September 2, 2004

San Jose State’s Spartan Daily celebrates 70 years of news

The Spartan Daily, published by the School of Journalism & Mass Communications at San Jose State University, will celebrate its 70th year of continuous publication on Sept. 10.

A full day of panel discussions, a luncheon and a Socratic dialogue on politics will begin on the San Jose State University campus at 9 a.m. and conclude with a banquet in the evening at the downtown Marriott Hotel.

“It will be a celebration of durability,” said event organizer Mack Lundstrom, “not only for the San Jose State University paper but also for its founder, Dr. Dwight Bentel, who at 95 will join the festivities.”

“Since Dwight supervised a small staff in publishing the first daily issue in September of 1934, some 5,000 news and advertising students have produced more than 9,000 issues,” said Lundstrom, a journalism instructor and former Daily adviser.” They have never missed a scheduled day of publication.”

Twice, newsprint shortages threatened, once during World War II when the staff was forced to mimeograph the paper and again in the 1970s when the five-day-a-week publication was trimmed to four days.

More than twice, angry students invaded the newsroom with demands to shut down the paper.

On Oct. 17, 1989, the Loma Prieta Earthquake shut down the campus, forcing the staff to write and make up the paper from an adviser’s home and San Jose City College for four issues.

The reunion, which has drawn more than two dozen SJSU alumni and Daily grads from some of the newspaper giants in the industry as panelists and speakers, will feature morning and early-afternoon discussions in the Student Union with such titles as “Relentless Reporting,” “If Not Newspapers, What?” and “What Will Line Our Bird Cages in 2034?”

At midafternoon, Dr. Terry Christiansen, SJSU political science professor, will moderate a Socratic dialogue on politics in Morris Daily Auditorium.

Some of the scheduled speakers and panelists include Steve Lopez, Los Angeles Times columnist,
Joe Trippi, former campaign manager for presidential candidate Howard Dean and now an MSNBC analyst.

The festivities will culminate with a reception at 6 p.m., banquet at 7 p.m. and a program of reminiscing at 7:45 p.m. at the San Jose Marriott Hotel, 301 S. Market St., in downtown San Jose.

SJSU’s School of Journalism & Mass Communications is one of the oldest journalism schools on the West Coast and is the largest one in northern California with about 750 majors, including graduate students. It offers a comprehensive curriculum with undergraduate degrees in advertising, journalism and public relations. Students learn and gain professional experience by working on the Spartan Daily, Access magazine, and a weekly 30-minute television news program, Update. The graduate program (M.S.) is the largest and most comprehensive in northern California.

For more information about the Spartan Daily 70th Anniversary Reunion, phone Mack Lundstrom at (408) 924-3261 or e-mail mlundstrom@casa.sjsu.edu.