Las Vegas Business Press : Today's newspapers are as plain as white bread

Today's newspapers are as plain as white bread

BY MICHAEL GREEN

Recently, The New York Times announced it's reducing the size of its pages, The Wall Street Journal reported ads will appear on its front page and the R-J- published Colin McKinlay's obituary. These stories were not mutually exclusive.

Both papers are responding to an evolving business. Newspaper readers are getting older and fewer, depending on the market. More information seekers turn to the Internet, whether for blogs, news services or Web sites where newspapers post tomorrow's news now, as well as material that doesn't wind up in print.

Experts on news and marketing can and do cite countless reasons for these developments, but McKinlay's death brings to mind another clue or two for solving this mystery of what's wrong with the daily press.

Michael Green

McKinlay died July 11 in Utah at age 79. He came to Las Vegas in the early 1950s as a Sun reporter. He rose to city editor, then moved to the R-J as a reporter and editor. He left the R-J to become a spokesman for the Culinary Union and do PR work, then returned to journalism as managing editor of the Business Press in the 1980s before retiring to homes in Utah and Mexico.

In helping to establish this publication as an important source for the Las Vegas business community, McKinlay was part of a change in local journalism. Readers may not suffer from information overload, but they certainly have more outlets. When he came to Las Vegas, the R-J and Sun were the daily newspapers, with weeklies in North Las Vegas, Henderson and Boulder City. Channel 8 had just come on the air, with Channels 2 (now 3) and 13 not far behind. A few radio stations dotted the AM dial. Entertainment magazines came and went.

Today, the Sun appears as a section in the R-J. Four of the eight English-language television stations offer several daily local newscasts and Channel 10, as a PBS affiliate, is full of news and analysis. Dozens of AM and FM radio stations are available, including all-news-and-talk public radio and AM news stations. Cable includes a 24-hour local news station.

In the print media, the R-J and Sun publish alternative and business weeklies and magazines. Such publications have a long history. But the Business Press was the first here to survive, and McKinlay deserves some of the credit. Its presence helps explain why the R-J, like many other dailies -- including The Times -- has changed its business coverage: Fewer stock listings, more news stories and items. You don't rely on one source because you don't have to.

McKinlay's death is a reminder of that and of another problem with newspapers: They often look and read alike. Newspapers increasingly are losing their character -- and their characters.

Here, the R-J was the Cahlans' paper, especially managing director Al Cahlan, a Democratic power and Pat McCarran ally. The Sun was Hank Greenspun's, and he was no shrinking violet. McKinlay worked for them and the two editors who ran The Valley Times in North Las Vegas: Adam Yacenda, who had been the Sun's editor and managing editor in the 1950s, and Bob Brown, who edited the R-J in the early 1960s. To call them political operators understates the case.

INSTITUTIONAL SIMILARITIES

Although they might have denied it, or wished otherwise, their publications reflected their interests and personalities. Today, more newspapers are part of chains that demand institutional similarities. Even when they don't, publishers' whims have far less to do with what winds up on the front page.

The change in Las Vegas has other roots. When McKinlay arrived in Las Vegas, its population hovered around 40,000, nearly quintuple the 8,400 it had been just before World War II. In many ways, Las Vegas remains a small town in outlook and operation. Back then it fit the definition physically. These editors and publishers could run, but they couldn't hide. Today, if they aren't at one end of town or another, they're probably stuck in traffic.

McKinlay fit in with this group because he was bright, as they were, and because he was a character himself. I had the privilege -- and that's what it was -- of being a Valley Times reporter and editor for Brown. When he died, we prepared a tribute issue. McKinlay contributed an article that included an anecdote that told a lot about Brown and himself.

At the R-J, advertising salesmen had the right to the best parking spaces. If a reporter parked near the door at 113 South First, where the R-J offices were until it moved to West Bonanza, he had to move his car if a salesman wanted his spot. One day, as McKinlay pounded out a news story, that's what a salesman wanted.

McKinlay walked past Brown's office, dangling participles and splitting infinitives. Brown asked what was wrong. McKinlay told him. They conferred.

McKinlay went outside and climbed into his new sports car. He moved it all right. Brown held open the front doors and McKinlay drove it into the lobby, parked it and returned to the newsroom to finish his story. And the next day, he explained with considerable relish, Brown lobbied hard to keep them both from being fired.

So, toast the memory of Colin McKinlay. He understood journalism -- and that journalism is more interesting when journalists are more interesting.

Michael Green is a history professor at the Community College of Southern Nevada and has written extensively about Southern Nevada. He is co-author of "Las Vegas: A Centennial History."

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