Originally published June 2003
Crusading Kansas City Publisher Dies at 91
“Lucile H. Bluford, a journalist whose voice dominated The Call of Kansas City from the Depression into the waning years of the 20th century, died Friday [June 13, 2003] after a brief illness,” the Kansas City Star reports.
Services for the editor and publisher of the African American weekly, who was 91, are scheduled for Thursday at noon at Kansas City, Mo.’s Grace and Holy Trinity Cathedral, a Call spokeswoman said.
“She loved Kansas City. She started working at the newspaper in 1932, and kept working until she was 87 years old,” Donna Stewart, managing editor of The Call, told the Star.
“In a career that spanned seven decades, Bluford helped integrate the University of Missouri as well as Kansas City’s downtown department stores and restaurants. She posed tough questions to some of the biggest newsmakers in the city and the nation,” the Star continued.
“Bluford also supported black journalists as they entered mainstream media. Lena Rivers Smith, a former Call staff member, became the first black reporter in Kansas City television news. Gerald Jordan, one of The Star’s first black staff members, received constant encouragement from Bluford.
“The present stature of Kansas City’s modern African-American community is impossible to imagine without Bluford’s work, said former mayor Emanuel Cleaver.
“‘The Call under her leadership was the principal source of maturation for the social and political leaders of our community,’ Cleaver said. “If any successful African-American politician of today points out his or her success independent from the K.C. Call, he is or she is a liar,'” the Star said.
400 Expected at NAJA Convention in Green Bay
The Native American Journalists Association convention got under way today in Green Bay, Wis., with about 350 registered and 400 people expected, said NAJA executive director Mary Annette Pember.
Those not in Green Bay may follow the proceedings in the student newspaper, “Native Voice,” and in the first convergence project, “Native Voice: Converging News in Native America,” which links together print, online, television and radio coverage on the NAJA Web site, Pember told Journal-isms.
On Thursday at 10 a.m., Scott Gillespie, managing editor of the Star Tribune of Minneapolis, is to share the newspaper’s rationale for dropping its nine-year-old ban on American Indian nicknames. The plenary, “Mascots: Where’s the Honor?” is also scheduled to feature Kathleen Rutledge, editor of Nebraska’s Lincoln Journal Star, which recently decided to drop the use of Native American mascots and logos in its sports coverage; and Suzan Shown Harjo, columnist for Indian Country Today who has covered the mascot issue extensively.
NAJA also plans to release Thursday the findings from this year’s “Reading Red Report,” a “report and content analysis on coverage by the largest newspapers in the United States” conducted by NewsWatch and NAJA members Kara Briggs of The Oregonian and Dan Lewerenz of the Associated Press.
Journalists’ Light Helped Free 12 in Tulia
When 11 men and one woman walked out of the Swisher County, Texas, Courthouse on Monday afternoon, finally free after spending several years in prison for crimes they did not commit, the credit can be shared by journalists who reported on the injustice. credit.
As the Austin American-Statesman said, the 12 freed “were among 38 Tulia residents convicted on drug charges after a controversial 1999 raid, which targeted the black population of this town of about 5,000.
“All were arrested and convicted for selling drugs largely on the word of a white undercover police officer with a checkered past who now is under indictment on perjury charges.
“The cases generated international outrage, branding Tulia a racist town and Texas a state with little regard for justice.
“There was no evidence against the defendants except the now-discredited testimony of undercover officer Thomas Coleman. But they received jail terms of up to 90 years, and it took a small army of volunteer lawyers and an act of the Legislature to win freedom for those in jail.”
In the New York Times on Monday, columnist Bob Herbert wrote his 12th column on Tulia since July 29, 2002, saying:
” ‘Among the prisoners to be released today is Joe Moore, a pig farmer, now in his 60’s, who was sentenced to 90 years. I remember standing outside his vacant and absolute ruin of a house, his shack, and thinking, ‘This has to be the most poverty-stricken drug kingpin ever.’
“Mr. Moore nearly died from illness while in prison.
“Elaine Jones, president of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which represents several of the people still in prison, told me yesterday: ‘I can’t get into a celebratory mood yet. This is progress, but the convictions have not been overturned and our clients will still be under the jurisdiction of the state, even after they’re released. I don’t want anybody to lose sight of that.’ ”
Priest Protests Firing of Longtime Chicago Anchor
“A Catholic priest called on parishioners Sunday to boycott WBBM-Ch. 2’s newscasts Sunday after the station’s dismissal last week of anchor John Davis,” the Chicago Tribune reported.
The story continued:
“‘We asked people to contact the station and let them know that they’re upset with the disrespect that was shown him and the way it was done and that we don’t intend to watch that station,’ said Rev. Michael Pfleger of St. Sabina Catholic Church, who said upon arriving at work Davis was told he was fired and escorted out.
“Davis, who is black, was last on the air Tuesday, a company spokeswoman said. Pfleger expressed concern that another black reporter, Steve Lattimore, was let go earlier this year. Reporter Derrick Blakley, who is black, is expected to start working at the station Monday.
“‘It’s no secret that Channel 2’s ratings have been in last place for a while. And [general manager] Joe Ahern was brought back to town last August with a clear mission to fix the station . . . With that comes some difficult decisions,’ a WBBM-Ch. 2 spokeswoman said.”
Davis had said in the Sun-Times: “I am eternally optimistic that as one door closes, God opens another. I hope to be back on a newscast somewhere in the very near future.”
Tom Joyner’s Black America Web Losing CEO
Barely a month after letting go its editor, Roland S. Martin, Tom Joyner’s BlackAmericaWeb site is losing its CEO, Donna Byrd, effective July 1.
“Her decision is based on her plans to return to Atlanta and join her business partner in growing their three-year-old consulting company. Commuting back and forth from Atlanta for two years would certainly take its toll on anyone!,” said an e-mail to the Dallas-based staff from Kim Nelson-Ingram of Reach Media.
Communications director Neil Foote told Journal-isms that a temporary editor, Rosalind Allen, has been editing the site since Martin’s departure May 14, and that there had been no word on Byrd’s successor.
The Web site describes the project, launched in June 2001, as “a broad-based effort to become a timely and credible source for news and information covering all aspects of daily life, featuring a wide array of viewpoints and perspectives.”
It said Byrd “has extensive experience in strategic marketing, public relations and brand management,” most recently with ezgov.com and Coca-Cola.
Jeanne Fox-Alston leaving NAMME for NAA
Jeanne Fox-Alston is joining the Newspaper Association of America in August to become its vice president of diversity, she has told members of the National Association of Minority Media Executives, where she has been executive director for four years.
“I will continue as executive director through mid-July . . . Toni Laws, the NAMME secretary, will serve as interim executive director once I step aside, and the NAMME board will begin a search immediately for the next executive director,” Fox-Alston wrote.
NAA, the newspaper publishers trade association, also aims to promote diversity in both the editorial and business sides of newspapers . It was coping with “significant revenue decreases” prompted by an advertising slump after Sept. 11, 2001, executive director John Sturm told Journal-isms in October.
As a result of those decreases, Sturm said then, senior executives were offered buyouts and Laws, senior vice president for diversity, accepted the offer and retired in February. Judith Burrell, senior vice president for communications, then added diversity to her portfolio, and created the position Fox-Alston was named to fill.
Jacqueline Adams to Lead National Black MBAs
Former CBS News correspondent Jacqueline Adams is the new president and CEO of the 6,000-member National Black MBA Association, the organization announces.
The 33-year old organization, based in Chicago, services 39 chapters in the U.S. and Great Britain, and represents the interests of the more than 95,000 African Americans holding master’s in business administration degrees, a news release said.
“I’ve spent most of last 30 years as an observer and student of history. As a journalist, I reported on domestic and world events. Now, as president and CEO of the National Black MBA Association, I step into the role of an active participant,” Adams said in the news release.
“We’re living in very troubling times. Far too many of our members are unemployed or underemployed. Our organization is committed to matching our members’ skills with the very real needs of our corporate partners as together, we create the diverse nation and workforce that have long been cherished dreams.”
Adams left CBS in 2000 after having served in the Washington and Northeast bureaus since 1979, and prior service at WNAC-TV, the CBS affiliate in Boston, and WBBM-TV, the CBS-owned station in Chicago where she covered business and economic news. She is a graduate of Harvard Business School and is a former wife of Gerald Boyd, until this month managing editor of the New York Times, whom she had married in 1989.
She most recently was president of J Adams: Strategic Communications, LLC, a New York-based public relations and public affairs firm, and was a managing director with Clark & Weinstock, “a reputation management firm known for developing strategic messages and campaigns for a diverse corporate and political client base,” the release said.
Yvette Walker Becomes K.C. Star’s Reader Rep
Yvette Walker, who since 1998 has served as the Kansas City Star’s assistant managing editor for staff development and multimedia, has been named the paper’s reader representative, effective Aug. 4.
“Walker, who has two decades of experience working in the newspaper industry, will replace Doug Worgul, who has held the position on a part-time basis since last October.” Walker will be full time.
Editor Mark Zieman, in an announcement Friday to the staff, said having a full-time, active reader representative has become especially important after ‘ethical stumbles throughout the industry.'”
Walker, 41, might be best known to those outside the Star as a recruiter and from 1998 to 2002, as editor of the NABJ Journal, magazine of the National Association of Black Journalists.
Television’s Soledad O’Brien: Truly Multicultural
“Soledad O’Brien thinks outside the box. Literally,” writes Gail Shister in the Philadelphia Inquirer.
“O’Brien, newly named coanchor of CNN’s American Morning, says she checks three boxes on the U.S. Census form under ‘ethnicity’ – African American, Hispanic and Caucasian.
“‘I define myself as multiracial. Definitions are important to other people. They make no difference to my life.”
“O’Brien’s mother, Estela, is a black Cuban who emigrated to America in the late ’50s. Her dad, Edward, an Australian, had Irish grandparents. The two met while at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.
“O’Brien, coanchor of NBC’s Weekend Today since 1999, will join Bill Hemmer on CNN’s 7-to-10 a.m. weekday American Morning in early July. Her NBC contract expires at the end of this month,” Shister writes.
Houston’s “Sonny” Messiah-Jiles to Head NNPA
Sonceria “Sonny“ Messiah-Jiles, publisher of the Houston Defender, has been elected chairperson of the National Newspaper Publishers Association, a federation of more than 200 black-owned newspapers, the NNPA reports.
Messiah-Jiles says she aims “to build the respect and to tout the respect and reputation of the Black Press and what it has accomplished in the past and its importance today and how it will play a role in our future.”
Messiah-Jiles was elected to a two-year term during the annual NNPA convention in Baltimore. She succeeds John “Jake“ Oliver Jr., publisher of the Afro-American Newspapers. Under new by-laws, the president now becomes chairperson. Others elected were: First Vice President John Smith (Atlanta Inquirer). Second Vice President Denise Rolark-Barnes (Washington Informer), Secretary Elinor Tatum (Amsterdam News) and Treasurer Lenora Carter (Houston Forward Times), the NNPA reported.
NNPA “Frets” About Media Consolidation
In Baltimore for the annual convention of the National Newspaper Publishers Association, about 400 black publishers, editors, writers and sales representatives fretted about consolidation of media power, economic hard times and other issues threatening the minority press, the Baltimore Sun reported.
“Janis Ware, a second-generation publisher of The Atlanta Voice, spoke for many: ‘It is more imperative today than ever before that the black press continue to exist. Otherwise the information is going to be disseminated in one view and one view only.’
“Ware and others said that, in tough economic times, giving the most powerful media companies license to become more powerful could spell disaster,” The Sun reported, noting that the Federal Communications Commission had voted 3-2 this month to allow individual companies to own more television and radio stations and newspapers than before.
Harry Belafonte: Peck Showed White “Humanity”
The voices of people of color weren’t heard much in the appreciations of actor Gregory Peck, who died last Thursday at age 87, but “Larry King Live” the next night included entertainer-activist Harry Belafonte in a discussion of Peck’s life.
“I’ll tell you this, that I think that most African Americans and people of color really look constantly for the humanity in the white world, in the white community,” Belafonte said. “And I think that when all of us saw ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ and saw the humanity in what Gregory Peck did in that film, it affirmed for us that there was America, no matter how elusive from time to time that America may be in terms of its goodness and its strength. But Gregory was the embodiment of that.
“And I think what he did as an actor and the selections that he made and the films he did, like ‘Gentleman’s Agreement,’ constantly was a reaffirmation of America, of the values of America, and what we are as a — as a people, what we aspire to be. And I think that I would say that most black Americans were not only deeply proud of Brock Peters’ performance, but that Gregory Peck was able to use his power to bring that film to the screen.
“You know, the book was, I think, in 1960, the only book that she had written, Miss [Harper] Lee. And Gregory Peck had a big influence on the fact that that film was made. And two years later, in 1962, at the height of the Civil Rights movement, when America was in a very conflicted place, out came this film, and Gregory Peck. And he gave everybody a chance to pause and to look at what we were aspiring to.”
