John Smalley
Editor
John Smalley, 52, has been editor of the Wisconsin State Journal since December 2008. Prior to that he was editor of the La Crosse (Wis.) Tribune from April 2002 until December 2008. The State Journal has a newsroom staff of about 80. In La Crosse, Smalley led a staff of about 45 at the Tribune, a 30,000-circulation daily located along the Mississippi River in western Wisconsin. Smalley returned to La Crosse after serving as editor of the Mason City (Iowa) Globe Gazette for five years, from 1997-2002.
Smalley was born and raised in Evansville, Wis., and is a University of Wisconsin-La Crosse graduate in mass communications. He and his wife, Barbara, have four children – two in college and two in high school - and live in Verona, Wis.
[WI 0201] - Part 1: Intro & Contribution (5:19)
John Smalley, editor, Wisconsin State Journal, says a youthful interest in sports enticed him into journalism, and that the success of the Wisconsin State Journal can be partially attributed to its watchdog reporting.
[WI 0202] - Part 2: Ethics & Content (7:39)
John Smalley, editor, Wisconsin State Journal, explains that publishing “part of a story,” as news breaks, was a new concept his news staff had to master to make the best use of their website.
[WI 0203] - Part 3: Strategic Changes (3:20)
John Smalley, editor, Wisconsin State Journal, says since his newspaper began using the Internet in earnest, its reporters had to learn to “capture information in all sorts of ways.”
[WI 0204] - Part 4: Adaptation & The Future (7:36)
John Smalley, editor, Wisconsin State Journal, says that being a reporter today means “being ready, willing and able to feed information to a variety of [platforms] at all times.”
[WI 0205] - Part 5: Prospects & Preparation (2:19)
John Smalley, editor, Wisconsin State Journal, says reporters coming into today’s newspaper jobs need to the skills to “work across multiple platforms” to succeed.