Staff and Speakers
Melissa Cox
Melissa Cox graduated from Ohio Wesleyan University in 1973 with a degree in elementary education. After her third child started school she joined Washington and Lee’s Department of Journalism and Mass Communications as administrative assistant, a position she continues to enjoy 19 years later. For the last 21 years much of her free time has been spent in service to her parish church, but she has still found time to knit, read, hike and walk with her dog Cashel.
David Fritz
David Fritz, 49, has been an editor of one sort or other in Gannett
newsrooms since 1981. Since 1998 he has been executive editor of The News
Leader, a daily newspaper in Staunton, Va. An increasing share of his
time has been spent in recent years developing the The News Leader's
online presence, which in many ways perfects the ideal marketplace that local
newspapers always have spoused. When not contemplating the industry's
future, he finds relative relaxation by camping with his wife, Tena, among
bears in the Blue Ridge mountains, parenting their 17-year-old daughter and
scuba diving with sharks and other critters in various locales.
Charlotte H. Hall
Charlotte H. Hall is senior vice president and editor of the Orlando Sentinel and president of the American Society of Newspaper Editors. She joined the Sentinel in 2004 and oversees the Sentinel’s newsroom, OrlandoSentinel.com and the weekly, bilingual El Sentinel. Prior to joining the Sentinel, Hall spent 22 years at Newsday, on Long Island, where she held several key management positions, including managing editor and vice president for planning. As managing editor, she oversaw the newspaper’s coverage of September 11 and the Iraq War. She earlier served as the paper’s assistant managing editor for Long Island and Washington news editor. Under Hall’s direction, Newsday reporters won the Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting in 1995. Hall has served several times as a Pulitzer juror. Earlier in her career, Hall worked at several other newspapers, including The Record (Hackensack, N.J.), The Boston Herald-American and The Washington Star. Hall has chaired several ASNE committees, including the Diversity Committee and the High School Journalism Committee. In recognition of her efforts for newsroom diversity, Hall received the Tribune Values Award and the Robert G. McGruder Award for Diversity Leadership, given by ASNE, the Associated Press Managing Editors and The Freedom Forum. Hall and her husband live in Winter Park, Fla.
Doug Harwood
Doug Harwood is the editor, publisher and sole full-time employee of
The Rockbridge Advocate, a monthly community newspaper he
founded in 1992. Despite its small staff and budget, the Advocate has
won awards for its investigative reporting and editorials. Harwood
was raised in Springfield, Mass., came to college at Washington and
Lee in 1970, fell in love with Rockbridge County and was too lazy to
leave after obtaining a degree in journalism. He began his reporting
career at a radio station in Waynesboro. He then founded the news
department at the commercial radio station in Lexington and edited
the newspaper in Buena Vista for a dozen years before starting the
Advocate. For 35 years he has hosted a peculiar radio music program,
and has survived two attempted murders, one of which was perpetrated
by an irate reader. Critics can be rough around here.
Diana Mitsu Klos
Diana Mitsu Klos joined the American Society of Newspaper Editors as project director in 1996 and was promoted to senior project director in May 2000. She supervises the High School Journalism Initiative, launched in April 2000. This ASNE program, which has grown into six components, has improved the quality and quantity of high school newspapers and imparts a better understanding of the First Amendment. Her work on this initiative has been recognized by the Columbia Scholastic Press Association, which awarded her a Gold Key in 2007, and AEJMC’s Scholastic Journalism Division, which presented her with the Robert P. Knight Multicultural Award in 2004. Prior to joining ASNE, Diana was managing editor of the Poughkeepsie (N.Y.) Journal, city editor at the Norwich (Conn.) Bulletin and a reporter at the Asbury (N.J.) Park Press. Klos graduated from the City College of New York and City Honors School in Buffalo, N.Y.
Frank LoMonte
Frank D. LoMonte is executive director of the Student Press Law Center in Arlington, Va., a nonprofit legal assistance group that advises collegiate and high-school journalists and their teachers. Before coming to the SPLC in January 2008, LoMonte was a litigator with the Atlanta office of Sutherland Asbill & Brennan, LLP, one of the 100 largest law firms in America. From 2004 to 2007, LoMonte served on the Legal Committee for the ACLU of Georgia, and was named “volunteer of the year” by the Georgia Asylum and Immigration Network in 2007 for his work on behalf of juvenile clients in immigration court. LoMonte is a magna cum laude graduate of the University of Georgia School of Law. Before law school, he spent 12 years as a daily newspaper reporter and editor, working in capital bureaus in Florida, Georgia and Washington, D.C.
Kathy Lu
Kathy Lu is features editor at The Roanoke Times, a 95,000-circulation daily newspaper in Southwest Virginia. She started at The Roanoke Times as a Landmark intern in 1997, after graduating as a journalism major from Washington and Lee University. In her 11 years at the paper, she has been an education reporter, a nonprofits and social services reporter, and the editor of the Neighbors community section.
She is also proud to have been involved in a few startups at the paper -- she was one of the first reporters to make online audio a regular part of her stories; she helped launch The Edge teen page in 2003 (it's still going strong and just won several awards from The Newspaper Association of America); and after taking over as Neighbors editor in January 2005, she helped launch The Lake community tab four months later. As features editor, she leads a team of eight. One of her goals is to engage readers through user-generated content, local stories and reflections on the human experience. And to have fun.
Pam Luecke
Pam Luecke is the Donald W. Reynolds professor of business journalism at Washington and Lee University. She assumed that position in the summer of 2001 and has since started a concentration in business journalism, bridging the college’s journalism department and its Williams School of Commerce. Before joining Washington and Lee, Luecke had a 26-year career in daily newspapers and most recently served as editor and senior vice president of the Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader. She also held various editing and reporting positions at The Hartford Courant, The (Louisville) Courier-Journal, and the Louisville Times. During her career, she was supervising editor of two projects recognized with Pulitzer Prizes. Luecke received a B.A. in philosophy from Carleton College in Northfield, Minn., a master’s in journalism from Northwestern University and an M.B.A. from the University of Hartford. Luecke and her husband, George Graves, live in Lexington, Va. When she is not teaching, she is futilely working on her tennis game.
Jim McGonnell
Jim McGonnell has been a newspaper adviser for 31 years. He advises the national award-winning newspaper Blue & Gold and 2AToday, the high school’s television news program at Findlay High School, Findlay, Ohio.The Blue & Gold is in NSPA’s Hall of Fame and has won a Pacemaker, two Gold Crowns, 13 Gallup Awards, 14 All Americans, 14 Medalists, five Best of Show trophies and is a consistent Best of Show top-five placer. 2AToday has won a Pacemaker after three nominations, two Best of Show trophies, and is a consistent Best of Show top-10 placer. This last year his staff produced its first video yearbook, The Vid, adding another advising duty to his day. This past fall, McGonnell was named Dow Jones Newspaper Fund's National Journalism Teacher of the Year. He also won a Gold Key from CSPA in March and was named Master Teacher of Ohio. He speaks at state and national conventions and is an instructor at summer workshops at Ball State, Michigan State and Walsworth’s Orlando, Fla., workshop. McGonnell has two daughters, one of whom is following in his footsteps and is looking for a teaching /advising job in Virginia. McGonnell is an ex-wrestling and girls' tennis coach, directed plays and musicals, and still loves advising and teaching.
John Muncie
John Muncie was a newspaper journalist for 30 years. Along the way he made stops at the San Diego Union-Tribune, the Los Angeles Times and the Baltimore Sun. He mostly specialized in feature stories and has directed coverage in every corner of the feature world, from classical music to film, from fashion to religion, from daily news spin-offs to year-long projects. He has been a pop music critic and a book reviewer; he has written for several magazines. In 2002, he left newspapers to write novels with his wife, Jody Jaffe, and teach university-level journalism. His travel stories have appeared in many of the nation’s major papers and during one travel adventure he nearly burned up a state park in New Mexico. As a consequence, Smoky Bear has never invited him to dinner.
Glenn Proctor
Glenn Proctor, a journalist for more than three decades, is vice president and executive editor of the Richmond Times-Dispatch, a position he has held since November 2005. His previous career included positions at The (Newark) Star-Ledger, the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle, The Louisville Courier-Journal, the Akron Beacon Journal and the Quad-City Times in Davenport, Iowa. While in Ohio, Proctor was an adjunct journalism professor at Kent State University for several years. In the late ’80s, he created a series of diversity and management workshops that he continues to present around the country. At the Beacon Journal, Proctor was part of the team that won the Pulitzer Prize in 1987 for coverage of the Goodyear takeover. He was a Pulitzer juror in 2006, 2001 and 2000. Proctor received the National Association of Black Journalists Legacy Award in August 2007. Under his leadership, the Richmond Times-Dispatch won the Virginia Press Association’s 2006 Public Service Award. As a Marine and Vietnam veteran, Proctor spent six years on active duty and six years as a reservist, leaving the Corps as a gunnery sergeant. His activities include reading and writing poetry, playing basketball and staying active. When he has time, he works on several dusty manuscripts.
Brian Richardson
Brian Richardson is a professor and head of Washington and Lee’s Department of Journalism and Mass Communications, from which he graduated in 1973. He holds an M.A. in communications and the Ph.D. in mass communications from the University of Florida. He has worked for local television and radio stations in Virginia and Florida, and worked as a reporter and editor for The Tallahassee Democrat, The Miami Herald and The Philadelphia Inquirer for more than 10 years. He has covered local government, courts, urban affairs and education. At Washington and Lee he has taught reporting, journalism ethics and state and local government. Also, the fact that he is having a bad hair life has not affected his sunny disposition.
Hampden H. Smith III
“Ham” Smith retired in 2003 as head of Washington and Lee’s journalism department, a position he had held since 1989. During his tenure, he oversaw the program’s embrace of convergence and shepherded the 2001-2002 renovation of Reid Hall. He began teaching at W&L in 1974 after a 10-year career with newspapers in Virginia. He holds a B.A. in English from Randolph-Macon College and a master’s in government and politics from Boston University. During his academic career, he received three Fulbright Fellowships to teach journalism in Albania, Russia and Bulgaria. Ham and his wife continue to travel extensively. His former students and colleagues remember fondly many Ham Smith aphorisms, especially: “There’s a grade for that.”
Rodney Smolla
Rodney Smolla became dean of the Washington and Lee School of Law in 2007 after serving as dean of the law school at the University of Richmond. He is nationally recognized as a scholar, teacher, advocate and writer. His wide-ranging scholarship includes four legal treatises, a casebook on the First Amendment, a coauthored casebook on constitutional law and scores of articles in the nation's top law reviews. He also writes widely for general audiences, including popular books such as Deliberate Intent (Crown 1999), Free Speech in an Open Society (Alfred A. Knopf 1992), Jerry Falwell v. Larry Flynt (St. Martin’s 1988), and Suing the Press (Oxford University Press 1986). His commentary appears frequently in national print and electronic media. Smolla has also been a nationally prominent advocate in cases involving constitutional law, civil rights and mass media. He has presented oral argument in state and federal courts throughout the nation, including the Supreme Court of the United States. He played football for Yale University before injuring his knee and was first in his class at Duke Law School.
Mizell Stewart III
Mizell Stewart III is editor of the Evansville(Ind.) Courier & Press. He has been an editor, managing editor, local news assigning editor and award-winning reporter at several newspapers, including the Akron Beacon Journal, the Tallahassee Democrat, the Dayton Daily News and the Springfield News-Sun. While a consultant for Knight Ridder Newspapers, he helped lead the team at The (Biloxi) Sun Herald that covered the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. That effort was recognized with the 2006 Pulitzer Gold Medal for Public Service. Mizell began his professional journalism career as a 16-year-old summer intern with Sun Newspapers in suburban Cleveland. The following school year, he was co-editor of The Fourth Estate, the student newspaper at Bedford High School in Bedford, Ohio.
Michael Todd
Michael Todd is digital media specialist for the Department of Journalism and Mass Communications at Washington and Lee University. He started his career in information technology and in 2001 moved into his current position with the Journalism Department. He graduated from Virginia Wesleyan in 1997 with a B.A. in philosophy. Thankfully, instead of needing to hold a sign reading “Will Think for Food,” he found gainful employment, owing largely to fact that he is a member of the first generation of children who grew up with computers in the home. Michael is also the proud father of four children, all of whom were born at home.
Lisa Tracy
Born and raised in Lexington, Va., Lisa Tracy was an English and French major at Oberlin College and holds a masters in English from Rutgers University. She lived most of her adult life in the Northeast, but returned to her childhood home after retiring from a 26-year career at The Philadelphia Inquirer. While there, she served in many editorial roles including the metro, sports and national/foreign copy desks, news and features assigning desks and the editorial board. Lisa has also taught high school and college and was adviser for a fledgling student paper at St. Mary's Hall in Burlington, N.J., in the early 1990s. She has a son, who graduated from Bard College in 2007, and three cats. Lisa is the author of several books and a member of Actors' Equity and the Newspaper Guild. She plays guitar and penny whistle and is trying to learn to play the fiddle.
Wendy Zomparelli
Wendy Zomparelli, retired president and publisher of The Roanoke Times, is now a senior associate with Kannon Consulting of Chicago, working primarily with media companies. Zomparelli joined The Roanoke Times in 1984 as a staff writer, became assistant features editor a few months later and was appointed features editor the following year. In 1992 she was named assistant to President and Publisher Walter Rugaber. She was named editor in 1995, vice president and general manager in 1998, and president and publisher in 2000. She retired in 2007. During her career in Roanoke, Zomparelli's community service included chairing the United Way board and serving on the boards of Roanoke College and of the Roanoke Higher Education Authority. She recently moved to Charlottesville, where her husband, Richard Handler, is a professor of anthropology and associate dean at the University of Virginia.