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Excerpt from Oral History Interview with Virginius Dabney, July 31, 1975. Interview A-0311-2. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) See Entire Interview >>

Shift from newspapers to televised news coverage

Dabney rejects the idea that television will replace newspapers. Instead, newspaper writers will retain job security because of their training.

Citing this Excerpt

Oral History Interview with Virginius Dabney, July 31, 1975. Interview A-0311-2. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Full Text of the Excerpt

WILLIAM H. TURPIN:
Yes, I wanted to ask you just a couple of things to get a general view on newspapers. A lot of people are saying that television is supplanting newspapers. I wondered what you think of newspapers now, generally speaking, and what will be here in ten, twenty, or thirty years, having spent your life in the business?
VIRGINIUS DABNEY:
I don't see television supplanting newspapers. I think that it has cut into the circulation of a good many papers and several magazines, but there are areas that newspapers cover that television can't cover and never can, as operated today. I see many technical changes in newspapers, different methods of production, for example, electronic things that I don't begin to understand, but which are coming and which will perpetuate newspapers, in my opinion. Television has a role, I think; it is often a rather distorted role and a pernicious role. I don't mean to say that all newspapers are public benefactors, either. Some of them are pernicious, too. But the newspapers are here to stay. I believe that they are technically better than they ever were and that the newspaper men are better trained than they ever were. I think some schools of journalism are worthless and others are extremely good; training in a good school of journalism is a benefit to any aspiring newspaper man.