New technology in newspapers from the 1920s to the 1970s : response of Tennessee newsworkers

This study seeks to determine the impact of technological change on persons who worked in the Tennessee newspaper industry from the 1920s to the 1970s. A historical/ qualitative approach was used to collect and analyze narratives submitted by selected newsworkers across Tennessee, working or retired, and in varying newspaper sizes. The participants were asked open-ended questions designed to elicit responses about their experiences with technological change. The responses were carefully read, compiled and analyzed for common threads of perceived reality to build a picture of the impact technology had on these Tennessee newsworkers.

The research question was: "What were the nature, manifestations and commonalities of technological impact on newsworkers in Tennessee from the 1920s to the 1970s?" Even though technological change caused feelings of fear and caution, the excitement and challenge of new technology overshadowed the negative. Despite staff reductions in larger newspapers, cross-training in smaller newspapers, early retirements, union pressure to save jobs, and replacement of men with women, these Tennesseans responded to technology well, all things considered. According to these participants, technology played such an important part in the lives of Tennessee new workers that it was either accept and adapt to it, or find something else to do.

The commonalities experienced by these participants were primarily in these areas: perception of greatest technological change observed; displacement, and observation or experience of lead-related disease and injury. A pattern emerged, however, around the term 'isolation'. News/ editorial workers, in particular, talked about the change from the old way to the new computerized way. The news-building process in the newsroom evolved from a more people-oriented, team effort around the copy editor and copy desk to that of an isolated, computer work station scenario from which the final product was generated. The art of interchange and working closely with other minds was seen as fading away with new technology.