Who is still in the biz: Your college newspaper staff

Weekly student paper in the late 80s. We didn't have many people who stayed through the end of college, much less 25 years later, but there's three of us that are still in the business.

 

that would be justin heckert. in indianapolis now

 

People would not believe this if I told them. Here are some of my college paper buddies:

--Was in the sit room when we got bin laden
--Owns an NBA team
--Chief counsel for Google
--Nominated for a Pulitzer
--CEO of big legal corporation
--Running for Congress in major metro area
--Top burn-unit doctor
--Others working in journalism, government, business.. and..
--Honorable mention on all-SportsJournalists.com

 

Most of those are believable, but that last one? Come on ...

 

not to disparage, but all you need to be nominated for a pulitzer is $50

 

My bad. I meant finalist for Pulitzer.

 

Nominated was the right word. It just gets misused a lot.

 

That's pretty stunning, Lugs.

 

I didn't touch journalism until after I graduated from UNC, so no Daily Tar Heel experience for me. I did, however, spend one semester as a grad student in journalism at South Carolina. During that semester I was in something called the journalism practicum with seniors who were about to graduate. We put out a newspaper once a week but it was a different publication than the regular student newspaper. That was 30 years ago. Yikes!

As far I know, one reporter is still in the business. He's with The State in Columbia. I interviewed for jobs just like the graduating seniors and got hired. I spent six years in the biz, got out for 13 and returned in 2001.

 

Well, my college paper staff can boast of a reporter who's flacked for Mitt Romney, another who flacked for a losing Mass. Democratic gubernatorial candidate, and one who won a Pulitzer at the New York Times and now works at ESPN. Our sports editor, though a New Yorker, landed in my state and is now in public relations at a toy company you may have heard of.
My roommate freshman year, though he never worked at my school paper, was a frequent topic in the Jobs section here when he was ME at his old shop.

 

Well I went to Iraq and Afghanistan after my 3 years on the Texas Tech newspaper. Another dude went into the army and saw combat as well, he's still in the army I just retired after a bomb blast to my lower back. I'm a sports editor now at a small daily and my boss at the Tech paper is sports editor at a bigger daily. Some of our staff has flamed out and went to law school the military or other things. But we did have a really kick ass college paper in the 90s.

 

The Daily Toreador: We'll kick your ass, terrorist.