Jared Funk Profile

A profile of wheelchair rugby athlete Jared Funk

Reporter: Sean Angus
Shooter/Editor: Kevin Hirschfield

Hiroshima

The August 31, 1946 issue of the New Yorker magazine featured just one article.

It had never happened before in the magazine’s history and it has never happened since. A 31,000 word article written by American writer John Hersey that chronicled the day an atomic bomb was dropped on the Japanese city, Hiroshima, as well as a detailed look at the aftermath. The article follows six citizens of the city and takes us through their daily lives, including what they were doing the exact moment the bomb hit, and how all six of them dealt with the after-effects of the bomb. And Hersey’s article made an immediate impact. The issue of the magazine was sold out around newsstands within hours and there were many requests for reprints. Even radio jumped on board, and the ABC radio network pre-empted regular programming to broadcast the text in four 30-minute programs. Other radio stations around the United States soon did the same thing.

A big reason why I think this article was so successful was the way that Hersey relayed the information to the readers. In an objective and non-judgmental way, he just reported the facts. And, frankly, the facts were good enough to make this story jarring and unforgettable. Another effective way that Hersey made this story successful was that he portrayed the Japanese people as just straight up human-beings. You have to remember, in the mid to late ‘40s, the Americans just thought of the Japanese as the enemy. They didn’t care that the Japanese people had families, ran businesses, lived an everyday life. They were an enemy of war, let’s go after them. So imagine an American reader in the 1940’s picking this up and realizing “Wow, they’re actually just like us.”

For once, the American perspective had been missing from a World War II piece of work. And for myself, this wasn’t a bad thing at all. Like many of those American citizens in the 1940s, all I have heard is the American side of things. Watching the documentaries on the American stations like I have, and reading the books published in America like I have, I’ve always heard one side of the story. Reading Hiroshima, I obviously gained another perspective. So to say this book had an effect on me is an understatement. It shocked me. Hearing these frightening stories of the Japanese trying to survive after the devastation of this atomic bomb is pretty eye-opening. And this had to have been Hersey’s goal when writing this article and judging from the popularity of the article, it seemed to have worked.

The obvious thing that journalists can learn from this book is that the more research done, the more effective the piece of work will be. We don’t know the exact amount of time put into this article by Hersey, but no doubt it took him months and months to get all this information. It also points to the fact that journalists must have a strong stomach to do their job. Hersey did countless interviews in Hiroshima and probably had to hear the gory details over and over again. Situations like this pop up in journalism all the time. Not events of the Hiroshima calibre, but events like murders, stabbings, and other tragic stories that sometimes feature detail that can be too much for someone to handle. Journalists have to throw their emotions out the window when it comes to this stuff. You’re there to report what is happening. It may not be easy, but it’s what you’re paid to do. Give a huge amount of credit to Hersey for doing this.

I guess I could compare Hiroshima to many of the 9/11 survivor stories that I’ve read and documentaries that I’ve watched. Just like the Hiroshima survivors, the 9/11 survivors at the World Trade Center went above and beyond to help those in need. It’s basically the many little stories behind the big stories, in this case, the big story of 9/11 and the little stories of all the survivors. A specific example of a documentary I can think of is one about Brian Clark, a survivor from the South Tower, who tells the entire story of his journey from the time the plane hit, to the time the tower collapsed. This documentary is told by Clark in his own words, unlike Hiroshima, but it’s still a “behind the scenes” look at a disaster.

John Hersey set out to create an article that informed the people of the United States, and the Western Hemsiphere, of what actually was going on in Japan. And as a result of great journalistic technique, and other great writing characteristics, Hersey created a masterpiece.

The Heidi Game

On November 17, 1968, one of the most famous professional football games was played in Oakland, California.

The reason it was so famous? Not because of an amazing play or an individual performance.

But because of a memorable decision made by the television station it was on. NBC decided to edit out the ending of the football game so that they could show the movie "Heidi."

Here's the story.

The game between the Oakland Raiders and New York Jets was a pretty big one with both teams battling for playoff position. The game started at 4:00 eastern time, and footbal games usually finish in about 3 hours or so. And here's where it got interesting. NBC had signed a contract with the movie's sponsor, Timex, to start the movie Heidi at 7:00 sharp, whether the game was still going or not.

Sure enough, the clock read 6:59 pm and the score read New York 32, Oakland 29 with 1:05 left in the 4th quarter.

And at 7:00 pm, the game, which was exciting and going down to the wire, had been cut off for Heidi.

People freaked and phoned NBC to complain. And guess what happened? The Raiders scored 2 touchdowns in 1:05 and won the game 43-32. And nobody in America saw it.

Since that day, a close football game has never been cut off before the end.

When the News Went Live

On this day 47 years ago, one of the defining moments in American history took place. The assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas. Not only did it change history forever, but it brought changes to the world of journalism as well.

Credit to PBS.org for this look into how November 22, 1963 brought television journalism into the picture.


http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/oswald/press/

How did Americans learn of the assassination on November 22, 1963?

You have to remember that there were very few TV stations, and people had not yet had the kind of event that would cause them to corral around the TV. This was the very first time that TV brought the public together. The first relays of what had happened went out on radio, by the way.

Television did what was unthinkable back then -- it stopped all broadcasting and all commercials. It stayed with the story for four days. It did everything it could to provide people with ongoing information. From Friday to Monday it provided the American public with an ongoing visual screen of what was going on in the assassination story.

I think that today when crises happen we go immediately to the TV. People don't even think twice. When 9/11 happened people turned on the TV set, even in schools.

In the Sixties that was not the case. TV news was hardly coming of age at that time. We only had 15-minute newscasts. It was very elementary. This was a really new experience.

How did the media cover the assassination?

This was really the event that TV news journalists like to claim brought them to age. In 1963 TV journalists were seen as the fluff journalists. Print journalists were the serious journalists. When the Kennedy assassination occurred, of course, TV cameras were able to roll 24/7, and so what you got was an ongoing attentiveness to the event that print could not provide. We got ongoing continuous coverage of the story.






In a day of journalism firsts, another first took place just two days later. Lee Harvey Oswald, JFK's apparent assassin, was himself shot to death two days later in the first live murder ever witnessed on television.

What's in your bowl?

A few weeks ago in editing class, we touched on how many names of stadiums, roads, buildings are named after prominent figures or sponsors.

An example we mentioned is how many stadiums around North America and the world are named after a company.

Bank of America Stadium in Carolina
Minute Maid Field in Houston
Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia

These are just some of MANY examples of company-named stadiums. In fact, we are probably a few years away from major sporting trophies being named after companies.

The Pepsi Super Bowl
The Tim Hortons Stanley Cup

Can you imagine?

American College Football has already done this in a pretty big way. At the end of each season, there are about 30 games called "bowl games" that teams play in. There's a national championship game and then there are these 30 other bowl games, which, frankly, mean nothing.

But don't tell that to the big companies. They have no problem associating their names with the bowls.

A long time ago, there used to be a few bowl games every year. The Rose, The Cotton, The Sugar, The Orange. That's it.

Now there's the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl

Advocare V100 Independence Bowl

PapaJohns.com Bowl.

Roady's Humanitarian Bowl.

The St.Petersburg Bowl presented by Beef O'Brady's.

Heck, even the classic bowls have been given brand names. The FedEx Orange Bowl. The Allstate Sugar Bowl.

Why the Roto Rooter Toilet Bowl hasn't been thought of yet is beyond me.

The greatest fictional journalist of all-time is.......

In previous posts on this blog, I've mentioned some of my favourite journalists from the past and the present. But now I think it's time to reveal my favourite "fictional" journalist.

I'm talking about any sort of journalist character in a movie/cartoon/fictional piece of work.

Who's the first name you think of? Well, there are so many noteworthy ones, let's list off a few before I reveal my selection.

Ron Burgundy (Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy)

The anchor of the KVWN Channel 4 News Team in San Diego has won 5 fictional Emmy Awards.

Lois Lane and Clark Kent (Superman)

The two backbones of the fictional "Daily Planet" newspaper.

Carrie Bradshaw (Sex and the City)

The star of "Sex and the City" has positions as a New York newspaper columnist and a Freelance writer at Vogue Magazine.

(Wait a minute, did I just mention "Sex and the City" in my blog??)

Other notable names:

Les Nessman (WKRP in Cincinnati)

April O'Neil (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles)

Tricia Takanawa (Family Guy)

But my all-time favourite fictional journalist has to be the Channel 6 Emmy Award-winning anchor in Springfield. He's the host of "Smartline" and "Eye on Springfield" and has a "My Two Cents" segment at the end of every newscast.

Ladies and gentlemen, the greatest fictional journalist of all-time, from "The Simpsons"........

Kent Brockman!

Why do I say this? Well, here are a few examples.

He works hard on getting his pronunciations right.

He asks the tough questions.

He is passionate about the big issues.

And finally, he's hungry for news and he's hungry for the truth.

The King of Defamation

I know I blogged about Don Cherry once before, but considering our editing class is talking about libel and defamation, why not hear from the king of defamation himself?

In fact, if they had a defamation hall of fame, they might have to name it after the hockey analyst.

The CBC television star basically goes on air and says whatever he feels like.

This is a great example of Cherry ripping on a player saying he "blackmailed" the team. But then the coach of the team comes on and accuses Cherry of slander.