Journals - The Birmingham News
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Birmingham News
In 2004, a News photo intern in search of a lens spotted a
cardboard box full of negatives marked, "Keep. Do Not Sell." In all,
Alexander Cohn found 5,000 images from 1950 to 1965 in the box.
He examined 2,000 and estimated that most had not been
published. "The editors thought if you didn't publish it, much of this
would go away," says Ed Jones, 81, a photographer at The News
from 1942 to 1987. "Associated Press kept on wanting pictures, and
The News would be slow on letting them have them, so they flooded
the town with photographers. The AP started sending pictures all
over, and it mushroomed." Many of the photos were published for
the first time in a special section on Sunday.
The Birmingham News did not “report on” the vendetta against
Governor Siegelman. Rather, it was a principal vehicle of the
vendetta, and its coverage is likely to be studied by journalism
students of the future as a reprise of the paper’s hideous and
reprehensible coverage of the Civil Rights era. And more to the
point, if a special prosecutor is appointed, then the very curious
special relationship between the News, certain backroom political
forces and the prosecutors who led the charge is likely to be right in
its crosshairs.
[1] Poynter Online; Feb 27,2006
[2] Harper's "No Comment" Feb 27, 2008
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Birmingham News
In 2004, a News photo intern in search of a lens spotted a
cardboard box full of negatives marked, "Keep. Do Not Sell." In all,
Alexander Cohn found 5,000 images from 1950 to 1965 in the box.
He examined 2,000 and estimated that most had not been
published. "The editors thought if you didn't publish it, much of this
would go away," says Ed Jones, 81, a photographer at The News
from 1942 to 1987. "Associated Press kept on wanting pictures, and
The News would be slow on letting them have them, so they flooded
the town with photographers. The AP started sending pictures all
over, and it mushroomed." Many of the photos were published for
the first time in a special section on Sunday.
The Birmingham News did not “report on” the vendetta against
Governor Siegelman. Rather, it was a principal vehicle of the
vendetta, and its coverage is likely to be studied by journalism
students of the future as a reprise of the paper’s hideous and
reprehensible coverage of the Civil Rights era. And more to the
point, if a special prosecutor is appointed, then the very curious
special relationship between the News, certain backroom political
forces and the prosecutors who led the charge is likely to be right in
its crosshairs.
[1] Poynter Online; Feb 27,2006
[2] Harper's "No Comment" Feb 27, 2008
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| __________________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored by Friends of Don Siegelman 2007 <feedback>________________________________________________________________________________ __________ |
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| These Birmingham News photographs of the civil rights movement have not been seen by the public. Until now. <more> "The editors thought if you didn't publish it, much of this would go away," says Ed Jones, 81, a photographer at The News from 1942 to 1987. <more> |
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