You decide: what was the most memorable moment during the recent Friends of The Daily Texan annual dinner? Consider these words from the 2019 Hall of Fame inductees: New York Times climate change and science reporter John Schwartz telling the crowd how he coveted and treasured the label he hears often: “nerd”. When Leon McNealy, one of the first African Americans to work at The Texan, described what it was like to be at the forefront of the civil rights movement in Austin and beyond, and the message he delivered – in song – abut the continuing struggle for equality. […]
Read more →Daily Texan alumna Laura Beil, who created the popular Dr. Death podcast and the upcoming podcast “Bad Batch,” will be on the UT campus at Moody College of Communication on Oct. 24 for “A Conversation With Laura Beil.” She joins Haley Butler, also a Daily Texan alum and now senior producer for The Drag, a Moody College audio production house, for the discussion to be held in BMC 2.106. Dr. Death is a 2018 podcast produced by Wondery that tells the story of Christopher Duntsch, a Texas surgeon who was convicted of gross malpractice after thirty-one of his patients were left seriously injured after […]
Read more →For 38 years, a former Texan staffer-turned-author and a co-author colleague have labored to produce what they informally called “The Book,” a collection of interviews and reporting about well-known native Texans. Next year their book – titled “Growing Up in the Lone Star State, Notable Texans Remember Their Childhoods” – will be published by the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History. The book takes a unique look at how their childhood influenced these notable Texas natives. “The emphasis is exclusively on how they grew up . . . premise being that good, bad, or indifferent your childhood experiences mold you into the […]
Read more →For almost a decade, Gaylon Finklea Hecker (BJ ’72) edited Austin’s monthly tabloid, The Jewish Outlook, chronicling contemporary local news from the Jewish community that had recently begun exploding due in part to the influx of high-tech jobs in Central Texas. Austin’s Jewish history from 1989 to late 1998 exists no other place, at least in this month-to-month detail. And now it has found a new home where researchers will be able to use this wealth of information along with that of the Texas Jewish Historical Society. Finklea Hecker has donated a hard copy of every issue of The Jewish […]
Read more →Two annual scholarships of $1000 each will be awarded to University of Texas at Austin students who are on the staff of The Daily Texan newspaper. The scholarships are being made possible by award-winning photojournalists John McConnico of Texas and Jean-Marc Bouju of France, both former Daily Texan staffers. The first recipients will be announced on October 4, 2019 at The Friends of The Daily Texan annual Hall of Fame dinner. Without The Daily Texan student-run newspaper, McConnico and Bouju may never have met and shared overlapping, award-winning careers in photojournalism. The Daily Texan nurtured them, just has it has thousands of students […]
Read more →Editor’s Note – The Longhorn Alumni Band – 300 strong with 230 additional along for support – was one of the lead groups marking the 75th anniversary of D-Day Anniversary June 6. Former Daily Texan staffers Gaylon Finklea Hecker and Susan LaRonde were part of the alumni band at the events. Gaylon shares her thoughts in this article. Also, attending as part of the band support staff was Rachel Davis, daughter of Friends of The Daily Texan board member Jim Davis, and her friend Sara Hemenway. Included with the article are photos by Gaylon, her husband Marvin Hecker, Rachel Davis and Sara Hemenway. The […]
Read more →From the Austin American-Statesman American-Statesman Publisher Patrick Dorsey has announced two leadership changes for the Statesman newsroom. John Bridges, a 30-year veteran of the Statesman newsroom and former staffer of The Daily Texan at the University of Texas, was promoted from managing editor to executive editor, and Bill Church, the senior vice president for news for Statesman owner GateHouse Media, added Statesman editor-in-chief to his corporate responsibilities. “Together, with Bill and John, we will build on our impressive legacy of doing journalism with impact,” Dorsey said in a staff announcement. “I look forward to all the amazing things we can […]
Read more →An Austin couple who met 59 years ago as staffers on The Daily Texan, student newspaper at The University of Texas at Austin, has established an annual cash award for present day staffers. With their gift to The University, the couple established the Jerry and Becky Conn Daily Texan Scholarship Fund to be awarded annually in perpetuity. The generous gift will generate a $1,500 cash award for a deserving Texan staffer. The award will be announced each fall at the Friends of the Texan annual event. The Friends of the Texan is a non-profit group of former staffers that supports […]
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New York Times reporter Amy Chozick got her start at The Daily Texan, where she worked from 1997 to 2001. She’s become best known as the Times’ lead reporter on the Hillary Clinton campaign in 2016. However, she also spent eight years at The Wall Street Journal, where she covered both Clinton’s and Barack Obama’s 2008 campaigns. Last month, her book, “Chasing Hillary: Ten Years, Two Presidential Campaigns, and One Intact Glass Ceiling,” went on sale, and not surprisingly, it has generated widespread attention. Friends of The Daily Texan caught up with her to find out what it was like […]
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Bryan Mealer wandered into The Daily Texan basement not long after arriving at The University of Texas at Austin in 1996. He had dabbled in writing here and there, covering concerts and reviewing albums for his high school paper. “I wrote one [Texan] story, and my editor was like, ‘Oh, you’re a senior reporter,’” he said. “I think they were desperately short-handed.” He was awarded the plum beat of covering the University of Texas administration when it was instituting affirmative action policies. “A lot of affirmative action stories were coming down the pike at that time,” he said. “I remember […]
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