Your editorial this week was truly a “great editorial” itself. Your summary of what an editorial should be and contain was excellent, and should be read by every student of journalism. It is especially appropriate at a time when many of our major publications – like the Wall Street Journal, have abandoned all pretext of objectivity.
I come from a long line of journalists. One branch of the family published a newspaper in Baltimore that was shut down by the military government in Baltimore during the Civil War for publishing an article that was supportive of the Confederacy. The publisher and his two sons were sent to federal prison, and then exiled to Charleston, South Carolina, where they started another newspaper, which at one point was printed on the backside of flowered wallpaper ( due to a shortage of newsprint). The arrest of the Richardsons created quite a political stir in Baltimore – so much for first amendment rights. My grandfather Hobbs was a war correspondent in the Spanish-American and Russo-Japanese wars, and became the editor of the Philadelphia Public Ledger, and then joined his brother-in-law, Frank R. Kent at the Baltimore Sun. Frank Kent was the Washington reporter for the Baltimore Sun during the WWI era, and then editor of the Sun. My grandfather Hobbs was the editor of the Sunday edition of the Baltimore Sun. My brother worked as a newspaper reporter for about ten years.
Thank you for publishing the Sentinel.
Skip Hobbs
