C O L O R F U L FIGURES have guided the Watchman through its 150-year history

The Watchman has had a number of colorful characters at its helm throughout the years — but all shared the same passion for chronicling daily life in Panola County. The following is a small selection of editors and publishers who made the Watchman the paper it is today.

Jasper Collins

Jasper Collins was the first Panola County native to own the paper. He first bought the Watchman in 1896 in a partnership with J.M. Dean. The dual ownership was short-lived; Collins bought Dean out of the business about nine months later.

Collins was described as a “widely-known figure in the newspaper profession in Texas,” according to research compiled for the Watchman’s 100th anniversary. He was a delegate to the National Editorial Association Convention for many years and was actively involved in Texas politics during his 10 years as editor. In 1899, he was elected to the Texas House of Representatives. He also served as a 1902 presidential elector and chairman of the speaker’s division of the statewide campaign for prohibition. Collins sold the Watchman in 1906 and moved to Dallas R.M. PARK

Robert M. Park purchased the Watchman from Jasper Collins in 1906, having worked as editor under Collins for several months. Under Park’s leadership, the paper made some of its first technological advancements and moved offices.

Park was a Kentucky native who as a young man working for the Henderson paper “hopped a freight train from Kaufman to St. Louis, where his experience at the Times got him a job with the St. Louis Post Dispatch as a janitor whose duties were cleaning in the backshop and distributing type — the job paid 50 cents a week.”

Park couldn’t stay away from East Texas though, and he eventually moved to Carthage and stayed for 30 years. It was then that he married, had eight children and brought his family into the newspaper business. Firstborn son Marcus C. would later become his father’s partner at the Watchman. But Park’s four other sons also helped at the Watchman, despite their disinterest — an article celebrating the paper’s 100th anniversary notes they all decided to become pharmacists. Park’s wife Madie handled local, personal and society news and also operated the linotype machine.

Park’s tenure also saw the publication of The Pine Burr, Carthage High School’s first newspaper, which was printed as a tabloid by the Watchman once students submitted their copy. Park also printed the school’s yearbook.

Neal Estes

Neal Estes was editor and publisher of the Watchman from 1931-1951. Although not a native of Panola County, the young editor acquired a genuine affection for Panola County. His daughter explained her father’s affinity for Carthage and the county’s numerous communities:

“The farmers, small businessmen, and cattlemen exemplified what he felt so vital to his country – stability, wholesomeness and commitment to life. This community represented a segment of America’s ‘bread and butter’ thinking and living.”

A city swimming pool, a scouting hut, a million dollar junior and senior high school for Carthage and the building of the American Legion hall became realities for the county during the 20 years Estes was editor and publisher. He was the brother of Carl Estes, publisher of the Longview newspaper.

He encouraged the development of Lake Dixie as a recreation facility and the construction of better highways for the county.

U.O. “CLEMO” CLEMENTS

U.O. “Clemo” Clements moved to the Watchman after working at the Gilmer Mirror. As part of his tenure, Clements made several improvements and also relocated the building as they discovered a need for more space. Clements’ biggest contribution to the Watchman was the introduction of local photography taken by Watchman staff — indeed, the legacy and tradition of comprehensive photo coverage of the Panola County community continues today.

Clements sponsored a circulation drive in 1955 that built the Watchman’s paid subscriptions to 4,500 — the highest paid circulation of any weekly in the state.

Clements served as president of the North and East Texas Press Association from 1956 to 1957 and as a director at the Texas Press Association for three years.

His love of journalism started young, but notably his first role as newspaper publisher occurred during World War II while stationed in the South Pacific with the U.S. Army. While at Biak Island in the Philippines, Clements established The Coral Reef Beef. It had a circulation of about 500 copies a week. Clements would later explain that, while company commander in charge of a depot, 125 men and three officers, he noticed their work came to a standstill after securing Biak Island. “They were bored to death and homesick; many had been overseas as long as I had — more than three years. That’s when I hit on the idea of putting out a newspaper. We didn’t have anything else to do and had plenty of paper and mimeograph machines.”

Doris Smith

Doris Smith was the Watchman’s first woman publisher, assuming the position after her husband James A. Smith’s death. She started her journalism career at the Kilgore News Herald, which was where she met and married her late husband.

While at the Watchman under her husband’s tenure, Smith took care of bookkeeping and billing, along with society news, recipes and local news. She also was very familiar with the entire production process.

Upon her succession to the publisher’s role, Smith pledged to continue the Watchman’s 100-yearold tradition.“The Panola Watchman has always supported this community and has worked toward the betterment of both Carthage and Panola County. James gave his life for this purpose and I will continue to strive to maintain both the purpose and quality of this newspaper.”

Ted Leach

Ted Leach joined the newspaper as editor in July 1971. He and others created the free tabloid Panola County Post, and Leach left the Watchman in March 1973. He was one of four co-founders of the Panola County Post, the county’s second weekly newspaper. Leach sold his interest in the Post in June 1973 and years later rejoined the Watchman as a sports editor.

Ted was born into a newspaper family. His dad was editor of the Longview News Journal. He started his career throwing papers at the age of 9. By the age of 13, he was writing sports stories for the paper. His career as a sports writer and editor took him throughout Texas — first to Borger, then Wichita Falls, back to Longview, to Mount Pleasant then Henderson and Carthage.

Ted's philosophy of sports writing focused on putting the athletes he covered first. The late Panola Watchman Publisher Bill Holder said at the time of Leach’s induction in the Carthage High School Bulldog Hall of Honor in 2011 that “Ted was a fanatic about statistics, and he always said the reason he was doing that was so he could get the kid's name on the page… He once told me he would rather have a stat box on the page than a story if he had to make a choice."

Bill Holder

Bill Holder did not start out his working life as a newspaperman. Holder ran Ben Franklin grocery stores in Marshall and Farmersville and Crowley, Louisiana before moving back to Carthage in 1972. He owned Bill’s Superette, a small grocery and meat market at East Sabine Street and MLK Boulevard for 17 years before joining the Watchman staff in December 1989 as an advertising salesman.

Holder served as the Watchman’s publisher for 20 years and also supervised 15 East Texas newspapers under ASP Westward. As he was getting ready to retire from the Watchman, Holder recalled several major news stories from his career, including explosions at the gas plant on U.S. 79 and a hostage situation at the Carthage Cup Factory in 1995. The Watchman’s reporting of convicted murderer Bernie Tiede drew national attention — and personal reflection from Holder.

“I spent one August afternoon with Bernie Tiede working on advertising for Boot Scootin’ Western Wear; he was arrested later that night at the Jalapeño Tree,” Holder told reporter Rodger G. McLane for a 2013 story on Holder’s upcoming retirement. “At the time I thought about how emotions could drive someone to kill someone else. I thought he was a pretty nice guy, but greed got the best of him.”