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APA Annual Ad Conference coming up next week APA Legislative Report
Arkansas Press Association
Publisher Weekly Vol. 16 | No. 9 | Thursday, March 4, 2021 | Serving Press and State Since 1873
Newspapers take spotlight in COVID-19 history project Four Arkansas newspaper industry veterans are among the voices featured in an expansive oral history project undertaken to preserve the history of the coronavirus pandemic’s impact on Middle America. The oral history chronicles “the challenges and opportunities faced by rural newspapers in the early days of the pandemic,” and is featured on Poynter’s website. Arkansas Press Association Executive Director Ashley Wimberley, Stone County Leader Editor Lori Freeze, Daily Record Publisher Wesley Brown and Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reporter Jeannie Roberts were all interviewed for the project. In all, more than 700 pages of interviews were collected from newspaper employees in five states: North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Louisiana. The project can be viewed at https://bit. ly/30bdFtN The Arkansas Press Association provided some funding for the project, which was
Ashley Wimberley
spearheaded by Dr. Teri Finneman of the University of Kansas and Will Mari of Louisiana State University. Finneman is a journalism historian and publisher of a newspaper in Kansas. She was a featured speaker at the 2019 APA convention. “I really believe that community newspapers are the heart of journalism in America, and to see how this substantial moment in history is impacting the lifeblood of information in rural communities, we feel, is really important,” Finneman said. She added that oral history allows for the capturing of history that would never otherwise make textbooks, but is critical to preserve to tell a more accurate picture of the past. For the project, the team collected transcripts, audio, photos and examples of news coverage. Those are now housed in each state’s historical society in addition to the Poynter website. Finneman is currently working on research papers related to the oral history interviews that will examine how journalistic routines
Lori Freeze
Wesley Brown
and newspaper business models were more broadly impacted by the epidemic. Poynter, in its summary of the project, noted that 2020 was a year of layoffs and newspaper closings as the pandemic and economic conditions took a heavy toll on the industry. Yet, “in the middle of the country, some newspapers serving small communities hung on. They had to. They reported on school closures, the spread of the coronavirus and the dead. While print advertising shriveled and other local businesses around them closed; these newsrooms covered a global public health story that literally meant life or death where they lived.” All four oral history interviews conducted with Arkansas newspaper professionals are included in the project. To read Wimberley’s, go to https://bit. ly/30qF1w9. To read Freeze’s, go to: https://bit.ly/3rhMPvD. For Brown’s, visit: https://bit.ly/3qemJIJ. To see Roberts’s, go to: https://bit.ly/3c5rLCr.
Jeannie Roberts