Last Days: of "Traditional Journalism"

By John Brightman Brock

What was "Traditional Journalism"?

It was the days when print journalism dominated the news cycle, when readers became "glued" to their morning or afternoon newspaper. God was moving... and so were "Traditional Journalists."

· Who wouldn't want to witness... the wheels of government and justice moving, whether in Cou

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trilogy Christian Publishing
• Release date: Oct 2, 2023
• ISBN: 9798890410283

John Brightman Brock

John Brightman Brock is a veteran journalist of newspapers and magazines in three states from the years 1977 to 2019. Reared in a Christian home, and with high hopes of success, Brock one day answered God's call to be led by the Holy Spirit. That decision whisked him away from aspiring toward a medical degree and, instead, had him a few years later-pen and pad in hand-"journaling my world," he says. It was a world of community and statewide events, where he and those whom he knew had been placed by a loving God. Nothing random. Nothing coincidental.He would write about the political moves of four governors, sometimes with exclusive interviews. At times, Brock talked one-on-one with entertainers and nationally- recognized politicians, musicians, or writers. At other times, he found himself standing in situations of danger, including his own near-death experiences that would shape his faith. He was always "standing in the need of prayer."

Book preview

With

Jesus!

LAST DAYS

of Traditional Journalism

John Brightman Brock

Dedication

I’d like to dedicate this book to all of the small towns across our country, and to the wonderfully sincere townsfolk who live there.

Dedication goes also to our journalists—in all the ages—who have attempted to chronicle the lives of ordinary Americans, to celebrate their successes, to further their dreams, and to document their challenges.

And in particular, dedication goes to small towns like Hayneville, Lowndesboro, Prattville, Jupiter, Weslaco, Frostproof, The Forgotten Coast of Florida, and growing cities like Montgomery and Mobile. And to similar towns and cities across this nation who are so knitted together by truth.

Here’s hoping that Almighty God will turn things around in our profession… to recall and celebrate the precepts and achievements of Traditional Journalism for decades upon decades of efforts in the past, and to include those successes as guidelines for our protocols in the future.

To God be the glory.

John Brightman Brock

Table of Contents

Chapter One

THE DAY THE LORD HAD MADE 11

Chapter Two

ALWAYS JUST A STORY AWAY 17

Chapter Three

GROWING UP SOUTHERN 25

Chapter Four

CHANGING WORLD OF JOURNALISM 33

Chapter Five

IN THE BLOOD 39

Chapter Six

A TASTE OF THE JOB MARKET 43

Chapter Seven

THE BORDER 47

Chapter Eight

NEWSPAPER TIMES 51

Chapter Nine

TRADITIONAL JOURNALISM MEMORIES 57

Chapter Ten

JUST THE PUBLIC TRUST 65

Chapter Eleven

THE NEWSROOM 73

Chapter Twelve

BAPTISM BY FIRE 77

Chapter Thirteen

THAT FEELING OF CALAMITY 83

Chapter Fourteen

LEGISLATION AND THE TRASH CAN 87

Chapter Fifteen

A SENSE OF IMMINENT DANGER 91

Chapter Sixteen

POWER AND THE GLORY 97

Chapter Seventeen

NEEDED: JOURNALISTIC HUMILTY, PLEASE 101

Chapter Eighteen

FOR THE LOVE OF IT 107

Chapter Nineteen

KNOWING HIM 111

Chapter Twenty

LEAVING THE BUILDING 119

Chapter Twenty-One

JOURNALISM JOURNEY: A LOOK BACK 123

Foreword

HIS HONORABLE PROFESSION

Our talents are God-given, simply put.

We can no more claim credit for them than if we were to boast of the color of our eyes, hair, or stature.

The first time I wrote a poem for the cafeteria lady, as I called her, at Ladd Elementary School in Stuart’s Draft, VA, Mama saw the verbiage used in that little handwritten piece, changing bows and arrows to the more provocative arrows and bows wording.

It was a poem about God, and Mama saw the wording. Write another poem next week, she said. I did. And the cafeteria lady was happily besieged with poems by a ten-year-old boy for many weeks.

Add eight years of growth in the knowledge of the Word, as Mama would say, and I was in my freshman year in pre-med education at John Brown University in Siloam Springs, AR. Being an ophthalmologist was my goal. But not God’s. 

An English literature professor once pulled me aside, asking, Why… (pausing) don’t you change majors? Hmmm… You’ll never make a lot of money as a writer, but… you’ll be happy. She smiled wryly.

At the end of that semester I came back to Florida, enrolled in Florida Southern College near our home in Winter Haven, and saw this new goal as real. It was God’s.

Tracing back now through years of the steps of a righteous man, I see the loving hand of God, who gave a sinner like me his Son’s standing and then years of constant blessing through periods of danger.

His timing has prevailed—for me to have been many times at the right place and right time, through forty-two years in Traditional Journalism.

It has become a collection of memorable reports of the everyday lives of everyday people whose worlds were challenged by unpredicted journeys.

For other readers, they could live vicariously through the printed words—a venue fast dissolving in today’s technology.

God was in control. God was placing me. Using me.

It was God’s honorable profession.

Chapter One

THE DAY THE LORD HAD MADE

I didn’t know what to say that morning in January, 2019.

My heart was pounding. I had waited for this day for forty-two years.

A crowded space just off the Vero Beach Press (Florida) Journal newsroom was full of journalists, mostly young, and a few older ones like myself, being honored for our last day with the newspaper group. There was coffee, the clamor of chairs pulled up to a central table. And it started.

Preparing for this day had been a time of personal reflection. My career had spanned seven newspapers and two magazines in three states. Whose day was it—ours, the retirees? No, it was more than that. It was the day the Lord had made.

MY LAST DAY

This was, in fact, the last day in newsrooms for myself, and a few others leaving the building of a South Florida newsroom, taking early retirement from a fast-changing world of corporate journalism.

Knowing Him, the Lord God, throughout these decades, these last days of Traditional Journalism, gave it meaning. Gave it purpose.

This avowed Traditional Journalist was among those leaving the profession of present-day digital journalism, and I had been tasked with taking my turn, recalling a so-labeled legacy journalism career, speaking to younger journalists gathered for the retirement breakfast.

It soon became a look back to what once was, and what was now being categorically shelved in the archives of newsrooms sincerely frantic to stay alive in a world without accountability to a reading public. Readers still demanded unbiased, in-depth stories in their changing world, but it was becoming a tough balancing act for newspaper corporations with a bottom line.

As I began my recollections, one magazine editor colleague blurted out, "Why, this is like Forrest Gump!" I nodded to the editor, then continued.

UNSEEN HAND

Well, in fact, I did know the book’s author, Winston Groom, I said, recalling several of my own back in the day memories to this gathering of multimedia journalists.

That was a mantra often repeated a few years earlier, as a professional accolade to news reporters who could gather the low-hanging fruit of community, state, or national events with a variety of tools: notebook, pen, point and shoot camera, videotaping devices, or doing voice-overs to radio affiliates in a 24/7 news cycle website.

I mentioned the day I had received a phone call from the now-deceased author about the opening of the film based upon his popular book, Forrest Gump.

Actually, the book had been based upon Groom’s father’s poker night stories, which a boyish Groom, presumed asleep in