1 1 0 ^{T H}  R E U N I O N ,  R E N O V A T I O N ,  R E C R E A T I O N
BIG  DOINGS  AT

By Peter Mooney

"I remember watching the then-outgoing editors cry as they walked out of the Daily for the last time as staffers. I now understand why," wrote Heather Kamins this past April in her last column for the Michigan Daily.

Reminiscences like these reflect the affection that University alums who worked on the newspaper feel for the Daily. As Kamins's column pointed out, the Daily becomes an almost full-time job and social hub for its staff. Permanent friendships, and even marriages, are forged within its offices. For many, a fierce attachment to the newspaper lasts for life.

Such sentiments will be much in evidence at the Daily's 110th anniversary reunion Oct. 13 and 14, when alumni and current staffers will celebrate the many attributes of the Daily, including its editorial independence and the impressive achievements of its graduates. Two former editors will speak at the reunion dinner. ESPN Sportscenter anchor Rich Eisen '90 will serve as the master of ceremonies, while Time, Inc.'s new media editor Daniel Okrent '69 will be the keynote speaker. (See profile of Okrent in Michigan Today, June 1993 issue, by Andrea Sachs '75, '78 JD.)

Goes Online

The reunion will give many in the Daily community a chance to see what has changed since the 1990 centennial celebration. Most, like other Michigan alumni/ae, will likely have already explored one '90s development, the Michigan Daily Online's Website www.themichigandaily.com.

According to Online Editor Paul Wong, the Web edition receives approximately 11,000 hits a day during football season, and 10,000 during the winter semester. The Daily calculates hits per day by section and story, with the sports section usually attracting the most interest, 4,000 hits per day.

Latino Students Protest Against

The Daily has long provided extensive coverage of campus activism from the Vietnam War protests of the 1960s to demands for greater minority enrollment in 1980s, but some '90s staffers recall one of the most memorable protests as targeting the Daily itself.

In 1996, the Daily published several items that raised the ire of Alianza, an organization representing Latino students on campus. According to staff members from the period, these items included an editorial cartoon critical of affirmative action and a student government endorsement editorial that found fault with a campus political party focused primarily on minority student issues.

On March 27, 1996, thousands of Dailys vanished from campus newsstands, which bore signs stating, "The Daily has been cancelled due to racism." A subsequent article about the missing papers quoted an anonymous source stating that a member of Alianza had removed at least some of the papers. In response to the article, approximately 200 students marched on April 3 from the Diag to the Student Publications Building. They protested both the article carrying the accusation about the removal of the Dailys, and the earlier cartoon and editorial that they found offensive. At least one issue was burned during the protest.

"I remember being shocked that students were burning Dailys," recalled Laurie Mayk, who watched the protest from inside the building. The sight convinced staffers that the Daily had to keep open lines of communication with campus groups and organizations it covered to address tensions and grievances before they boiled over.

The Student Publications Building to Undergo a Facelift
When not getting caught up with college journalism issues or getting reacquainted with old friends, the Daily alumni will learn about efforts to ensure that the Student Publications Building can serve students for many years to come. Last fall, University Regents hired Boston architects Finegold, Alexander and Associates to prepare drawings for renovations to the almost 70-year-old building. Improvements will include putting in an elevator, providing accessibility to the disabled, refurbishing the interior, enlarging space for the Michiganensian yearbook and Gargoyle humor magazine, and updating technological features. Although work won't begin for more than a year, Daily alumni and the U-M Office of Development have already begun discussions about raising funds for the project.

Many alums will undoubtedly suggest, or at least quietly hope, that the renovations leave everything looking exactly as they remember it. For them, there will be a melancholy aspect to this reunion, as they cherish the memories of a place where they devoted so much of their time, energy and passion at Michigan.

Peter Mooney '90, '93 JD, lives in Ann Arbor and practices law in Flint, Michigan. A former Daily editor, he wrote the article "100 Years of the Michigan Daily" in our Feb. 1990 issue.

1990s Datelines 1990: Hundreds of Michigan Daily alumni celebrate its centennial at Michigan League with a large reception and dinner. For information about this year's reunion, see www.dailyalumni.com/reunion. 1996: Former sports editor Rich Eisen '90 becomes an ESPN sportscaster. 1997: Former news editor Lisa Pollak '90 of the Baltimore Sun wins the Pulitzer Prize for feature writing. 1998: The Daily publishes a successful book featuring articles highlighting the Wolverines' 1997 national football championship. 1999: The University's Board of Regents hires an architectural firm to begin planning large-scale renovations of the Student Publications Building. Among many 1990s alums with positions on major news media staffs are James Poniewozik '90, media writer, Time magazine; Amy Harmon '91, reporter, the New York Times; Steve Cohen '91, manager of news planning, ABC Radio; David Lubliner '91, agent, William Morris Agency; Judd Winick '92, former MTV "Real World" cast member and now author/illustrator of the comic book series The Adventures of Barry Ween, Boy Genius; Stephen Henderson '92, associate editorial page editor, the Baltimore Sun; Henry Goldblatt '93, senior editor, Fortune Magazine; Joshua Rich '98, reporter, Entertainment Weekly. (We invite '90s Daily alums whom we've missed on this list to help us update it. Furthermore, we'd like all U-M alums in the news media, Daily alums or not, to let us know where they are and what they are doing.—Ed.)