The Tampa Tribune touched a number of Hernando residents. It was the second most popular paper in the county at the time of its closing on May 3rd, 2016. The Tampa Tribune newspaper’s white and even older orange delivery boxes are to be the last reminder of the once proud paper.
Media General, the parent company of the The Tampa Tribune, purchased the local Hernando County newspaper, the Hernando Today, in the 90s from its founder Derek Dunn-Rankin. Mr. Dunn-Rankin made news recently when he passed away April 17th, 2016, which was a few days before his Charlotte Sun newspaper won its first Pulitzer prize.
The seeds for the Tampa Tribune’s demise were sown in 2012. Media General sold their print holdings except the Tampa Tribune and associated papers to BH Media Group which is a subsidiary of the Warren Buffett-led Berkshire Hathaway, Inc on May 17, 2012. Media General then sold the Tampa Tribune and associated papers including the Hernando Today to the Revolution Capital Group October 8th, 2012. A couple of years later, after staff cuts, the Tribune closed the Hernando Today newspaper on December 1, 2014. The Tribune cited the difficult advertising market as the reason for closing the paper. This left Hernando County without a local paper and lacking in local coverage.
Revolution Capital Group continued to cut costs and sold off the assets of the Tampa Tribune until May 3rd, 2016, when they sold what remained of the paper to the Tampa Bay Times. The Tampa Bay Times promptly closed the Tampa Tribune, with subscribers receiving a Tampa Bay Times newspaper instead on May 4th, 2016.
Along with the newspaper boxes, the Tampa Tribune leaves us with a number of stories. Many of our writers and contributors formerly worked for the Tampa Tribune and the Hernando Today. The publisher of Old Brooksville in Photos and Stories, Robert Marinez worked for the Tribune for a number of years.
We recently carried the obituary of Frank Roderus, who died in Spring Hill, FL. Frank was a prolific novelist of western fiction who won a couple of Spur Awards. Frank was also the Tampa Tribune’s Bartow Bureau Chief. While he worked at the Tampa Tribune he met Jesse Moore who worked for the Lakeland Ledger. Jesse recounts a story about the two of them.
Frank and I were friendly newspaper competitors in the late 1960s. He was the Tampa Tribune’s Bartow (FL) Bureau Chief and I held the same position for the Lakeland Ledger.
Since his paper published in the morning and mine in the afternoon, we split the 24-hour clock. He could easily scoop me on anything that happened from noon to midnight and I could easily scoop him on events from midnight to noon.
One day I scooped him with a bang-up front-page super-dooper story about something that actually had happened the previous day, during his half of the clock.
Since our offices were two doors apart in the same building, I taped my teletype copy on his office door with one huge word at the top: GLOAT.
The next morning when I got to work, I found a (poorly-typed) letter taped to my office door. I’ll paraphrase, but basically it said “Your Gloat is returned herewith, unused. You have so little to gloat about, I thought you might need a few Gloats to make you feel better, so here are some.” Attached to the letter were about a dozen small square slips of paper, each marked “Gloat”.
Jesse became good friends with Frank and it was Jesse who provided us with this story in remembrance of his friend.
The Tampa Tribune was not just a paper that covered the Tampa Bay area for 123 years. It was made up of the people who worked on it, the Frank Roderuses of the world. It was also the stories that were covered: Pearl Harbor, VE Day, Kennedy’s Assassination, and the Sunshine Skyway accident.
Another story comes from Paul Catala a long time Tampa Tribune employee who now works for the Lakeland Ledger. He recounted his lone front page story at the Tampa Tribune. He had previously covered a pirate radio station that had cropped up in Ybor City with a range of a few miles. The station had been started by Kelly Benjamin (Combat Kelly) and Billy Budget and was broadcasted with DIY equipment. It had no set hours and would go on and off the air. When the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) raided the station and arrested Kelly, Kelly reached out to Paul. Paul wrote up what had happened and it ran on the front page of the Tampa Tribune.
Despite the many wonderful stories of the Tampa Tribune throughout the years, the story of its final days leave many with a bitter taste. Bob Nolte, Editor of Hernando Today from 1992-2007, commented, “It’s a sad day for newspaper readers in Tampa Bay as they have lost a reliable, conservative voice that will now be drowned out by the monolithic, arrogant and liberal Times.”
One of the final memories of the Tribune came from Erik Erlendsson who was covering the Tampa Bay Lightning in Brooklyn when the Tribune was purchased and closed. He reported that he was stranded in New York City without a job. He said that booking a flight home was made more difficult because the Tampa Bay Times had wiped the contacts on his phone. This was reported on twitter and you can follow the exchanges by searching for erlendssonTBO.
The Tampa Tribune touched many of us. Its closing was sudden and leaves only one daily newspaper covering the entire Tampa Bay Area. The Tampa Tribune did leave behind many stories that can still be enjoyed. We look forward to sharing more of these stories.