Michael Bowen (The Pacific Northwest Inlander), Skylar Browning (Missoula Independent), Brendan Kiley (The Stranger), and Ashley Lindstrom (San Antonio Current) have been named fellows in the fourth National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Arts Journalism Institute in Theater and Musical Theater at USC's Annenberg School. The fellows will participate in a rigorous 10-day program in February with guest faculty including L.A. Weekly theater editor Steven Leigh Morris.
AAN members won 15 first-place awards in the California Association of Newspaper Publishers' annual contest, led by Palo Alto Weekly, which took home five firsts. Chico News & Review placed first in in three categories; Pacific Sun won two; and Metro Santa Cruz, North Coast Journal, Sacramento News & Review, San Francisco Bay Guardian, and the Santa Barbara Independent each finished in first in one category. The awards were presented in a ceremony Saturday evening.
Von Buchau, a veteran arts critic who wrote for the AAN member Pacific Sun for almost four decades, was 67-years-old when she passed away, report the San Francisco Examiner and the San Francisco Chronicle. The cause is believed to be complications from diabetes. Von Buchau won three AltWeekly Awards for arts criticism, including a first-place prize in 1999. "She was a brilliant woman, talented, irascible, and witty," former Pacific Sun managing editor Linda Xiques tells the Examiner.
Jason Walsh will take the helm from Linda Xiques this Friday, the Marin County weekly announced in its current issue. Xiques began working at the Sun as an intern before becoming a reporter and then serving as an editor of the paper for 23 years. Walsh "has a broad newspaper background in areas of news and features as well as experience in radio and television," according to the Sun. Most recently, he was news editor at the Sonoma Index-Tribune.
Putting out a summer guide is not every alt-weekly staff writer's idea of a good time. To produce the Pacific Northwest Inlander's award-winning special section, editor and publisher Ted S. McGregor Jr. gathered his staff in a room and wouldn't let them out until they came up with some ideas that would make the guide not only fun to create but fun to read. This is the 29th in a "How I Got That Story" series highlighting the AltWeekly Awards' first-place winners.
Editor and publisher Ted S. McGregor, Jr., made an appearance this morning on the Al Franken Show, which was broadcast from the Inlander's hometown of Spokane, Wash. McGregor got a chuckle from the host, whose new book is called "The Truth (with jokes)," when he said his 13-year-old paper has proven that its readers want "the truth, with movie reviews." He also discussed alt-weeklies and their place in the universe, and gave a shout-out to his alt-weekly friends publishing in conservative towns like Colorado Springs, Cincinnati and Louisville. (To hear the interview, move the scroll bar on this podcast about four-fifths of the way through the show.)
Effective Jan. 1, Chris Ferrell will take over as publisher of Nashville Scene, replacing founding publisher Albie Del Favero, who announced his retirement in July. "I hoped we could find [a successor] who was passionate not only about this paper but also about this community," says Del Favero, calling Ferrell "the ideal person for the job." Ferrell is a Nashville businessman and former Metro Council member. His hire comes on the heels of Pacific Sun's announcement regarding the appointment of another former politician, Sam Chapman, as that paper's new publisher. Chapman was chief of staff to U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer and a former member of the Napa County Board of Supervisors. He succeeds Steve McNamara, who recently sold the Sun after owning and operating the paper since 1966. "[Chapman] has an extraordinary varied background in journalism, law and politics, plus a longtime attachment to Marin County," says McNamara.
Owner, publisher and editor of the Sun since 1966, Steve McNamara addresses his sale of the paper to Embarcadero Publishing in this message to his readers. He writes, "Being editor and publisher of the Sun has been a dream job, way better than working the oars at the dailies in North Carolina, Miami and San Francisco where I started out." And he's leaving his legacy in good hands. About the paper's new owners, McNamara says, "In the newspaper business there are some real egomaniacs and general nut cases, but these guys are at the other end of the scale."
Two AAN newspapers serving different parts of the San Francisco Bay Area became part of the same organization today as the owner of the Palo Alto Weekly, Bill Johnson, purchased the Pacific Sun of Marin County. The sale coincides with the 70th birthday of Sun owner, publisher and editor Steve McNamara, who purchased the paper in 1966 and grew it into an award-winning newsweekly. McNamara said, "Once the decision [to sell the Sun] was made, it seemed natural to pass the responsibility to my old friend Bill Johnson and his associates at the Palo Alto Weekly." Said Johnson, "Steve and I have known each other and shared our challenges and ideas with each other for the last 25 years, and this seems like a natural outcome of that relationship."
