Sports Editor, Huntington, IN

Position Description: Responsible for the sports coverage of a six-day community newspaper in Huntington, Ind. This position requires a hands-on editor with writing, editing and design skills to cover local sports, including high school and college levels. Requirements include other duties as assigned. A commitment and passion for community journalism is a must. Minimum Requirements: Bachelor’s degree in journalism or equivalent. Experience with Quark Xpress and Photoshop. Must be able to use a digital camera. Send Resume To: Rebecca Sandlin, Editor, Herald-Press, 7 N. Jefferson St., Huntington, IN 46750, rsandlin@h-ponline.com No calls please

 

The hometown of Dan Quayle.

 

Just some quick notes on this one:
• This is a Paxton paper, part of a multi-paper group with its base in nearby Marion, which does the printing for all the group publications.
• Deadlines are ridiculously early (5 p.m.), meaning even local sports don't get published the next day. Everything is two days late.
• There is no page design done in Huntington. All editorial decisions, along with layout, is done in Marion. The editors in Huntington have no decision in story placement.
• There is just one high school in the county to cover (Huntington North), along with an NAIA Division II school (Huntington University).
• This was a decent small newspaper until the Quayle family sold to Paxton a couple of years ago. The entire newsroom staff that had been together for more than a decade all left in the span of six months. They were all replaced with staffers with little or no experience. The result has been a disaster, with a drop in circulation from 6,600 to 4,400 over that time.

For the record, I was the sports editor here for 20 years and the Herald-Press had built a solid reputation around the state for doing things the right way. I left soon after Paxton purchased the paper, not wanting to accept the conditions and decisions that were being made by new ownership.

 

Paxton has had that reverse Midas touch with a lot of its Indiana papers. Sounds like the H-P is basically being used as the newsroom bureau of the nearby Marion paper now, with universal desk in Marion.

The ridiculously early deadlines is a rather recent, but very distasteful, thing that has happened in this area (the reason why -- most papers are shutting down their presses and printing at a centralized location AND firing their delivery staffs and going to mail-only). The paper where I was SE now has an 8 p.m. deadline, so all sports are also 2 days late. There's no point in even covering games at that point.

A couple of other things ... their previous SE, Paul Siegfried, was a really, really good guy. Hope he's doing well.

The only school in the county, Huntington North HS, is a big school that is part of the North Central Conference, Indiana's traditionally prestigious basketball league. Get ready for a lot of long winter travel -- the NCC plays most of its boys basketball games on Friday nights, and teams are spread out all over the place. Most conference opponents (Richmond, New Castle, Anderson, Muncie Central, Logansport) are going to be 1-2 hours away, mostly on 2-lane roads. The NCC is a horridly bad football conference, but is a very well-known hoops league. HNHS is known as a girls basketball power, but has recently been through some instability.

Huntington College has no football. Men's basketball is pretty good (plays in what is probably the strongest NAIA D-2 conference in the country), but most small colleges in Indiana have a very miniscule local following (and have SIDs feeding you info), so if there's a place to skimp, this might be it.

 

A 5 p.m. deadline? Wow.

 

As far as the town itself, it's in NE Indiana about 20-30 minutes from Fort Wayne, probably an hour from South Bend and close to two hours from Indy. Chicago is probably a 2-3 hour drive (or a 2-hour drive to NW Indiana and an hour train ride).

 

Good lord. I didn't know that. Hate to see that happen to one of my stops, though I'm not surprised given the ownership.

 

Man, if it wasn't for the insanely early deadline, I'd probably apply for this.

 

Is there any word on whether this has been filled?

 

Don't let the deadline tell you not to apply.

It is a fulltime gig close to where you want to work. That's hard to come by these days.


Yes, the early deadlines would cause a problem. But you can overcome those with some creative thinking. And somewhere down the line, SEs may be looking for creativity.


Obviously, it's not a job to stay at more than a year. But sometimes you have to pay your dues.

 

Close to two. I've done it before and not for work. Don't ask.

Ah, good old Huntington. Aka Hell on Earth (especially for single males NOT from metro Fort Wayne).