News-Sentinel - Something New and Something Old

The something new is that the News-Sentinel endorsed Ken Fries for Sheriff in the Republican primary.

The something old is that they scrounged around the newspaper library for the photograph of Ken Fries which ran with the editorial endorsement today. The photo the News-Sentinel ran is at right. 

Retired IPFW political science professor C. James "Buzz" Owen remarked during a class in the late 1970's that then-Sheriff Charles "Bud" Meeks had the best hair of anyone in politics in Allen County.  Professor Owen's remarks about political image-making remained true regarding Bud Meeks when Bud later served as a state senator from Allen County.  Bud's full head of hair, having turned a striking silver, still made for an impressive image.

Well, Buzz Owen could say the same thing about Sheriff candidate Ken Fries thirty years after the remark about Bud Meeks.  Except that Ken's photo in the News-Sentinel is at least a decade old.

The Fries campaign reports that it has provided a contemporary photograph to the News-Sentinel this primary season. 

However, it can be difficult to get the newspaper not to run with an old photograph that happens to be in its files.  I know.  I had two occasions where the Fort Wayne newspapers insisted on using a photograph of me that was very out of date.

One was a photograph from the first year that I ran for office.  I was sporting a mustache that looked about as out of date as that of Mr. Fries.  The use of that photograph only ended when I asked for the physical return of the older photograph and gave the newspaper additional copies of my latest portrait.

The second occured after the inauguration of President 41 and Vice-President Dan Quayle; it is the only inauguration I have attended.  A photographer from one of the Fort Wayne newspapers was present at the Indiana ball and took a photograph of myself and then-Mayor Helmke dressed in formal wear.  During the next legislative session, the newspaper decideded to illustrate legislative stories with a cut-down photograph which resulted in a head shot of me wearing a wing collar and a black bow-tie.

My appearance in formal wear is a less frequent occurrence than a total eclipse. Again, it took a personal visit to the newsroom to retrieve the old photo.

It's a little more difficult today when everything is digital to retrieve old photographs from the innards of a newspaper operation. The Indiana Pundit weblog post on the Ken Fries yard sign has produced several comments about a Fries photograph used in some print material which shows him running.   One reader's comment comparing Fries to David Hasselhoff has sparked other, differing opinions.  It's a funny read; here is the link to the Indiana Pundit post.  Indiana Pundit hasn't posted the photograph that has sparked the comments so Fort Wayne Observed is providing it here. (photo on the right.)