Duke lacrosse: Ashley’s ashes

A number of bloggers ( e.g. Liestoppers, KC Johnson, Johnsville and JinC) have called attention to the sharp decline in the accuracy and completeness of the Durham Herald Sun's reporting and analyses of matters relating to the Duke Hoax. They've also called attention to a series of Editor Bob Ashley’s editorials and columns concerning the hoax. Ashley, though, doesn’t call it a hoax. He's more: "Brodhead and Nifong are great; when's the trial?"

It occurred to me you might be interested in learning a little bit more about the Herald Sun, Ashley’s editorship and how the paper’s been doing recently. So I put this post together.

Three years ago, The Durham Herald Sun was a respected community newspaper owned by a local family. Then in late 2004, the H-S was sold to a privately held The Paxton Media Group, based in Paducah, Ky.

Paxton sent Ashley to Durham to run the H-S. On Ashley’s first day, scores of long-time H-S employees were summarily fired and escorted by security guards from the H-S building. They weren’t given reasons for their firings, other than they were no longer needed. They weren’t even allowed to return to their desks to say good-bye to friends and colleagues, some of whom they’d worked with for more than 20 years. Ashley explained that was because of "security reasons."

I called Ashley in mid January 2005, to complain about his treatment of the employees as well as what I saw as a significant drop in the paper’s quality after he took over. I said I was on the verge of doing what thousands of readers had already done: cancel my subscription.

Ashley asked me not to. Give him a chance, he said. Sure, there had been some initial “bumps.” But if I just gave him a chance, I’d see what he would do.

Ashley said in a year the H-S under his editorship would be a much better paper than it had ever been.

I gave him a chance; and watched the paper decline. When my subscription was up, I didn’t renew. I’ve since re-subscribed but mainly to have access to the H-S’s archives.

OK, that’s me. What about other people in Durham? How do they feel?

When Ashley first took over, the H-S had a weekday circulation of about 54 thousand. My best guess is that the H-S weekday circulation is now about 35 thousand or so, and continuing to decline. The decline is occurring in a fast-growing region with a strong and expanding economy.

It isn’t just readers who are abandoning what many people now call “Ashley’s H-S.”

Advertisers are abandoning it, too.

The information below illustrates that. For each of the five weekdays beginning Monday, Sept. 11, I counted the total number of pages in the H-S’s “A” section. Then I estimated the total number of those pages taken up by advertising.

I estimated the ad “pages” because ads were in various sizes from a few inches high and one column wide to a full page. I tried to make my ad “pages” estimates on the generous side. I suspect if Editor Bob Ashley himself were to check the amount of advertising in those “A” sections, he’d find my ad “pages” estimates might be a little high.

Here's what I found for each of the 5 days' "A" section

Sept. 11 -- 6 pages of which .75 was advertising.

Sept.12 -- 8 pages of which 2.25 were advertising.

Sept. 13 -- 8 pages of which 1.75 were advertising.

Sept. 14 -- 8 pages of which 1.50 were advertising.

Sept. 15 -- 8 pages of which 3.00 were advertising.

When a newspaper’s circulation is declining as its region grows and its weekday “A” section advertising averages less than two full pages a day, that paper’s headed for “a crash and burn,” even if its editor was once “Duke of Paducah.”

Ashley’s ashes!

I’ll be saying more soon about the demise of a once fine newspaper.