It was 40 years ago this week that I wrote my first column for North Carolina newspapers. Still in journalism school at UNC-Chapel Hill, I was interning that summer at two outlets based in Nash County: the Spring Hope Enterprise, which covered the southern part of the county, and a startup called the Rocky Mount Record.
Although I enjoyed covering municipal affairs, county government, school systems, and local businesses, I’d long been enamored by the opinion pages of my hometown paper. Having penned columns in my school paper, I asked the Enterprise editor Ken Ripley for the chance to try my hand at it. He said yes, although he knew my views were very different from his.
Check that — he said yes because he knew my views were very different from his. Ken believed local newspapers ought to offer a spectrum of opinions, not only to reflect the breadth of their communities but also to inform, challenge, and deepen the understanding of their readers.