In the early 1990s, I answered an ad for a job as a reporter at the Gazette. I had experience as an editor—I’d worked as a copywriter, editor, and proofreader—and I enjoyed writing, but I’d never worked for a newspaper before, aside from a few articles I’d written for my high school newspaper.
There was a big reason for this: I was not, and never have been, a sociable person. I always thought that this was an essential requirement for a job that involved approaching strangers and asking them questions.
But at that point in my life, I needed a job, so I sent my resume and some writing samples to the Gazette. I got the job as a reporter for the town of Hatfield.
Just over 30 years later, I’m retiring from the newspaper. When I started, I never imagined I would work here for so long. But life – like the news that you’re about to become a parent – takes its own course, and here I am.
This is largely due to the opportunities I had to do different things at a small newspaper like the Gazette. In my first few years at the paper, I covered Hatfield, Hadley, and then parts of Amherst, while also writing regional news. Then I covered the University of Massachusetts and the other local colleges as part of a higher education section.
I also wrote occasional editorials for the paper for a while, and was a part-time arts editor for a time. But my real niche was as a staff writer for what was once Hampshire Life magazine, writing longer cover stories on a wide range of topics: arts and entertainment, history, politics, sports, energy and the environment, profiles of Valley people, even hard news like crime.
I welcomed the opportunity to be a little more expressive in my writing and to delve deeper into different topics. It was also somewhat of a relief not to have daily deadlines, although the longer stories could bring their own pressures.
And after spending around 10 years at Hampshire Life, I’ve spent the last 12 years as an arts and features writer for the Gazette, covering music, books, visual art, film, theatre, dance and a few other things. It’s been a great starting point to better understand the diversity of the region’s arts scene.
Eventually, I also developed the ability to overcome my basic shyness, set up interviews, ask questions, and move on to the next story, even if the butterflies in my stomach never completely went away. A few months ago, I was afraid to talk to Madison Cunningham, a Grammy-winning songwriter and guitarist I knew next to nothing about. (The interview ended up going well; I had studied her music a lot beforehand.)
I think that covering the arts has helped in that regard. News reporting can be difficult, especially when you’re trying to get comments from people who don’t want to talk to you or don’t like the media. I’ve had my share of argumentative interviews in the past and written articles about difficult subjects that can often make the person you’re talking to unhappy (or worse).
But artists are generally very interested in talking about their work, even if the well-known artists have had many of the same questions answered before; it becomes more of a conversation than a formal interview.
That doesn’t mean everything goes smoothly, though. About ten years ago, I spoke with Jeff Daniels, the veteran actor who is also an accomplished fingerstyle guitarist and songwriter. He came to the Iron Horse in Northampton with a small band to play his songs. It was part of a tour to raise money for a theater he owns and runs in his hometown of Chelsea, Michigan.
I had scheduled an interview a few weeks before Daniels’ appearance and was pretty nervous. At that point, he was perhaps the most famous person I’d ever spoken to. So it didn’t help when my phone rang and he said, with the enthusiasm of someone reporting to his parole officer, “Hi, this is Jeff Daniels.”
Luckily, I’m a fingerstyle guitarist myself, so most of my questions focused on guitars and acoustic music. We discovered a shared interest in pieces like Doc Watson’s “Deep River Blues” and Jorma Kaukonen’s version of “Hesitation Blues.” Daniels soon got into his stride and we had a good chat, including a few Hollywood anecdotes (and put on a great, funny show at the Horse).
It was a reminder that if you do your research on a topic (I did), think of reasonable questions, and listen to the person’s interests and background (and find some personal common ground without getting too involved in the conversation), you can usually get a pretty good interview, even if it might be a little awkward or awkward at first.
It’s hard to remember all the people I’ve talked to over the years, but I’m surprised by how kind many people have been to me, from well-known musicians from outside the area – Lori McKenna, Tommy Emmanuel, Keb Mo – to talented players who live or have lived here, like some of my favorite guitarists: Brooks Williams, Jim Henry, Chris Smither, John Sheldon.
In fact, I will be forever grateful to Emmanuel, the amazing guitarist, for calling me back after I messed up the timing of our interview and called him half an hour late. I was on a very tight deadline and may have left him a slightly panicked message. But he called me back 10 minutes later and waved off my apology: “Don’t worry, brother. Nice to talk to you.”
I also remember a portrait I did for Hampshire Life of the Northampton painter Nanny Vonnegut. She was preparing for an exhibition of new work about her relationship with her late father – a man called Kurt Vonnegut. It was an emotional time for her, but she told her story and I think we made a really good article out of it. (Her work is funny as hell, by the way – she inherited her father’s droll sense of humour.)
And sometimes a good interview and a good subject create a magical alchemy when it comes to writing a story. After speaking with Florence illustrator and children’s author Jarrett Krosoczka about his graphic biography/novel “Hey, Kiddo” and Whately author George Howard Colt about “The Game,” his portrait of a memorable Harvard-Yale football game in the turbulent late 1960s, the words seemed to flow effortlessly from my fingertips.
Both times I thought: “Why can’t I all my stories come together like this?”
Looking back, I’m very grateful to all the people I spoke to who took the time to answer my questions. Not only has reporting on the arts allowed me to meet some very talented people, it has also sometimes been an antidote to the often ugly news around us, from mass shootings and wars to angry politicians and environmental disasters. It’s an important reminder that our species is capable of good things.
By writing arts and other articles, I have been able to mitigate some of the changes, particularly the job cuts of recent years, that have taken place during my tenure at the Gazette.
When I started here, we worked on strange, clunky little computers that looked like props from the Starship Enterprise in the early days of Star Trek. But the newsroom was a hive of activity, like a smaller version of the rooms in Hollywood journalist dramas. Editors would call for pieces as deadlines approached, and there were probably three times as many reporters and freelancers as there are today.
We also had three editors, which is an unthinkable luxury today.
Over the years we got better, more modern computers and Internet service, and even though our newsroom got smaller, the Gazette regularly won awards in the annual New England newspaper contests.
In 2020, the rug fell away with the advent of COVID-19. By the end of the year, I was the only person left in the features department, Hampshire Life had been shut down, and the size of the paper had shrunk.
There’s no sugarcoating it. Things have been tough here for several years, as they have for so many other newspapers. A recent report said that an average of 2.5 local U.S. newspapers will go out of business each week in 2023. Over the past few years, I’ve often felt that the coverage I can provide of our bustling arts scene is quite inadequate.
But I’m proud that the paper has persevered with the support of the Gazette’s parent company, Newspapers of New England. My colleagues (well, former colleagues) are working as hard as ever to cover important community stories and make sure this region doesn’t become a local news desert.
And as I retire, I trust that the Gazette will find a strong columnist to replace me, someone who can bring fresh energy and perhaps some new perspectives and ideas to the position.
Thank you to everyone who has given me feedback on my pieces or suggested stories I could pursue. We can’t do good work without the support of readers who have stuck with us.
And maybe someday I can be persuaded to work as a freelance writer for the newspaper.
