Paul Stevens on LinkedIn: Good Friday morning on this Aug. 30, 2024, School is back in session for… (2024)

Good Thursday morning on this Aug. 29, 2024,News of the retirement of our AP’sKent Kilpatrickof Mexico City resulted in some great memories from colleagues who once worked with him, and we lead with their stories.And, we received a few comments on the days of the AP delivery mainstay, the teletype printer. Remember theopening themeof the CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite?My introduction to them was at my hometown newspaper and they made me a few bucks - coming in to the newsroom Sunday morning and rolling up all the typesetting tape and printed stories from the AP Newsfeatures report that would move overnight.In my first bureau, Albany, the desks were surrounded by maybe 20 Teletype printers. I’m guessing there are some who got hearing loss from desk work. Maybe me? But as I play this printer sound now in the masthead, it’s soothing enough to be included in the Calm or Stellar Sleep lineups.Here’s to a great day – be safe, stay healthy, live it to your fullest.https://conta.cc/4g71q72

Good Wednesday morning on this Aug. 28, 2024,Join me in congratulatingKent Kilpatrick, an editor in the Mexico City bureau, on his plans to retire Sunday after a long and distinguished AP career that began in 1972 in Detroit.His AP journey, which also took him to Boston and New York, is recounted in today’s Connecting in a staff memo shared byPatrick Quinn, AP’s deputy director of Global Text based in Bangkok."His knowledge and editing skills are rooted in years of varied experience and he has been a role model for many aspiring editors," Quinn said.If you have a favorite memory of working with Kent, please drop me a note.In the masthead of each Connecting issue, you are provided opportunity to click a link and listen to the long-ago sound of a clacking Teletype printer.For some, it invites nostalgia for those early days of our careers when teletype punchers entered our typewriter-written stories onto a wire that moved at 66 words per minute.For others, especially in bureaus where the printers were placed right next to our desks, there’s little such nostalgia and maybe a bit of resultant hearing loss or tendency to talk loudly above that din.Our colleagueBrad Martinloved the sound so much that he has kept a printer in the basem*nt of his Raymore, Mo., home after he retired as head of the Technical Center in Kansas City in 2018. What's more, he has configured it so that it can print out real-time news.The Connecting masthead link now brings you the image and sound of that printer. (Thanks to Mark Mittelstadt for YouTubing the link.)Brad tells us more about the printer in today’s Connecting, and Ye Olde Editor puts out an invitation for your own memories of the Teletype.Here’s to a great day – be safe, stay healthy, live it to your fullest.https://conta.cc/4dRSpx2

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Good Tuesday morning on this Aug. 27, 2024,A Connecting shout-out to our colleagueChris Connellfor his work in telling the story of the life ofBob Dubillin Monday’s issue. Chris put his heart and soul into the obituary.Our colleagueCharlie Hanleyput it best when he said in a note to Chris, “Wonderfulpiece, Chris. For once a great man found a great journalist to send him off.”We lead today’s issue with another remembrance of Dubill, and his work as AP’s New Jersey bureau chief and in key news positions with Gannett News Service and USA Today.We also bring you a listing of RSVPs to the first Jack Stokes Memorial Dinner, sponsored by the AP for its retirees, that will be held Oct. 19 in Kansas City.Here’s to a great day – be safe, stay healthy, live it to your fullest.https://conta.cc/3X05sp3

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Good Monday morning on this Aug. 26, 2024,We’re saddened to bring you news of the death of our colleagueBob Dubill, whose outstanding career in journalism of a half century began when he was hired for a summer job in the AP’s Buffalo bureau just out of college.That career took him on to become AP statehouse reporter and bureau chief in New Jersey, newspaper editor in Camden, N.J., and positions with Gannett News Service and USA Today, from which he retired as executive editor in 2002. He was 88 at the time of his death Friday.Our colleagueChris Connellpresents a wonderful, detailed account of Bob’s life and career – much of it based on interviews with Bob’s wifeMary Gordon Dubill, also an AP alum.A Requiem Mass will be celebrated on Wednesday, Sept. 4, at 10:30 a.m. at Holy Trinity Church, 3513 N Street NW, Washington, D.C. 20007.If you have a favorite memory to share of Bob, please send it along. We bring you memories of colleagues in today's issue, including in The Final Word.You can find USA Today’s story by clickinghere. Photo of Bob above by Leslie Smith Jr., USA Today.Today's issue brings you a report from Raw Story that a publishing house founded by Donald Trump's son used Evan Vucci's iconic photo of the attempted assassination of the former president before the AP managed to fully license the image.Mark Mittelstadtbrings you the story.JOHN SCHWEITZER SERVICES: Graveside services for our colleague John Schweitzer will be held 1:30 Saturday afternoon, August 31, at Oakwood Cemetery, Monticello, Iowa with Military Honors. Goettsch Funeral Home, Monticello, has taken John and his family into their care. Clickherefor his obituary. (Shared by Dave Tschantz)Here’s to a great week – be safe, stay healthy, live esch day to your fullest!https://conta.cc/4cEHPbC

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Good Friday morning on this Aug. 23, 2024,Our colleagueDavid Tirrell-Wysockishares word thatCheryl Laughlin, wife of former Northern New England Bureau ChiefLarry Laughlin, reports that she and their sons have been heartened by an outpouring of visits and good wishes since the recent Connecting message about Larry’s declining health.Larry is under hospice care at home for Parkinson's/dementia. Current and former Concord colleagues have visited to greet Larry and share stories and photos with Cheryl. Many other former colleagues have called or emailed from around the country.During a visit this week, Cheryl mentioned that Larry rarely spoke at home about his work, so she is hearing of many AP adventures and misadventures involving Larry for the first time. She’s also hearing how highly regarded Larry was as an AP newsman and bureau chief.Larry began his AP career in Boston before moving to Providence, then Richmond and finally to Concord, where he was COB from 1990-2009.Cheryl welcomes messages for Larry at:cherylmlaughlin@gmail.comAnd if you would like to drop her a note by postal mail, let Paul Stevens know and he’ll provide.JOHN SCHWEITZER SERVICES: A graveside service for our colleague John Schweitzer will be held at 1:30 p.m. on Aug. 31 at Oakwood Cemetery in Monticello, N.H. SCHENECTADY WITH TWO E’S!– I was reminded on Thursday - Aug. 22, the 50thanniversary of the birth of our oldest child Jenny - of a misspelling that will long live in Stevens Family history. Linda and I lived just outside Albany – my first AP bureau – when we were blessed with her birth at a maternity hospital in Schenectady. Following the format that my newspaper parents adopted for their three kids’ birth announcements, they called it the Stevens Crier, we composed her birth announcement and got it into the mail to family and friends. A week later, we got the card returned to us from a journalism professor at the University of Kansas, John Bremner, a stickler for style and accuracy, with “Schnectady” circled in red. My face was as red as his ink. And I never again misspelled the name of that city.Have a great weekend – be safe, stay healthy, live each day to your fullest.https://conta.cc/3AzUDT7

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Good Thursday morning on this Aug. 22, 2024,We lead today’s Connecting with news of the AP announcing three new content sharing agreements with U.S. nonprofit news newsrooms: Deep South Today, The Maine Monitor and The Nevada Independent.The agreements are part of an effort to expand the reach of local news ahead of the 2024 U.S. presidential election and increase access to AP’s fact-based, nonpartisan journalism.We're saddened to bring you news of the death ofHerrick Jackson, whose family owned two New Haven (Conn.) daily newspapers. He was the husband of our colleagueElaine Hooker,longtime AP executive and bureau chief. Herrick died Monday in Berkeley, Calif., where he had lived since 2010.A celebration of the outstanding AP career ofJohn Antczakwas held Tuesday night in Los Angeles – and we bring you photos and a story on how his colleagues honored his 44-plus years of AP service.And today’s issue brings fond memories of our colleaguesJohn SchweitzerandBill Saul.Here’s to a great day – be safe, stay healthy, live it to your fullest.https://conta.cc/46XwpOQ

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Good Wednesday morning on this Aug. 21, 2022,We bring you sad news of the death of our colleagueJohn Schweitzer, who was a newsman, correspondent and broadcast executive in his 22-year career with The Associated Press.John, who died last Saturday at 87, wrote his own obituary several years ago as he began putting his affairs in order and specifically requested that his family share it with Connecting, according to his friend and fellow BERichard Shafer. No funeral service is planned.If you would like to share a memory of John, please send it along.Here’s to a great day – be safe, stay healthy, live it to your fullest.https://conta.cc/3yJfbrT

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Good Tuesday morning on this Aug. 20, 2022,We asked in Monday’s Connecting to keep our colleagueLinda Deutschin your thoughts and prayers, in her fight with cancer, and many of you responded with notes to me asking for her postal address. I trust Linda heard from many more via herLcdeutsch@yahoo.comaddress. (Drop me a note if you would like her postal address.)One of them,Kathryn Loomans, said, “It’s funny how, even though I never worked side-by-side with Linda and some of our other AP ‘wireside’ greats, much less assign or edit their work, I allow myself a certain pride of association. Or should I say Association.I’m sure I’m not alone in that.”May you add two other colleagues to those who you put in your thoughts and prayers:Larry Laughlin, retired AP bureau chief for Northern New England, is under hospice care at home for Parkinson’s/dementia, and his wife Cheryl invites colleagues to come visit him at the Laughlin home in Concord, N.H. Or you may drop him a note through Cheryl –Cherylmlaughlin@gmail.com. (If you'd like a postal address, drop me a note.) Larry began his AP career in Providence and served as news editor in Richmond before he was appointed COB in Concord. (Shared by Adolphe Bernotas)Bill Saul, former Los Angeles AP newsman in the mid-1970s, died earlier this month, according to colleague Michael Rubin, who added, “Terrific reporter, writer, great person to work with and know for these many years.” His obituary is presented to you in today’s Connecting.Here’s to a great day – be safe, stay healthy, live it to your fullest.https://conta.cc/3MckenH

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Good Monday morning on this Aug. 19, 2024,Please keep our Los Angeles colleagueLinda Deutsch– retired AP special correspondent and one of the best court reporters in journalism history - in your thoughts and prayers. She had pancreatic cancer two years ago, was treated, but it has returned and she has stopped treatment.Her good friend Robi Wax said Linda would welcome cards/letters or emails. Linda’s email is –lcdeutsch@yahoo.comIf you would like to send her a card, drop me a note and I will provide her postal address. Robi said that while Linda is not driving right now, she is going out and was looking forward to a nail appointment on Sunday, which you know is an excellent sign!The Democratic National Convention opens today in Chicago – and we bring you reaction of two colleagues to a story byCarl P. Leubsdorfin Friday’s edition on covering the tumultuous 1968 convention in Chicago.If you have a memory of convention coverage, please share it with your colleagues.Ye Olde Connecting Editor was oblivious to the news from Chicago that week. I was in Air Force basic training at Lackland AFB in San Antonio, cut off from news of the day (no cell phones back in 1968), and concerned more about passing the “Confidence Course” that included climbing rope ladders up a 60-foot tower and back down (I never met a height I ever liked, other than my own).Here's to a great week – be safe, stay healthy, live each day to your fullest.https://conta.cc/3YP1D8E

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