Culture

Richmond, Va., Journalist Insisted on High Standards Raymond H. Boone Sr., the colorful, principled and feisty founder, editor and publisher of the weekly Richmond (Va.) Free Press, died Tuesday at his Richmond home after battling pancreatic cancer, his wife, Jean Boone, told Journal-isms. He was 76. Boone was on the job until nearly the end,…

“I Identify with People Who Don’t Have Much Power” Dean Baquet, the first African American top editor at the New York Times, does not talk much publicly about race, but he says that he owes his job to the black journalists who came before him and that his own background makes him “want to make…

In 1960, Renaissance Woman Landed Editor’s Job in Egypt Maya Angelou, the Renaissance woman who assumed roles ranging from poet to calypso singer, for a brief time was also a journalist. Angelou, who died at 86 Wednesday at her home in Winston-Salem, N.C., had her baptism of fire in journalism in 1960. As Angelou explained…

Mark Cuban Remarks Prove Fodder for TV Food Fights “Two CNN panelists really went at each other on Friday night over Mark Cuban‘s comments about prejudice,” Josh Feldman wrote for Mediaite, referring to the tech millionaire and owner of the Dallas Mavericks. “Author Tim Wise duked it out with conservative commentator Crystal Wright over exactly what the crime rate is in the black…

The Atlantic Launches P.R. Blitz for Ta-Nehisi Coates “On Wednesday night, The Atlantic posted the cover story for its June 2014 print issue: Ta-Nehisi Coates’ ‘The Case for Reparations,’ ” Edirin Oputu wrote Friday for Columbia Journalism Review. “A vast, multimedia, multi-chapter story in the vein of Nikole Hannah-Jones’ recent investigation into the resegregation of America’s schools, ‘The…

NPR Favors Integration Into Other Programming “Tell Me More,” NPR’s third try at a daily newsmagazine that targeted people of color, “was not financially sustainable in its current form,” an NPR executive told Journal-isms on Wednesday, leaving the implication that no such show could be. NPR announced on Tuesday that, effective Aug. 1, it is…

NPR Cancels Multicultural “Tell Me More” Host Michel Martin Given Network-Wide Role NPR said Tuesday it is ending production of “Tell Me More,” the multicultural daily magazine hosted by Michel Martin that began in 2007, promising a wider role for Martin and regretting the budget crunch that executives said made the cancellation and other cuts…

Baquet Calls Glenn Greenwald Criticism “Idiotic” Update: Ravi Somaiya, New York Times: Times Publisher Denies Gender Figured in Top Editor’s Dismissal (May 17) Update: Howard Kurtz, Fox News: Sulzberger, under siege, rips Jill Abramson for poor management (May 17) “Gossip overshadowed the history-making moment for Dean Baquet. He became the first African-American to head the…

Veteran Journalist Is First African American in Role Dean Baquet, managing editor of the New York Times and former top editor at the Los Angeles Times, was named executive editor on Wednesday after Jill Abramson stepped down from the New York newspaper’s top editorial job. “Baquet, 57, becomes the first African American in the job. “It is…

“Too Terrifying for Words,” Says One Who Escaped “CNN’s Nima Elbagir, Lillian Leposo and Nick Migwe made the dangerous journey to Chibok, Nigeria, to gather firsthand accounts of the abduction of the schoolgirls — and how people in the northeastern town are still living in fear,” according to an editor’s note introducing this CNN story…