We're taking a personal approach to the interview series this time. We're talking with current employees who have worked at The News-Gazette the longest to find out what it has been like to work at paper.
This week I sat down with our editor, Darryl Woodson. Darryl has worked at The News-Gazette since 1983 and has been the editor since 1994. What the editor does is run the newsroom: oversees the reporters and the layout people every week, organizes the stories covered in the paper, talks reporters about their stories as well as any possible news that comes in. He also takes care of anything people want us to print or any advanced notices of events for different organizations, churches, schools, etc.
Why did you come to work at The News-Gazette?
I'm a hometown boy. Part of my family's been here since the 1740s. I developed a desire to go into journalism in high school and decided to pursue that in college. The News-Gazette was family to me even back before I started working here. There were a lot of nice people. Matt [Paxton]'s father was the publisher and the editor back then. He was very nice. The reporters I worked with were all very nice. Before one of the reporters left that summer, she recommended me to Mr. Paxton. He already knew me, so I got the job. I don't know that I intended to stay here all this time or not, but I enjoyed it here. I enjoy the small town atmosphere. I enjoy the people here. It just became a career.
What made you stay here instead of looking for anther job?
A lot of my W&L peers and classmates went on to large papers, even from the get-go. In general, the way it used to work in journalism anyway, is you would work at a small paper to get your feet wet, go on to a daily, go to a bigger daily, and that would be your career. A lot of people would do that and then end up in PR work because PR work pays more money than the newspapers, even at the daily level. But I've always just enjoyed working here. I like being in a small town. I never want to move to a city, a big city. The people here, this place, it's like a family and we all care about each other.
We've always had a staff of 13 - 17 or whatever. We celebrate birthdays. We celebrate the holidays. We've watched each other's kids grow up. Having lived here all my life, I want to give back to the place that reared me. So I've tried to help this community as much as I can, in every way I can.
What kind of education or work background do you have that helps you do your job?
I got a bachelor's degree in journalism. Actually a double major in journalism and history from Washington and Lee, which has a very good journalism school. I started actually working here when I was in high school, as a photographer. I worked here off and on during college. When a reporting position came open in '83, I took that.
What are three things you love about working at The News-Gazette?
Again, working with the staff, the people here. I've always liked talking with people and meeting new people. I tell the school kids this: one of the reasons I've liked this job all along is that I got to meet people I never would have met otherwise. I've met some dignitaries, not very many. I met Willie Nielsen one time, briefly. I got to know veterans and have talks with them. I've talked to city managers, mayors, council members, supervisors, legislators. But I wouldn't trade any of that for the type of experiences that I've had with just regular, normal people. I really have been enjoying this job. I'm getting to know people that I wouldn't have otherwise.
I guess learning maybe another thing. I've learned a large variety of things. I've learned so much from the people here. When you work in the newspaper world, you have to know at least a little bit about a lot of things. I've loved doing that. I love politics, I love history, I love the pieces that we do about education.
The newspaper world is very exciting. You're never bored and I have never been bored since I've been here. Usually it's a matter of not having enough time to do things, rather than being bored. That's what makes the job fun. I deal with so many great people all the time. There are so many people wanting to do great things here and I'm trying to help them achieve their goals. A lot of our stories are about causes, like the Chessie Trail group trying to raise money, or hospice, or whatever. We do try to make a real positive difference in the lives of everybody here.
Do you have a favorite funny story from working here?
My memory is not a steel trap, but back when I was reporter - in the days when people didn't cuss - I quoted a supervisor. I don't remember whether it was 'hell' or 'damn' but it was one of those words. The quote was from the wrong supervisor. He called me and he was very upset. His fellow supervisor said he didn't say it. This is days before we used tape recording. It was one of those things when you're taking notes: the supervisors spoke one right after the other and I wrote the wrong name by the quote. So he wanted me to call up his pastor and tell him he did not say that. Now, it's one thing to, you know, say we'll correct any mistakes - we'll write corrections the next week. But I actually had to call that pastor and boy, did I feel bad about this this is, like, 24 years ago.
I've made some headline boo-boos that rank right up there. Most of these we would catch [before it goes to print] and it's just funny between us, but there was one of the funniest typos recently: it was public dorks! In a story about Public Works. What I did was I tried to lowercase the 'w' but instead of that, I lowercased a 'd.' So that happens. Most of the time I catch them but that was the funniest one I've had lately.
How do you feel about newspapers and journalism?
I feel that newspapers and objective journalism is very important. I think that newspapers have always given people a chance to delve more into a story than what they get with TV. Journalism is vastly important. Trying to sort through the mess we have on the internet these days, when people get most of their news through Facebook. Everybody's scrolling. But a lot is just not true whatsoever and we're trying to give people the facts. We just came across a piece being shared about one piece of legislation as part of the general assembly. I don't know whether it was AI generated or what, but what's being circulated is flat out wrong. They're quoting things in the original legislation that's just not there. You know, we try to give people the most accurate and balanced news that we can. That's our job as newspapers. That's our job in journalism.
