My First Job ...

George Benge,
news executive, Gannett Co., Inc.

George Benge

The memory of my very first reporting assignment on my very first job remains with me, vividly, to this day. The assignment was to go to the Farmers Market and report on the prices and quality of locally produced farm products.

Still a college student and not owning a car, I rode my 10-speed bike to the market. Pedaling through the quiet, pre-dawn streets and dewy countryside of Grand Rapids, Mich., I felt uniquely alive and attuned to the smells and sounds of early-morning life all around me.

Because I was now a reporter, the colors and conditions of the tomatoes, corn, lettuce, apples and eggs seemed brighter and more vibrant than ever. My eyes took notice of details that I had not been aware of before. Because I was now a reporter, the farmers' comments about their beans and eggs seemed charged with special significance and import.

Without realizing it, the enhanced sensitivity to details and words that I experienced at the Farmers Market was the professional awakening of what would be a life-long passion for telling good stories and using words well.

I felt the same acute sensitivity to detail almost 40 years later -- as I took notes and asked questions at the Pentagon on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. Flames and smoke shot upward toward a flawless blue sky as medics set up triage units on the Pentagon's once immaculate lawns.

Looking back now, it is clear that the sublime sensitivity to detail and words that I experienced as a cub reporter at the Farmers Market was the same -- exactly the same -- as I felt standing in front of the Pentagon inferno. Those experiences -- 39 years apart -- demonstrated for both the young cub and the seasoned veteran the enduring, unquenchable values of good story telling and great journalism.

My First Job archive

Ronnie Agnew, executive editor, The Clarion-Ledger, Jackson, Miss.

Caesar Andrews, editor, Gannett News Service, Washington, D.C.

George Benge, news executive, Gannett Co., Inc.

Peter Bhatia, executive editor, The Oregonian, Portland

Michael Chihak, publisher and editor, Tucson (Ariz.) Citizen

Bill Church, executive editor, Star-Gazette, Elmira, N.Y.

Don Flores, executive vice president and editor, El Paso (Texas) Times

Karla Garrett Harshaw, editor, Springfield (Ohio) News-Sun, and senior editor, Cox Community Newspapers

Bennie Ivory, executive editor, The Courier-Journal, Louisville, Ky.

Sherrie Marshall, executive editor, The Macon (Ga.) Telegraph

E.J. Mitchell, managing editor, The Detroit News

Ricardo Pimentel, columnist, The Arizona Republic, Phoenix

Africa Price, managing editor, The Jackson (Tenn.) Sun

John Quinn, senior advisory trustee, Freedom Forum

Mark Russell, assistant managing editor, The Plain Dealer, Cleveland