When a magazine goes under, it is upsetting for subscribers and personally disturbing for contributors. I neither read nor wrote for Editor & Publisher, but I heard of its death yesterday with a feeling of sadness.
One day in the spring of 1989 I was sitting in my cubicle in the editorial offices of the Providence Journal scanning the want ads in the back of E&P. (Reading classifieds is not really reading.) One caught my attention: the Sun-Sentinel in Fort Lauderdale was looking for a travel editor.
I sent, as the ad requested, a resume and a letter stating my philosophy of what a travel section should be. Feeling I had no chance allowed me to be brutally honest. To my immense surprise, I got a call a few weeks later, and shortly after flew down for an interview. The features editor and her assistant - Robin Doussard and Lisa Shroder - both shared my ideas about travel writing.
That August I began my career as a newspaper travel editor, one of the very few who was hired from outside - usually someone was plucked from the newsroom as a reward for long service - and perhaps the only one who got the job through Editor & Publisher.
