Sara Chappel was the Online Editor for the Spring 2008 issue of the Ryerson Review of Journalism. Going Long (and We Mean Really, Really, Really Long)
The Hamilton Spectator's Jon Wells has but one job—to write extended serial narratives. Mostly they're about crime in his city, but there was one about the nasty industrial inferno that claimed the life of a steeltown firefighter. In conversation, Wells explains how he keeps it all together without losing the plot
The newspaper medium is an easy mark for ridicule. Itscaricature consists of the inverted pyramid, the 5 o’clock deadline and a strict adherence to “just the facts, ma’am.” Yet for a half-decade Jon Wells has worked within the supposedly rigid confines of his daily newspaper, The Hamilton Spectator, and repeatedly tested the limits of long-form […]
Holy Mackinaw!
Industry accolades came fast and furious for the "revolutionary" plays of former Hamilton Spectator editor Dana Robbins. The locals were not as impressed. Now east-end boy David Estok has the ball. But is he taking his team in the right direction?
For some people, home smells like baking bread, apples and cinnamon, maybe even hay and manure. For David Estok, it smells like ink. When he arrived for his first day as editor-in-chief of The Hamilton Spectatorand climbed up the back stairs, boxes in hand, the smell of the ink from the presses down the hall hit […]
And They Throw Erasers Too, Just Like in Public Schools…
In the second of a two-part investigation into the coverage of religion during Ontario's recent election campaign, the Review examines how reporters dealt with a suddenly hot topic, the funding of faith-based schools. Turns out they learned a lot by just hanging out and observing the action at Christian, Jewish and Muslim schools
When Daniel Girard stepped into the Leo Baeck Day School at Bathurst and Eglinton in Toronto, he wasn’t sure what to expect. Uniforms, probably. Reverence, maybe. He did notice yarmulkes adorned with the Maple Leafs logo andSimpsons characters, and shorts and T-shirts worn to Friday afternoon services in the Holy Blossom Temple next to the […]
