![]() ![]() Jerry Mitchell, writing for the Clarion-Ledger in Jackson, Mississippi, wrote last April that shortly after midnight on Dec. In 1964, prodigal son Jerry lee, whose marriage to his 13-year-old cousin caused a scandal that temporarily derailed his promising rock and roll career, had begun an improbable comeback by re-branding himself as an equally adept country music artist with songs like How’s My Ex Treating You?, What Made Milwaukee Famous Has Made a Loser Out of Me and She Even Work Me up to Say Goodbye. now runs the family newspapers in Ferriday, West Monroe, and Winnsboro).īut make no mistake, Stanley Nelson has put his own indelible mark on the Sentinel. He could not have chosen a better mentor in the person of the late Sam Hanna, a legendary name in Louisiana newspaper lore (his son Sam Jr. Nelson began his newspaper career at the Hammond Daily Star before moving back home to work at the Sentinel, the quintessential hometown paper. That was just about the time the late John Hays, who would become a pretty fair investigative reporter in his own right, was getting cranked up with his controversial Morning Paper in Ruston. Nelson, a native of nearby Sicily Island, is a 1977 graduate of Wiley Hilburn’s journalism program at Louisiana Tech University in Ruston. Claire Chennault-quite a résumé for a town of fewer than 3500 residents (3,453 to be precise).Ĭlayton is another small town in the mostly farming-reliant parish and is best known as the home of the family cemetery of Jerry Lee Lewis, who son is buried there. Vidalia (not the home of the onion by the same name-that’s Vidalia, Georgia) is the parish (county) seat and Ferriday sits a little more inland in the heart of the rich delta that provides a living for the area’s soybean and cotton farmers.įerriday is the home of Jerry Lee Lewis, Jimmy Swaggart, Mickey Gilley, network television news anchor Howard K. įor those of you unfamiliar with the geography of Louisiana, Concordia Parish lies directly across the river from historic Natchez, Mississippi. It is still in publication as of 2010.Every journalism student in America should be making a pilgrimage to Ferriday, Louisiana, on this date to sit at the feet of and learn from Stanley Nelson, 59-year-old Editor of the Concordia Sentinel, a small weekly newspaper (circulation about 5,000) that serves up mostly local news, wedding announcements, obituaries and sports to the residents of Concordia Parish. In 1966, Percy Rountree, Jr., sold the paper to Sam Hanna, a well-known local journalist, who moved its operations from Vidalia to the neighboring town of Ferriday. Upon returning from World War I, Rountree’s son Percy Rountree, Sr., took over as manager and editor. Rountree, patriarch of a family of north Louisiana newspaper publishers. The Concordia Sentinel’s founder was Josiah L. ![]() Fiction, including condensed classics, was printed for readers of all ages, while a fashion column appealed to women. ![]() Other columns featured short essays on miscellaneous social issues. ![]() News from the nation’s capital was highlighted in a “Washington Sidelights” column. Local reporting covered the advent of Prohibition in Louisiana, the establishment of farmers’ cooperative unions, activities of the Concordia Progressive League and district levee board, the social and economic effects of the boll weevil blight on the region, and the north Louisiana oil boom. It reported a mix of local, national, and international news. Published weekly in eight pages, the Concordia Sentinel was the official journal of Concordia Parish. Its population at that time was more than three-fourths African American. Located in the agriculturally rich bottomlands of the Mississippi River, the parish was closely tied to the cotton-based economy of nearby Natchez, Mississippi, during the 19th and early 20th centuries. The Concordia Sentinel was founded in 1882 in Vidalia, Louisiana, the seat of Concordia Parish in rural northeast Louisiana. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |