A note to a friend in the newspaper business who had had a particularly tough week made me think about everything we do.
Her response to me ended, “We’ve all done it ... and I wonder how we do it. But at the time it’s all happening, there’s never any question that it must be done.”
The tragedy started with a simple horseback ride – by a young woman who was taking her niece out for a jaunt after a rainstorm.
Neither returned. The body of the six-year-old was found fairly quickly. The body of the older woman, in her mid-20s, took days.
It took five days with the sheriff’s department officers, volunteers, firefighters, all searching through the river, trying to find the body. Finally, as water receded, her body was found in the mud trapped beneath a tree branch.
How did the townspeople get a hint that something was wrong? When the two didn’t return on time, the horse was found, still saddled, standing by the spot where the youngster drowned.
It was tragic for the families of both victims.
But it was also difficult for the newspaper to cover. The publisher of this newspaper, because she covers a small town, knew everyone involved.
She said her camera was sitting on the seat of her car, but she couldn’t even touch it when the family of the young rider was told. She was at the river the morning searchers found the little girl’s aunt.
No photos – just a hug to the sheriff, “who had tears streaming down his face,” she said.
She wrote the story after waiting at the office while the sheriff contacted the family.
This publisher stayed up nights blocking and deleting posts on the Facebook page announcing news of the deaths. Why? Because the families hadn’t been notificed and rumors abounded about “whodunit.”
Thankfully, it is rare that we have to cover such events.
But, when it does happen, it makes us wonder “why do we do what we do?”
Because tragedy happens, and maybe there is a lesson to be learned. Because the truth can stop the rumors that inevitably fly after a tragic happening.
When someone calls our office locally, complaining that they don’t like the political cartoon, or that our editorial page leans too far left or too far right, we have to think that there is good in what we do.
We shed light on what is happening in city hall; we give advertisers a way to get their names out to the public; we let people know which school team is winning or losing; we print pictures of people doing something good or helping out a neighbor.
And, sometimes, we have to cover sad news and tragedy.
It’s what we do, because there’s never any question that it must be done.
