October 2001
MEETINGS
Next at IABC ...
Unblock, then Unleash: A Guide to Fresh Creativity
Hollywood screenwriter/film journalist Rex McGee knows the challenges of creativity and how to meet them. A protege of Oscar-winning writer-director Billy Wilder, McGee wrote Warner Brothers' "Pure Country" and is working on a musical stage adaptation of the film. He recently wrote an IMAX film for the Texas State History Museum in Austin and has taught the Artist's Way workshop at SMU. He was profiled in a Dallas Morning News story in April, "Hollywood writer leads artists back to their creative roots."
Such exotic experiences. Perfect, perhaps, for an IABC program? That they are, and that it will be. McGee will outline the roadblocks to artistic fulfillment -- fear, perfectionism, workaholism, oversleeping, too much food, too much TV, too much time on the phone -- and ways to soar past them at the IABC/Fort Worth meeting Oct. 9.
* Time & date: 11:30 a.m. Tuesday, Oct. 9
* Place: Petroleum Club, Carter-Burgess Plaza, 777 Main St., 39th floor
* Cost: $17 members, $22 nonmembers, $12 students
* RSVP by noon Oct. 5: Dan Frost at (817) 735-6157 or mailto:frostdg@c-b.com
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Next at PRSA ...
A Fashionable Look at 'Looks'
At some point in a PR professional's life, he or she realizes that practical skills aren't all that's needed for career growth. October's guest speaker, relying on more than 25 years' experience in the world of etiquette and fashion, will fill in the details.
Susan Huston, dubbed the Emily Post of Arlington by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, will address the importance of manners, achieving success in dressing, and the 10 most common grooming mistakes. The owner of Susan Huston Fashion Concepts, her clients have included Marriott Hotels, Bell Helicopter, Texas A&M University, the UTA College of Business, Ebby Halliday Realtors and the Texas Rangers Baseball Club.
The chapter also will elect officers and vote on revised bylaws. Nominations may be made from the floor. The slate: for president, Kristie Aylett, APR; president-elect/membership, Roger Partridge; vice president/programs, Hope Caldwell; secretary, Elizabeth Eslick; treasurer, Pamela Smith; and treasurer-elect, Ann Genett Schrader, APR. Directors: Carolyn Hodge, APR (continues through 2002); Carolyn Bobo, APR (through 2003); and Marc Flake (through 2004). Assembly delegates: Beth Park, APR (through 2002), and Kim Speairs, APR (through 2004). Past president will be Mary Dulle.
* Time & date: 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 10
* Place: Ridglea Country Club, 3700 Bernie Anderson Blvd., just off Camp Bowie Boulevard near Bryant Irvin
* Cost: $20 members, $23 nonmembers, $18 students; parking free
* RSVP by noon Oct. 8: Elizabeth Eslick at mailto:elizabeth@stuartbacon.com
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Next at SPJ ...
Life at Ground Zero: 'We Will Never Forget'
A doctor running a makeshift clinic in a deli at the edge of the rubble in Lower Manhattan keeps cots in the back for weary rescuers, but some insist on sleeping on the sidewalk, afraid they'll be too far away if needed. They come in only when the blisters get unbearable.
They cannot forget. The words scream in the gray dust on window fronts and shout from a banner atop a skyscraper missing its windows: "WE WILL NEVER FORGET." "You can break buildings," reads another slogan etched in soot, "but not souls."
Area journalists went there to tell the story. They smelled it, tasted it, breathed it. And they will have the floor when Fort Worth SPJ meets Oct. 16.
* Date: Tuesday, Oct. 16
* Time: mingling 5:30 p.m., dinner 6:15, program at 7
* Place: Water Street Seafood, 1540 S. University Drive
* Cost: $13 members, $17 nonmembers, $5 students
* Menu: choice of shrimp enchilada, fried catfish, brandy mushroom trout or shrimp-k-bob, all served with a salad, vegetables and seasoned rice; grilled chicken caesar salad or Gulf shrimp salad; fresh-baked bread and tea, soft drink or coffee; cash bar
* RSVP: (817) 877-1171 or mailto:doti1@aol.com
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STRAIGHT STUFF
Raffle items are needed for the holiday party Wednesday, Dec. 12, benefiting the JPS Health Network children's library. Mary Dulle at mailto:mary.dulle@alconlabs.com would love to hear from you; operators are standing by. ... Reminder: In addition to futurist John Hoyle as keynoter ("Public Relations: Visions of Virtual Vigilance"), White House special projects director Jane Hampton Cook will discuss "Shaping Opinion with Technology and Internet Communications" at the Texas Public Relations Association's fall professional development seminar Oct. 12 in College Station. Other speakers will examine how Texas is changing, from demographics to lifestyles, and what types of communications tools will be needed to reach the state's diverse publics. Presentations will feature the latest techniques in streaming video and how Texas A&M has coped with the aftermath of the 1999 bonfire tragedy. Info at http://tpra.com, or call (800) 525-0405. ...
PRSA national update: Sign them on, give them value. The national membership campaign is underway, with recruiters earning PRSA Dollars, which can be used toward any publication, service or conference offered by national. As an incentive, national is waiving the $65 initiation fee, and GFW PRSA is waiving its $45 local dues for the rest of 2001 for new national members who join the chapter (2002 local dues will be invoiced in January). Why waive the chapter dues? Because the chapters that recruit the highest percentage of new members win prizes, too. The campaign runs through Nov. 15. For more information or a membership packet, contact Kristie Aylett, APR, at (817) 735-2553 or mailto:aylettk@yahoo.com. ...
SPJ national update: 1 loss to terrorism, 1 loss and holding. In the aftermath of the worst terrorist attack in America, First Amendment proponents fear that national security concerns will soon overpower basic freedoms. On Sept. 12, Vermont Gov. Howard Dean said the crisis will require "a re-evaluation of the importance of some of our specific civil liberties." The U.S. Senate approved legislation Sept. 13 that would make it easier for the FBI to electronically eavesdrop. "It's the beginning of a different epoch, a conceptual shift in the way government and First Amendment freedoms interact," said Scott Armstrong, an award-winning journalist formerly with The Washington Post. "We are now in a period where civil liberties get put to the side while we fight this war against terrorism." Meanwhile, Robert S. Mueller III was the Justice Department official who approved in May a subpoena for the home telephone records of AP reporter John Solomon, demanding incoming and outgoing calls during a five-day period in which Solomon investigated and reported on New Jersey Sen. Robert Torricelli's 1996 campaign. Mueller took over as FBI director Sept. 3. ... Vanessa Leggett, 33, the novice crime writer jailed for refusing to turn over her notes about a murder to a federal grand jury, has spent more time behind bars than any journalist in the United States. Leggett was found in contempt of court July 20 and could be held in a Houston federal detention center for up to 18 months; she was still in jail the week of Sept. 26. The Reporters' Committee for Freedom of the Press says the previous record was 46 days when a Los Angeles Herald-Examiner reporter refused to disclose material related to the Charles Manson trial in 1972. Federal prosecutors assert that Leggett is not a journalist and therefore lacks First Amendment protection against revealing sources to the government. ... Note the snazzy new features -- a media job bank, daily news about the industry, an online version of Quill, many members-only items -- in the redesigned SPJ Web site (http://spj.org). The site and its upkeep are covered by a $120,000 grant from the Sigma Delta Chi Foundation, the educational arm of the society.
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Crisis Planning Hits Home with Healthcare SIG
The PRSA Healthcare SIG goes global Oct. 18 when it ties into an interactive Web-based teleconference, "Crisis-Proofing Your Organization," presented by James E. Lukaszewski, APR, Fellow PRSA. The teleconference is from 12:30 to 2:30 p.m., and participants are invited to attend all or part and to bring their lunch.
The presentation is not specific to health care. Topics will include: what an employer should know when a worker is called up for military service; how to handle a terrorist threat; dealing with casualties; and the crucial role of the CEO and other senior executives in a crisis. Related areas will explore crisis plan development, avoiding mistakes that cause collateral damage, and the specific steps to ensure appropriate first-response action.
Lukaszewski is a specialist in trouble-shooting sensitive corporate communications issues. PRSA just published his three-volume Executive Action crisis communication management series.
Cook Children's Medical Center is hosting the session, in a room to be chosen based on how many say they're coming. RSVP to Beth Solomon, APR, at (817) 885-4372 or mailto:bethso@cookchildrens.org.
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Remembering the City's Past to Appreciate Its Present
... Coming Soon to a Coffee Table Near You
by Frank Perkins
Ever study a historic picture and wonder what the photographer standing at the same spot would see today? The good folks at director Judy Alter's TCU Press have eliminated the guesswork with "Fort Worth: Then and Now," a simple concept with tremendous civic potential that turned out to be more complex than expected.
The book was patterned after "Colorado: Then and Now," which features photos taken 100 years apart. Trouble was, Fort Worth doesn't go back that far photographically. "We wanted to show how the city streetscapes looked in 1900 and how they looked today," explained author-historian Carol Roark, who researched and wrote the text that accompanies Star-Telegram photographer Rodger Mallison's pictures. "But it was difficult finding old photographs of its streetscapes because Fort Worth was very small then and 98 percent of the existing photos from that time are studio portraits."
As the appropriate streetscapes were selected, Mallison photographed the same scenes from the same site and angle as the originals. For the proper timeless "feel," he shot in black and white on 2 1/4 by 3 1/4 film, a format he hadn't used in 15 years.
What emerged was a chronicle of impressive change and historical record. There's out-in-the-country Forest Park Boulevard at Berry Street, looking south after a rain; Berry is the brick road, Forest Park the unpaved bog. Midcentury photos show Lancaster Avenue far from a sparkling ribbon of commerce (growing more lovely in our memory with each passing year), but a dingy industrial street in places and not that much to look at.
Other locations have changed so much that shooting from yesterday's vantage point just wasn't possible. "In the book is a shot taken in 1952 from the center of the West Freeway 300 yards from Forest Park Boulevard," Mallison noted. "You wouldn't survive standing there in the middle of the West Freeway today."
In the early 1900s, Fort Worth was a treeless plain. Roark found a 1913 photo of TCU that proves it: two stark buildings on a grassy, prairie hill with no trees anywhere to be seen. Mallison's photo from the same angle shows a bustling, tree-lined, landscaped campus.
Designer Margie Adkins West said she was concerned with every detail of the oversized book, from the paper to the margins around the photos and the size and face of the type. "The white space around photos gives them life and breath, and the paper is very important in book design," she said. "I wanted this book to be a comfortable, yet beautiful one."
"Fort Worth: Then and Now" is available at Barnes & Noble bookstores.
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PEOPLE & PLACES
How committed was the Star-Telegram to covering the attack aftermath firsthand? Three rented SUVs embarked at 5:30 p.m. Sept. 11 on a 26-hour, straight-through trip to New York; other members of the team came later. Over a couple of weeks, Jennifer Autrey, Deanna Boyd, Bob Cox, Jack Douglas Jr., Ron T. Ennis, Bill Hanna, Mary McKee, Miles Moffeit, Bryon Okada, Tom Pennington, Barry Shlachter, Kathy Vetter and intern Nicole Gull all made the trek. Knight Ridder picked Vetter to be its editor on the ground there, which says something about KR's confidence in its Texas crew. ...
Baby daze! Autumn Nicole Bryant was born at 6:18 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 11, to former Arlington copy editor Michael Bryant and his wife, Jennifer. She weighed 7 pounds 3 ounces. The Bryants went to the hospital about 6 a.m. that day and watched the events in New York and Washington on television while Jennifer was in labor. ... Those snapshots on Star-T writer Gordon Dickson's desk are of Marshall Gordon Dickson, born at 1:47 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 23, weighing 8 pounds 9 ounces. Gordon and wife Grace also have a daughter, Sentell Marie, 6. ... That's Granddad to you. Star-T police/fire editor Ernie Makovy is a first-time grandfather. Micayla Ann Denton, 6 pounds 7 ounces, was born Saturday, Aug. 25, to Jamie (Ernie's daughter) and Keith Denton of Arlington. ... Anna Clare Bohler, brand new daughter of TCU student publications director Robert Bohler and wife Helena Cantrell, checked in Tuesday, July 31, at 6 pounds 14 ounces. Robert reports: "My wife woke me at 2:30 darktime and asked if I wanted to go have a baby. Anna Clare was born shortly after 6, holding off just long enough for the midwife to arrive with about five minutes to spare. Thought for a minute, in one of those James Thurber moments, I was going to have to bite the cord and wash her in the Brazos myself. 'This is how they did it in "Lonesome Dove," ' I'd say. Didn't happen."
Kudos & Contracts ... La Estrella publisher Javier Aldape has received this year's Batton Award for diversity from Knight Ridder. This is the Star-Telegram's second award in the annual KR recognition program. Pressroom manager Paul Keese won one last year.
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COMINGS & GOINGS
Additions/shiftings ... UT Austin liberal arts honors grad Maggie Estes, a former legislative intern for a state representative in Austin, now an account assistant with InterStar Marketing & Public Relations ... at the S-T: Tim Sager, a deputy copy chief on the Fort Worth desk and the Texas Daily Newspaper Association's 2001 recipient of its John Murphy Award for excellence in copy editing, promoted to copy chief ... Cal State-Long Beach grad Maria Vega, fresh from a stint at the San Jose Mercury News, to the FW copy desk ... ol' Carter-Riverside boy and UTA Shorthorn ex Mike Hinshaw, with experience at Harcourt Brace and other outposts and whose mama worked at the Star-T for about 35 years, also now on the desk ... Iowa native and recent Notre Dame grad Kathleen O'Brien, to the Sports Zone staff in Arlington, following a summer sports internship downtown
Exits ... Bob Mahlburg, after more than a decade at the S-T, to the Orlando Sentinel as a state capital reporter
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A NOTE FROM THE PRESIDENT
Mary Dulle, GFW PRSA
I write these notes sitting in a hotel room in Cork, Ireland, my laptop perched on my knees. It is Sept. 14, and I was due home yesterday. I don't know when I can return to my loved ones, international flights having been canceled due to the horrible events in the United States on Tuesday, Sept 11.
I do know, however, warm feelings of comfort and assurance. The Irish outpouring of sympathy toward Americans is unbelievable. At dinner in restaurants, people hear our accents and make a point of coming to our table to express their condolences. The four of us here from my company all have experienced the same feelings of being cared for until we can return home.
Today was declared a National Day of Mourning in Ireland. Everything but essential operations is closed, and memorials were held this morning. Several in my group decided early to go out walking as we'd finished our business and needed some exercise. Within blocks of the hotel, we happened upon St. Finnebarr's Cathedral just as the memorial service was about to begin. While we hadn't gone in search of such a thing, something led us there. The large cathedral was packed, and the crowds spilled into the parking area. There were people of all ages and stations in life, all quietly straining to hear. When three minutes of silence were requested at the exact moment three days before that the first plane hit the World Trade Center, there was not a murmur but for small children who didn't understand what was happening. As the silence was finally broken by the priest, organ and choir, the crowd wiped away tears and the sky began a slow drizzle. It felt as if nature and the world were mourning with us.
I know my colleagues in America are helping any way possible. Thank you to all who have given blood, donated funds or used your skills to assist. I hope I'm able to return soon and join you in your efforts. Certainly, I shall be back among the active by the time you read this.
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PRESIDENT'S COLUMN
Cecilia Jacobs, IABC/Fort Worth
Now and then, plans change. When tragedy struck early Sept. 11, the IABC/Fort Worth board unanimously agreed to cancel our luncheon and accreditation workshop set for later that day. It was the American thing to do. My personal apologies to Kevin Snow, IABC District 5 board accreditation liaison and speaker for the September get-together. Kevin arrived in Fort Worth the night before terrorists assaulted our nation.
It is a trying time for all of us. And in times like these, we need organizations like IABC to unite us and motivate us to keep telling our stories with professionalism and integrity. Many of us are faced with communicating the worst of messages in the best of ways.
Come to our Oct. 9 luncheon. Enjoy a fine meal, a great speaker and the warmth of friends. A good laugh is therapeutic, and there will be a laugh or two. Promise. Screenwriter Rex McGee will teach us how to be more creative, and along the way maybe he'll share a bit of Hollywood with us. Membership chair Lydia Murphy will explain the changes and details -- money and prizes -- of our annual recruitment for new folks. The more members we have, the more opportunities for networking.
Until then, I join each of you in praying for our nation and its leaders. It's the American thing to do.
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OVER & OUT
John Dycus, Fort Worth SPJ
Welcome, Lauren Black and Envision Works, LP, the E-Chaser's newest advertiser. Envision Works is a marketing, promotions and creative communications company specializing in print and digital solutions. Quite the animated Web site. ... Let's take a poll. How many think the Basses' billion-dollar margin call was a curse on the family for Ed's closing Caravan of Dreams? ...
Observations in a meteor storm: When the last trumpet sounds, let it herald the sacrificial bravery of the New York firefighters and police officers who stepped into the inferno so that others might live. In contrast, behold the hijacker, a coward with no conscience, twisting a religion of peace into an instrument of war, a mass murderer splashing flaming jet fuel on a planet's pain in exchange for the afterlife promise of, what, 100 virgins? (An inordinate number, whatever it is; once into three figures, any tally of virgins becomes moot.) On the one hand, witness a supremely selfless public servant; on the other, a man thinking solely of himself, spewing death for the great priapic payoff. I have to believe only one died a hero Sept. 11 to his God. ... There's comfort at http://spot.eroded.org/thankyou/. And a real-time history print primer you never thought you'd see at http://poynter.org/Terrorism/gallery/wedgallery.htm. ... Never in the nation's history has "The Star-Spangled Banner" been rendered publicly with such well-meaning inefficiency. No respecter of age, gender or ethnicity, it teases its perpetrators with vocal glory, then ties them in quavery knots. Give me the saxophone version. Maybe handbells. ... Best battlefield speculation, from a retired CIA operative: Look past the scraggly beard, and Osama bin Laden has the smooth skin of an aristocrat, not the leathery countenance of a cave dweller. His followers live in the mountains; he's up in the royal palace behind the dam. ... Best statistic, grasping for the slightest positive division: Of 74,280 people directly targeted (all the seats on the four hijacked planes plus the number of workers at the Pentagon and the World Trade Center), 93 percent survived or avoided the attacks -- a higher survival rate than heart attacks, breast cancer, kidney transplants and liver transplants. ... Most creepy visage: Several people said they saw the face of the devil -- eyes, nose, horns -- in an AP photo of the smoke billowing from the WTC towers. It's as good an explanation as any. ... Creeps among us: the hate-filled losers who would kill a Sikh or stab an Ethiopian under the guise of "patriotism." Early on, George W. Bush weakly condemned their actions, saying they "should be ashamed of themselves." I hope he later said that they will be pursued and prosecuted with the fervor reserved for terrorists. For that is what they are. ... Most intriguing reactions on a politician's face, post-attack: Hillary Clinton's during the president's address to Congress. She looked eye-rollingly partisan and maybe a little bored and disinclined to hide either. What was she thinking, other than perhaps that whatever chance she had of being president is gone? ... Best children's happy ending, Dallas sector: the grade-schoolers who'd been saving their pennies to buy a playground set but instead donated the money to the American Red Cross, only to have jungle-gym manufacturers leap to fill the schoolyard with more equipment than the kids could've bought in the first place. ... Best secular thing you can do, in addition to the other things you've done: donate to Rotary District 7230's education fund for the sons and daughters of the firefighters and police officers who died. The check goes to Rotary District 7230 NYC/WTC Disaster Relief Fund, P.O. Box 2, White Plains, N.Y. 10605. ... Best sight in North Texas as I write this: near-record throngs at the State Fair. Most people crave structure, visible signs of security. In unsettling times, a police presence attracts, not repels. Likewise, people will return, eagerly and in quantity, to a D/FW Airport patrolled by the National Guard and later with sky marshals on the planes. ... Best sight in the Star-Telegram lately: ads!