I ALWAYS believed there were a few things in life that were recession proof. Good weekly newspapers and barber shops.
As we stumble through this pandemic you realise there is probably no such thing as recession proof anymore. The steel shutters of Paddy the Barber’s shop remain rooted to the pavement while local newspapers across the north are dropping like flies.
Perhaps I’m slightly naïve to think these important resources are merely hibernating through this dastardly period in our history and that one day their steel shutters will ripple upwards and their offices will be a hive of activity again.
I liken newspapers to vinyl. Through the blurring speed of modern technology, the newspaper is a calm, generally thoughtful oasis away from the scrolling, the 'likes' and the 'retweets' of inane videos on our cursed mobile phones.
With the touch of a button we can access all types of information – and yet we become less informed as time passes and Donald Trump and Boris Johnson end up leading the ‘free world’.
I started off in a weekly newspaper in 1998. It was a tough baptism. A thousand reports to collate and not enough time in the day.
You simply didn’t have time to think.
And don’t forget the bowls results.
In a revealing interview with Eamon Dunphy last year, Paul Kimmage asked the veteran journalist about returning to writing again.
Dunphy replied: “It's not going to happen. I think I'd drive myself mad... I couldn't go back to that. The podcast requires research and concentration but it's nothing like as severe as the writing is.”
Severe is the word. You’ll not get a better apprenticeship than working at the coalface of a weekly.
If you can succeed at that and enjoy it at the same time, you can succeed at almost anything.
Before the pandemic ruined our utopian existence, I’d be in different press boxes from week to week, picking the brains of the weekly ‘hack’. These are the men and women who provide you with golden nuggets of information and give you the inside track.
Pandemic aside, a good weekly newspaper should always flourish. If you have a tight, committed, passionate team and sound managerial structures, you should never fade away. A good weekly newspaper is sown into the fabric of the community.
Because I’ve experienced the severity of the weekly beat I’ve the utmost respect for those who perform in these roles.
David Mohan, Paddy Tierney, Mal McMullan, Steve Malone, Gareth McCullough, Elaine Ingram, Kevin McLaughlin, Frank Craig, Chris McNulty, Alan Rodgers, Kevin Kelly, the Gaelic Life guys.
I could fill an entire Boot Room of names, all of them criminally under-rated.
A few weeks ago, the Newry Reporter became a casualty of the Covid19 pandemic. In a heartfelt statement to its readers, advertisers and employees, the newspaper hoped to return when some sense of normality returns.
There are dozens of other newspapers that have either closed their doors or availed of the furlough scheme.
I’m biased but when a weekly paper disappears from view the pulse of that community fades a little too.
Here’s a case-study: Gareth McCullough is a sports journalist of the highest calibre whom I’ve got to know over the last 10 years or more.
They say some football teams are too good to go down. Well, Gareth and his colleagues are too good to lose to this profession.
He’s worked for the ‘Reporter’ since July 2007.
“I love my career,” he says. “I love the job I do. We are very loyal to the paper and the staff are very loyal to each other.”
To the casual eye, Gareth McCullough’s job is a glamorous gig - until he explains the harsh realities of it and the amount of words he actually writes in any given week.
A local paper has to reflect its community and must understand that a local bowls report is as important as coverage on a big cup final.
“Whether it’s the Carnbane League or the All-Ireland Championship, you’re covering one end to the other. I might be typing out bowls results and I’m thinking: ‘I have no interest in this whatsoever’, but then it’s always in the back of my mind that it mightn’t be the most important sport in the world to me but that one bowls game, to see their name in the paper, in the headline or even a photograph is the most important thing to them.”
The 2010 All-Ireland final was such a big deal for the local papers in Co Down.
“It was the biggest game I ever reported on,” he explains.
“You were at the biggest event there is, 82,000 people, watched by millions on TV, proper stadium. That was why I got into journalism. The only thing that would top that if Newry City won the Premiership.”
Down, of course, lost to Cork by a point on a rainy day in Dublin.
“I remember going down to do interviews afterwards and Danny Hughes and Damien Rafferty were there, two local lads who I got to know reasonably well over the course of that year.
“I knew it was a bad time for them, they'd just lost an All-Ireland final, and I was asking them to give me a few words and the two of them were crying their eyes out. I remember giving both of them a hug, you felt the emotion. Here was just a couple of local lads who happened to be good at their sport and I just happened to be a local journalist covering the team.
“If I’d been doing any other job I wouldn’t have got to meet the people I’ve met.”
Every weekly newspaper has its own cherished history. It would be a crying shame if some of the weekly newspapers doesn’t make a comeback.
“Gareth is a die-hard Newry City supporter and at times he would struggle to hide that in his journalism,” jokes Newry City manager Darren Mullen.
“Anything we’ve ever asked him to do for the club, he’s always done it. The Newry Reporter has been a local institution from when I can remember. You always waited on the paper coming out on a Tuesday night. You wouldn’t have waited to get it on Wednesday morning. I’d read the reports and look at the photographs of the functions people were at. It was a big shock when it went.
“When it does come back it will certainly be welcomed because it’s a great forum for local people.”
When the weekly papers do return to the shop shelves it will be a sure sign that we’re all in recovery.
