journalism history
-
Henrietta Poynter and the St. Petersburg Times/Poynter Institute
On Thursday, we are traveling to St. Petersburg for a three-day workshop at Poynter. It is named for St. Petersburg Times Publisher Nelson Poynter – although I always think that it should also be named for his second wife, Henrietta, who wrote editorials for the newspaper with her husband. Together, they created Congressional Quarterly. She had an impressive background with a 1922 journalism degree from Columbia University and then an editor for Vogue and Vanity Fair before marrying Nelson. She was the first woman to serve on the American Committee of the International Press Institute. A friend described her as “an earthy highbrow … the most unboring person I ever…
-
Helen Wells and the Miami Herald
In my continued work on the women’s pages of the Miami Herald, I am looking into the career of Society Writer Helen Wells. The photo above is from her 1969 retirement party held at Marie Anderson’s house. A Google News search revealed that she was also a longtime society editor at the Miami News. The above 1952 clip noted that she did club work in Washington D.C. prior to coming to Miami. It also noted that she served as a Gray Lady for the Red Cross during World War II. Here is an interesting online exhibit about the Gray Ladies. Wells died of a fire in her home in Coral…
You May Also Like
Writing Women into the Curriculum
-
Women’s Page Editors and Dogs
We just adopted a five-year-old puggle (a mix of a pug and a beattle) named Pugsley. The video above is our son Curtis meeting his new dog. Several women’s pages editors had dogs. Marjorie Paxson who was a women’s Paged editor in Houston, Miami and St. Petersburg, always had a dog. When she was interviewed for the Washington Press Club Foundation’s Women in Journalism oral history, she had a dog named Typo. When she became a publisher in Muskogee, Paxson became known in the community for bringing her miniature dachshund, Tiger, to work. She said, “He was a small dog and so I thought he needed a name that would…
-
Kathryn “Kay” Clarenbach’s Papers & AJHA
I just received the good news today that our panel has been accepted by the American Journalism Historians Association. It’s called: “Into the Archives: A Look at Some Major American Resources.” I will be speaking about going through the papers of Kathryn “Kay” Clarenbach at the University of Wisconsin last summer. Clarenbach was a leading feminist but not always the most visible person. Much of her work was done behind the scenes although she did serve as the first president of the National Organization for Women. She was also the chair of the Wisconsin Commission on the Status of Women – one of the most active state commissions in the…
-
Kathryn “Kay” Clarenbach’s Papers & AJHA
I just received the good news today that our panel has been accepted by the American Journalism Historians Association. It’s called: “Into the Archives: A Look at Some Major American Resources.” I will be speaking about going through the papers of Kathryn “Kay” Clarenbach at the University of Wisconsin last summer. Clarenbach was a leading feminist but not always the most visible person. Much of her work was done behind the scenes although she did serve as the first president of the National Organization for Women. She was also the chair of the Wisconsin Commission on the Status of Women – one of the most active state commissions in the…
-
A visit from Holly and a reminder of Beverley Morales
On Sunday, we traveled to St. Petersburg to see one of our former SIUE student-turned-journalist Holly who was in town to go through a Poynter workshop. She works at the Rapid City Journal in South Dakota. Her visit reminded me of Florida women’s page editor Beverley Morales. She, and her first husband Hector, ran the Beulah Independent in North Dakota during the 1950s. Above is an example of one of the issues. Beverley wrote the editorial. Holly and I talked about some issues in the Native American community which also reminded me of Beverley. She ran the Native American newspaper, A’tome in Lame Deer, Montana in the 1970s and married…
