Thank the hard-working journalists
To the Editor:
Congratulations The Smoky Mountain News for its 20th anniversary.
As a fifth-generation journalist, I thoroughly enjoyed reading Scott McLeod’s remembrances through the past two decades. Leaving a paying job at one paper to start another, and with his wife and young children at the time, was certainly a gutsy move.
My family got into the newspaper business in Columbus, Georgia, in the 1880s and at one time had daily papers in three states, in addition to a radio and television station. My brother and I literally grew up in our family newspaper in Bradenton, Florida, and I wouldn’t give anything for those memories.
We went on to study journalism and photography in college, long after the family sold the papers. I worked for various papers in Florida and New York during and after college but have been a publicity photographer in the film and television industry for the past 25 years.
Our family still talks about the possibilities of starting a small weekly sometime. Well, Scott and crew did just that, and reading through their paper is one of the things I look forward to on our trips up here.
America was founded with a clear appreciation of the importance of a free press. The work that’s done by the SMN and other publications is vital. Let’s remember that please, and if you see any working journalists out there, thank them!
Gene Page IV
Micanopy, Fla.
