Bill would do what?

Posted on by

Clips I saved in a scrapbook from my journalism internship as a student at the University of Washington in Seattle.

Thanks to fellow blogger from Writing from the Heart with Brian for his post about “The Elements of Style” by Strunk and White. It brought back memories of my first encounter with the powerful little book that has been by my side since my internship as a “stringer” for a Washington state newspaper.

The Elements of Style was listed as one of the 100 best and most influential books written in English since 1923 by Time in its 2011 list.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elements_of_Style

I haven’t thought about those days “like forever.”

Our professor, who was an intimidating former editor/publisher of a Northwest paper before he retired to “professoring,” selected 12 students to move to Olympia, Wash., our state Capitol. He assigned each student a newspaper where he believed they’d fit.

For example, a single mom who was older than the rest of us, got the Seattle Times, the biggest newspaper in the state. I was assigned to The Daily Chronicle and covered news for Centralia and Chehalis — the midpoint between Seattle and Portland, Ore.

I was surprised to be one of the chosen. In fact, I was scared to death having no interest or knowledge about government and politics. How was I going to write about it?

I looked up to — or rather worshipped my older brother at the time. He was the golden boy who was smart, good looking and could do no wrong in my eyes as well as my parents.

We got together so he could go over the basics of government with me. I was going to get a crash course in politics.

“What’s a Gop?” I asked pronouncing the word so it rhymed with cop. I was referring to the GOP or Grand Old Party.

“Is it too late to get out of this?” my brother asked. “Please, do not go!”

I was so afraid to go, that I procrastinated and showed up to the state Capitol several days late. My excuse was my part-time job at a restaurant. I was comfortable in my apartment with my roomie, watching General Hosptial and eating Kraft Mac-n-Cheese. I liked working with career waiters and waitresses. It was so less threatening than the unknown I faced.

I missed orientation, meeting the other students, but finally mustered up courage and made my appearance. My professor gave me a one-on-one tour. My best friend’s dad was a lobbyist for Weyerhauser and invited me to his office for my second crash course — this one about the timber industry. His wife was a big wig in the department of Natural Resources and they took an interest in me.

They helped me get off my feet and I busied myself with my first article, writing it longhand on a legal pad.

“I never would have selected you if I knew you wrote longhand,” the professor said stopping at my desk. “I can usually tell. Put down the pen and use the typewriter from now on.”

The 12 students, including me, shared one big room with our desks in two rows. The professor had a private office and critiqued our stories. He made us rewrite them before sending them via wire or snail mail to our newspapers. If there was a tight deadline, I’d call my editor at the paper and read the story to him as he transcribed it.

One of the students put up a picture of a cowboy and named him Bill. Then he posted all our headlines that included the word “bill.” Bill would to this. Bill would do that. Bill would do all sorts of things.

I turned in my first article to my professor. He called me into his office. It was marked with lots of red ink. He told me it was a great puff piece for Weyerhaeuser, but instructed me to get both sides of the story. He gave me names of several people to call who were in government or lobbied against the timber giant. He also showed me how to cut and paste my article so the most important facts were up on top.

Yes, back then we cut and paste with scissors and glue!

The article above about RIF by lottery above was from a bill that a Senator in my newspaper’s district proposed. My editor asked me to write about it. The bill and the article was supposed to be tongue-in-cheek. I got a call from a congressman reading me the riot act over it.

“You must feel so powerful!” he yelled at me.

I guess he missed the joke — even though I have the word “joked” in the article. Sheesh!

What memories do you have of an internship or first job? What did you learn?

43 thoughts on “Bill would do what?”

  2. What a fun glimpse into your past, E.A.! I don’t have many great stories, but I took a temp-to-perm job after graduating college during the recession. My first task about three hours. My boss marveled that it had taken all their previous temps two weeks to complete the same task. I don’t think I realized how dumb and lazy people could be until then. 😅

    Reply ↓

  4. Oh…such fun to read and reminisce about the original “cut and paste” techniques! I remember. I worked for a local paper interning to help with their advertisements and graphics and I was horrible at it…and so intimidated by the gruff and pompous writers. Cheers to you for your accomplishments! 🥰

    Reply ↓

  5. My first job out of college was as a paralegal. I learned there’s nothing quite as boring as industrial development revenue bonds. Nothing. They make watching paint dry a frolicking good time.

    Reply ↓

  8. Thanks for the shout out Elizabeth. And thank you so much for the walk down memory lane. You hit on so many things: hating typewriters, the inverted pyramid, trying to learn Civics on the fly, and getting edited for the first time. This sounds crazy now, but I hated typewriters with a passion. I was such a slow typist and it was so hard to write on them. I was lucky. For the most part, we had old word processors (which had green/black screens and always crashed, losing your content). And yes, I remember getting yelled at by others too. “You must feel so powerful” Um, no, not really, I’m just trying not to mess up! Ha, ha.

    Reply ↓

  9. I was never a journalist, but I was a graphic designer at a textbook publishing company way back when, so I know all about cutting and pasting copy. The job would be so different today (including, of course, using graphic programs for designing and illustrating).

    Reply ↓

    • I’m sure graphic designers jobs have changed a ton through the years, too. I remember in my PR and marketing jobs, driving copy to the graphic designer’s firm for typesetting.

      Reply ↓

  10. What fabulous stories, Elizabeth! No wonder all those Bob Hope classic celebrities didn’t faze you – you’d already been put to the test. Fantastic post about the illustrious start to your career!

    Reply ↓

  12. My first official job after college was at the Times Building in NYC. Upon recommendation of a friend, I was hired to file news articles at the library onsite. Entry level job with a very detail oriented librarian supervisor and the ability to garner tickets to author presentations. Interesting opportunity.

    Reply ↓

Leave a Reply