Woman’s Editor Number One
In a different field. Anne White early set
the pare, and turned a step-child depart¬
ment into the envy of all North Carolina
newspapers.
It «as inevitable that recognition
should conic to Anne Cantrell White,
woman's editor of the Greensboro
Daily News and the Greensboro Rec¬
ord. who long since passed the level
of the linished craftsman to become
one of the state's leading newspaper
personalities.
For 25 years she has publicized the
accomplishments of others, all the
while running away from credit for
herself. Thus she so outdistanced
fame that, the world being small and
round, she has finally come upon it
from behind.
All the Way Around
"And. darn it." she complained to
her interviewer, "it now looks as if I'm
chasing it."
That, of course, is a reverse Eng¬
lish approach; but it puts the career,
if not the subject, in proper perspec¬
tive. It’s a sort of mid-way entry, from
which it is easy to turn back to her
birth in Mississippi half a century ago
or look forward to speculate about
what the Greensboro News Company
will do a few years hence when she re¬
tires.
Her contribution amounts to more
than elevating the woman's de¬
partment of the Greensboro News from
step-child status to one of the paper's
best business assets (ask the advertis¬
ing department which pages arc the
easiest to sell); but the caliber of her
reporting, the scope of the coverage
and the quality of the editing have be¬
come the envy of publishers through¬
out North Carolina. In addition, she
has trained and sent on to better jobs
enough young women to qualify her as
a sort of on-the-job journalism school.
Taskmaster
In her work, she is a perfectionist
and. like all perfectionists, a hard task¬
master. She had been back on the job
at the Daily News just long enough to
give her a vestige of job security when
the storm of the 30’s came on to blow.
THE STATE. M*v 24. 1952
«i
/
J AY 111 SK1.YS
Note: Jay lluskins. veteran Greens¬
boro newspaperman, is now editor
and publisher of “The Statesville
Record."
Others with less seniority were swept
away. Everybody worked 60 hours a
week for less pay than a printer's devil
gets today — and felt pretty fortunate.
A. L. Stockton, managing editor and
part owner of the two papers, was
doubling as reporter and desk man.
Jim Reynolds was serving as news edi¬
tor and covering a beat. So was Eric
Rodgers, city editor, who is now pub¬
lisher of the Scotland Neck Common¬
wealth.
It was not unusual, therefore, that
the society editor was doubling in har¬
ness. Besides weddings, parties, per¬
sonals and other bona fide social
events. Anne’s “beat” covered every¬
thing that came out of the city schools,
two local women’s colleges, the par¬
ent-teacher associations, garden clubs,
literary groups and auxiliaries to
everything.
Quality In Quantity
All of which means that Anne, dur¬
ing those days, turned out more copy,
and better, than any man on the staff.
The average worker who produces in
volume is not required to pay too much
attention to quality; nor is the quality
writer expected to deliver in volume.
But Anne produced quality in volume.
"In my book," said John Harden,
former news editor of the Daily News,
now a Burlington Mills vice-president.