The newspaper Al Neuharth famously launched 30 years ago is now reporting that he died today as a result of injuries following a fall at his home in Cocoa Beach, Fla.
"Newsroom smart and board room savvy," USA Today reports, "Neuharth was audacious, flamboyant and a self-described 'dreamer and schemer.' He used all those talents, and a dose of Midwest charm and common sense, to help build Gannett into one of America's largest media companies."
"Newsroom smart and board room savvy," USA Today reports, "Neuharth was audacious, flamboyant and a self-described 'dreamer and schemer.' He used all those talents, and a dose of Midwest charm and common sense, to help build Gannett into one of America's largest media companies."
Now the Devil Will have to leave hell, because he won't be able to stand the competition.
ReplyDeleteIt must gall you that the newsroom knew and no one told you. You had to read it online like every other retiree. Now lets get back to important things like the incorrect Project Butterfly string.
ReplyDeleteDang, Al! I'm reporting this from my car with my iPhone.
ReplyDeleteWhere do I begin? I know: a stripper named Boom-Z-Boom!
ReplyDeleteHey, the classy comments have started. So, on that note:
ReplyDeleteJim, isn't it the fourth anniversary of you clowning it up with Al in the background? I wish that video were still live. It was comedy gold.
LOL!
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DeleteDear 6:58 "I HAVE NEVER WORKED FOR GANNETT OR ANY OF THEIR NEWSPAPERS IN MY LIFE' Get you facts straight.
ReplyDeleteI am sure Neuharth wouldn't mind my pointing out that he has cheated USA Today on this story. That's because USAT doesn't publish in print tomorrow so the competition will get first dibs in this story before the paper that he founded gets its chance in Monday.
ReplyDeleteReally Jim? USA TODAY Rome the story online ahead of all their competition. Welcome to the 21st cenrury Jim. Oh my gosh you just humiliated yourself
DeleteBroke the story
DeleteSeriously, you are so 2005.
DeleteRIP Big Al, self-avowed SOB.
ReplyDeleteHe dragged the newspaper business kicking and screaming into the 20th Century — but alas it was too little, too late.
RIP. he was ahead of his time but he wasn't a nice person. Ask the daughter he never recognized or embraced her whole life other than some minor financial payments. Brilliant but in the end a heartless ass.
ReplyDeleteI agreed with his critics at the time (1982) that Neuharth was dumbing down journalism with USAT. But it did have its market, created where one wasn't before (reasoning rather than solid journalism of the days of yore, let's exploit the lazy kiddies). And yet I'd always pick up a copy to read along with more sober publications that didn't treat the reader like a two-year-old. Then I compare Neutharth's USAT with today's incarnation (yes... I kept old copies all this time) and his helmsmanship is stellar by comparison.
ReplyDeleteTypo: "Neutharth's USAT" was supposed to be "Neuharth's USAT."
ReplyDeleteWonder how Paul Miller is feeling about all of this.
ReplyDeleteKudos to David Colton and Rick Hampson for their bylined USAT obit; it included a lot more warts than I ever imagined it could, given all the office politics surrounding such work.
ReplyDeleteThud. No one cares. I actually liked Al when I worked at USA TODAY in the late 80s. But it's just a sad deal. A fall that resulted in a loss of a life. May God bless his children.
ReplyDeleteNo quotes from Al's handpicked successor, John Curley. Also no quotes from Tom Curley, or the biggest Al wannabe Frank Vega. Kind of says it all.
ReplyDeleteHe grew the top line 1,450% and the stock fourfold.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, $100 invested in GCI the day he retired in 1989 would now be worth $108 (after inflation, $58).
I remember when Al wrote his first book and set-up a signing table right at the top of the down-escalator leaving the corp building(s), in Arlington. No one dared get on the elevator without buying the book. He was a self promoter and salesman, more than newsman. Newsman is the persona he enjoyed most. I think he was more Ringling than Cronkite, as Al did a great job of buying circus after circus, then selling tickets to the greatest show on earth--news.
ReplyDeleteRIP, Al.
ReplyDeleteI worked for Gannett late in Neuharth's tenure but never even came close to meeting him. Heard a few stories, but nothing that hasn't been repeated a million times. So I don't have any particular insight into him as a person or an executive.
ReplyDeleteBut I will always give him credit for starting USA Today. It was a brilliant idea. Throughout the '80s and '90s, I read it daily with pleasure. It was a great, lively supplement to my own city's daily newspaper, wherever I was living at the time.
Now it's been rendered irrelevant by the Internet. The Times and to some extent the Wall Street Journal have taken the mantle of "the nation's newspaper," but in a different way. USAT became the nation's newspaper by giving us a light, entertaining read. That's what we were missing 30 years ago. Now we meet that need on the Web. The Times has become our national opinion leader on important issues -- that's what we're missing in the Internet era, and the Times is meeting that need.
But in its day, USAT was a great and bold innovation.
That's completely backwards. To his credit, Neuharth had nothing but contempt for elite opinion. Thanks to the Internet, the very phrase "national opinion leader" is an anachronism, and certainly any credibility or authority claimed by the New York Times and its ilk is long gone. Neuharth would have been the first to grasp that.
DeleteThe New York Times is "our national opinion leader"? LOL. Only in a nation entirely populated by far-left professors.
DeleteIt certainly sets the news agenda.
DeleteOh, come on, 12:28. There is no "far left" in this country, let alone in the media. Look around. Thanks.
Delete2:07PM - To the extent the New York Times still "sets the news agenda" for card-carrying journalists, that fact merely highlights the yawning chasm between the profession and the public at large, for whom the days of agenda-setting by the clueless lamestream media is but an unpleasant memory. Indeed, the journalism profession's predictability, groupthink, careerism, and ideological bias are major factors in its increasing obsolescence and irrelevance.
Delete4:30PM - See above.
5:27 PM, 4:30 PM here. Eloquently put!
DeleteLook at the comments on the various stories about his death. Al gets less comments on his death than the popular local high school kids that died in a car crash. Shows that the demographics that read the paper, remember Al, and use the internet come together like oil and water.
ReplyDeleteGannett's digital future is Al's present.
Ironically, today Gannett papers print both a list of their former customers along with the USAT founder.
I predict that the last financial quarter filed in Gannett's bankruptcy will list its status as a creditor in thousands of probate court proceedings as an asset.
How appropriate.
I was working for minimum wage at a Cox newspaper in the early '70s when someone said, "I hear Gannett has a push on to hire and promote women." I didn't really know what that meant until 15 years later when I was hired in a Gannett newsroom and looked around. I've always credited Al Neuharth for that.
ReplyDeleteIf you really didn't know what that meant, then you never should have been hired.
DeleteAlso, the idea of hiring people based simply on gender or race is a big reason why Gannett is dropping like a stone and why the media profession is irrelevant to many, as described above.
But I'm sure you think that because it worked for you, it should work for everyone.
How long before the Newseum's board of trustees -- chaired by his daughter, Jan -- votes to change the name to the Allen H. Neuharth Newseum?
ReplyDeleteThat would be perfect as the Newseum and the Freedom Forum sink into obscurity and eventual evaporation.
DeleteVisionary? For a few years maybe. Then he just milked it for all he could get.
ReplyDeleteHopefully it's not to hot on the day of his funeral, I'd hate to get heatstroke standing in line to piss on his grave.
ReplyDeleteA visionary with balls of steel, but also a heartless, soul-less prick who would eat his children for another 100,000 in circulation. RIP and good riddance.
ReplyDeleteBeing a Gannett employee for 34 years and never had any direct business dealings with Neuharth, our paths would cross often as I live two blocks from Pumpkin Center. Wheather it would be on each of our morning walks on the beach or in the grocery store, he'd be quick with a smile and a "hello", knowing I work for Florida Today. His wife and addopted chiidren were always polite and respectful. Condolences to his family and may he rest in peace.
ReplyDelete