After graduating from St. Bonaventure University, Barbara O’Brien worked at radio stations in Salamanca and Olean for four years before coming to The News in 1984. She did three stints in the Southtowns Bureau over the years, as well as being a general assignment reporter and working evenings for 11 years. Most recently, she covered the Southtowns as well as education, and general assignment stories as they came up. Her reflections:
By Barb O’Brien – I really miss One News Plaza. Every year, a couple days before Thanksgiving week, Scott Street used to be lined with tractor trailers hauling advertisement inserts to be stuffed in the Thursday paper, the all-important edition advancing Black Friday.
You could take the stairs if you wanted, or walk in the production entrance and take the freight elevator to your floor.
The five-story building had a different department on each of the floors. There were two cafeterias, one on the second floor on the Thruway end of the building and the other on the fifth floor, with a great view of the waterfront.
Most people didn’t venture outside their floor. One good thing about moving to Larkinville is we all are in the same space and we get to know folks in other departments.
But let’s not forget the free parking for events at KeyBank Center!
We still had manual typewriters when I started in 1984. Reporters made three copies of each story: the original and two copies (made by placing two pieces of carbon placed between three sheets of paper). Reporters kept one copy and the others went to the city desk. If it was a five-page story, editors glued the five sheets together in one long take, worked their magic on the story, then sent it in a pneumatic tube to the second floor typesetters.
We put -30- at the end of each story so editors would know that was the last sheet of paper and the end of the story.
Computers came to the newsroom in the mid-1980s.
I had a memorable man-, er, woman-on-the-street story that came my way in 1986.
An assistant managing editor sent a note to the city editor, and an assistant city editor sent it to me. (Note: at this time, seven women in Rochester had taken their shirts off in a park to object to a state law allowing men, but not women, to go shirtless in public.)
“Next nice weather weekend day, when parks are full, might send a young woman out to see what Buffalo women think about bare breasts in public parks. Should talk to young and old. If you just talk to women, you can stay clear of the adolescent silliness. They all saw the Rochester goings on on TV, so they’ll know what we’re talking about. Also the park or recreation setting is likely to get the right mindset. Also, I think there’s two questions: What about the law in general and what about you?”
My story appeared July 5, 1986 with the headline “Women Here Opt to Keep Shirts On.”
So next time a weird story appears in The News, cut the reporter a little slack – it could have been an editor’s idea (!).
I remember people telling me not to be nervous meeting the editor, Murray Light, when I went for my interview. I wasn’t nervous until I got the job and walked into that cavernous third floor filled with people pounding on their typewriters.
What have I got myself into, I thought. I will never be good enough to belong here.
Forty years later, I still have some of those feelings. I am in awe of the people I have worked with then and now. I learned something from everyone. I am proud to have worked at The Buffalo News.
And thanks to the Buffalo Newspaper Guild for doing its best to watch out for us.
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This article is part of the Fall/Winter 2024-25 edition of The Frontier Reporter.
Buffalo Newspaper Guild CWA Local 31026 