLB.com)

By Ian Browne

This story was excerpted from Ian Browne’s Red Sox Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

For 24 years now, the emails have been flying back and forth between myself and a man named Jack. Late into the night. Early in the morning. Mid-afternoon.

The topic? Always the Red Sox. Every single one of them.

After thousands of emails through nearly a quarter century, I finally met Jack Marshall last Thursday.

The chance to meet my favorite pen (email) pal occurred with the Red Sox in Washington playing the Nationals. Jack lives in Alexandria, Va., and emailed that he was going to the game with his sister. I unsuccessfully tried to track him down at a Sox-Nats game in 2009. When I couldn’t find him in his seat that night, I honestly thought maybe it was a sign we should just keep our relationship to email only.

But here we were, 14 years later, and I decided to give it another crack.

And what a thrill it was for both of us. Jack, who is a youthful 72 -- 21 years older than me -- practically jumped out of his seat to greet me. Then we went into the concourse behind his section and spoke for about 15 minutes.

Read more here. Shared by Dennis Conrad.

Today in History - Aug. 22, 2023

By The Associated Press

Today is Tuesday, Aug. 22, the 234th day of 2023. There are 131 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On Aug. 22, 1851, the schooner America outraced more than a dozen British vessels off the English coast to win a trophy that came to be known as the America’s Cup.

On this date:

In 1787, inventor John Fitch demonstrated his steamboat on the Delaware River to delegates from the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia.

In 1910, Japan annexed Korea, which remained under Japanese control until the end of World War II.

In 1914, Austria-Hungary declared war against Belgium.

In 1922, Irish revolutionary Michael Collins was shot to death, apparently by Irish Republican Army members opposed to the Anglo-Irish Treaty that Collins had co-signed.

In 1968, Pope Paul VI arrived in Bogota, Colombia, for the start of the first papal visit to South America.

In 1972, John Wojtowicz (WAHT’-uh-witz) and Salvatore Naturile took seven employees hostage at a Chase Manhattan Bank branch in Brooklyn, New York, during a botched robbery; the siege, which ended with Wojtowicz’s arrest and Naturile’s killing by the FBI, inspired the 1975 movie “Dog Day Afternoon.”

In 1989, Black Panthers co-founder Huey P. Newton was shot to death in Oakland, California.

In 1992, on the second day of the Ruby Ridge siege in Idaho, an FBI sharpshooter killed Vicki Weaver, the wife of white separatist Randy Weaver.

In 1996, President Bill Clinton signed welfare legislation that ended guaranteed cash payments to the poor and demanded work from recipients.

In 2000, Publishers Clearing House agreed to pay $18 million to 24 states and the District of Columbia to settle allegations it had used deceptive promotions in its sweepstakes mailings.

In 2003, Alabama’s chief justice, Roy Moore, was suspended for his refusal to obey a federal court order to remove his Ten Commandments monument from the rotunda of his courthouse.

In 2007, A Black Hawk helicopter crashed in Iraq, killing all 14 U.S. soldiers aboard.

Ten years ago: Egypt’s ousted leader Hosni Mubarak was released from prison and transported to a military hospital in a Cairo suburb to be held under house arrest. The day before, Mubarak was sentenced to up to 35 years in prison for leaking secrets. A mysterious glitch halted trading on the Nasdaq for three hours.

Five years ago: The bull market in U.S. stocks became the longest one on record; it had been 3,453 days since the S&P 500 index had seen a drop of 20 percent or more. Ohio State suspended football coach Urban Meyer for three games; investigators found that Meyer had protected an assistant coach for years through domestic violence allegations, a drug problem and poor job performance. A Democratic Party official said an attempt to break into the party’s massive voter database had been thwarted.

One year ago: Lawyers for former President Donald Trump asked a federal judge to prevent the FBI from continuing to review documents recovered from his Florida estate until a neutral special master could be appointed. The attorneys asserted in a court filing, their first since the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago two weeks earlier, that the sets of documents taken from the residence were “presumptively” covered by executive privilege. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert who became a household name — and the subject of partisan attacks — during the COVID-19 pandemic, announced he would leave the federal government in December. Great Britain's Prince William and his wife, Kate, announced they were relocating their family from central London to more rural dwellings in Windsor.

Today’s Birthdays: Broadcast journalist Morton Dean is 87. Author Annie Proulx (proo) is 87. Baseball Hall of Famer Carl Yastrzemski is 83. Pro Football Hall of Fame coach Bill Parcells is 81. Writer-producer David Chase is 77. CBS newsman Steve Kroft is 77. Pop musician David Marks is 74. International Swimming Hall of Famer Diana Nyad is 73. Baseball Hall of Famer Paul Molitor is 66. Rock musician Vernon Reid is 64. Country singer Ricky Lynn Gregg is 63. Country singer Collin Raye is 62. Actor Regina Taylor is 62. Rock singer Roland Orzabal (Tears For Fears) is 61. Rock musician Debbi Peterson (The Bangles) is 61. Rock musician Gary Lee Conner (Screaming Trees) is 60. Singer Tori Amos is 59. Country singer Mila Mason is 59. R&B musician James DeBarge is 59. International Tennis Hall of Famer Mats Wilander (VEE’-luhn-dur) is 58. Actor Brooke Dillman is 56. Rapper GZA (JIHZ’-ah)/The Genius is 56. Actor Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje (ah-day-WAH’-lay ah-kih-NOY’-yay ah-BAH’-jay) is 55. Actor Ty Burrell is 55. Celebrity chef Giada De Laurentiis is 52. Actor Melinda Page Hamilton is 51. Actor Rick Yune is 51. Rock musician Paul Doucette (DOO’-set) (Matchbox Twenty) is 50. Rap-reggae singer Beenie Man is 49. Singer Howie Dorough (Backstreet Boys) is 49. Comedian-actor Kristen Wiig is 49. Actor Jenna Leigh Green is 48. Rock musician Bo Koster is 48. Rock musician Dean Back (Theory of a Deadman) is 47. Talk show host James Corden is 44. Rock musician Jeff Stinco (Simple Plan) is 44. Actor Brandon Adams is 43. Actor Aya Sumika is 42. Actor Ari Stidham is 30.

Got a story or photos to share?

Connecting is a daily newsletter published Monday through Friday that reaches more than 1,800 retired and former Associated Press employees, present-day employees, and news industry and journalism school colleagues. It began in 2013. Past issues can be found by clicking Connecting Archive in the masthead. Its author, Paul Stevens, retired from the AP in 2009 after a 36-year career as a newsman in Albany and St. Louis, correspondent in Wichita, chief of bureau in Albuquerque, Indianapolis and Kansas City, and Central Region vice president based in Kansas City.

Got a story to share? A favorite memory of your AP days? Don't keep them to yourself. Share with your colleagues by sending to Ye Olde Connecting Editor. And don't forget to include photos!

Here are some suggestions:

- Connecting "selfies" - a word and photo self-profile of you and your career, and what you are doing today. Both for new members and those who have been with us a while.

- Second chapters - You finished a great career. Now tell us about your second (and third and fourth?) chapters of life.

- Spousal support - How your spouse helped in supporting your work during your AP career.

- My most unusual story - tell us about an unusual, off the wall story that you covered.

- "A silly mistake that you make"- a chance to 'fess up with a memorable mistake in your journalistic career.

- Multigenerational AP families - profiles of families whose service spanned two or more generations.

- Volunteering - benefit your colleagues by sharing volunteer stories - with ideas on such work they can do themselves.

- First job - How did you get your first job in journalism?

- Most unusual place a story assignment took you.

Paul Stevens

Editor, Connecting newsletter

paulstevens46@gmail.com