Imogene Lawrence then and now – she still loves to talk about news in the North Vinemont community.
I started when I was 13, I think. Maybe I was 14. At the time, my mother didn’t take the paper and somebody told me that if I wrote the community news, they would send me the paper.”Imogene Lawrence
VINEMONT – The Cullman Tribune has been around since 1874, so it goes without saying that over the years, countless reporters have contributed their talents to the newspaper. Take, for example, Mrs. Imogene (Drake) Lawrence. At 90-years-old, Lawrence has seen many changes since her days of reporting the news in and around North Vinemont. Thankfully, though, one thing remains the same; people still enjoy reading about events happening in their community.
I recently had the honor of interviewing Lawrence. Together we sat, one lady reporter to another, and talked about our days at the Tribune. Surprisingly, there were a lot of similarities even though our time at the Tribune holds a gap of over 60 years!
“It’s been a long time since I wrote for The Cullman Tribune,” Lawrence began. “I started when I was 13, I think. Maybe I was 14. At the time, my mother didn’t take the paper and somebody told me that if I wrote the community news, they would send me the paper,” she smiled. “I think it was Mr. Arnold himself (the Tribune’s then-publisher) who told me that. So I started writing the North Vinemont News and wrote every year until October 1950 when I went to Detroit, Michigan. I lived up there five months and then I came back home to Alabama. Someone else had taken my place at the Tribune by then.
“I wrote silly things really. I had asked Mr. Arnold what kind of news was I supposed to write about and he said, ‘just anything, you know; things that happen in the community.’ So I would report who visited so-and-so on Sundays and if somebody went on vacation. I would tell who had gone on dates on the weekends and when people got married. We (my girlfriends and I) were always tickled when the boys read about our dates in the paper,” she giggled. “There was just something about the news.”
Celebrating the good things in life is the best part of the job. Sadly, just like today, the news wasn’t always good.
“I was writing for the paper during the war (WWII),” she began. “There was a lot to write about back then; lots of people were getting telegrams and some of them weren’t very enjoyable. I remember when my first cousin, Able Drake, got a telegram. It was to notify him that his son was missing in action. That was really big news in my community. It wasn’t too long after he had gotten another telegram saying that his son was killed in action.”
I could totally relate to what Lawrence was telling me. I shudder at the tragic news I come across, but I also enjoy writing about the many good things going on in the community as well. The difference between the two of us is that my reporting spans all over Cullman County, thanks to modern gadgets like smartphones, the internet and my car. They help me get my information in a snap. But back in the 1930s and 40s, reporters had to find their own news a little differently.
“We didn’t have telephones back then; there were only about three or four families in the community that did, be we never used them. I just wrote what I heard, which was usually what was talked about on my front porch. Back then we always visited our neighbors or they would come and visit us. That’s where I would find out what was going on.
“One year it was my daddy’s birthday, I don’t how old he was, but our honored guest was Big Jim Folsom and his family. They came out and spent the day with us for the party. That was a big write-up.
“Sometimes I would be in town and would walk by the Tribune office. Mr. Arnold would be sitting there in the window and I would go in and tell him, ‘I don’t know anything worth writing about,’ but he would always tell me, ‘you’re doing good, just keep writing.’”
A little encouragement goes a long way, which is something I can totally relate to. So once we finish our work, there’s another big difference between the two of us that I realize. Today, when I complete an article, I simply zip it via email to my editor. Back in Lawrence’s day, she would pay 3 cents to send it via snail-mail to Arnold!
Lawrence and I had a wonderful visit. She and her daughters made the perfect hostesses. We shared some delicious cake and lots of stories. Together we laughed about silly things that Lawrence and I, as reporters, shared; one being our love for seeing our work in the newspaper and saving each edition until we completely run out of room and have to throw them out!
There’s just something neat about the women of the Cullman Tribune; no matter how old or how young they are, they enjoy what they do and make lots of new friends along the way. Community matters, indeed.
