{"id":2304,"date":"2022-07-14T19:48:16","date_gmt":"2022-07-14T19:48:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/"},"modified":"2024-03-05T16:58:03","modified_gmt":"2024-03-05T16:58:03","slug":"francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/","title":{"rendered":"A tribute to the consummate reporter\/writer: Francis X. Clines"},"content":{"rendered":" \n
\n
\n EDITOR’S NOTE:<\/strong> This tribute is shared with permission from our friends at The Poynter Institute.<\/em>

F<\/span>rank Clines arrived at The New York Times <\/em>in 1958, one year before the death of that most brilliant Times writer Meyer Berger<\/a>. It was the greatest replenishment of talent the Big Apple had seen since Mickey Mantle replaced Joe DiMaggio in centerfield for the New York Yankees.

Now Clines has died,<\/a> leaving behind a legacy of sharp and graceful writing, arguably unmatched in its range, energy, and creativity.

In my formative years as a newspaper writing coach, it was the work of Frank Clines that revealed to me the true potential of newspaper writing.\u00a0 He came to Poynter in the 1980s for one of our earliest writing seminars, sharing wisdom that still echoes in my brain: \u201cI knew that if I could just get out of the office, I could come back with a story.\u201d\u00a0 And, \u201cReporters have to tell the morbid truth, no apologies for that.\u201d

In 1988 Clines won the ASNE Distinguished Writing Award for deadline writing. At the time, he was covering the sectarian violence in Northern Ireland, a topic of special interest to an Irish-American Catholic. He wrote this lead out of Belfast on March 16, 1988:
Three people were killed and dozens wounded today as an assailant threw grenades into a screaming crowd at a funeral and then fled across the graveyard from enraged mourners.<\/blockquote>
Or this one three days later:
There was more macabre violence at an Irish Republican Army funeral today as two armed British soldiers in civilian clothes drove their car into a crowd of panicked mourners and were seized, beaten, and finally shot to death.

Their bloody bodies were discovered a short while later in a garbage patch.<\/blockquote>
Both of those stories were reprinted in the 1989 edition of “Best Newspapr Writing,” an annual anthology of ASNE prizewinners. That volume was edited by Poynter writing teacher Don Fry<\/a> (who died earlier this year).\u00a0 Fry wrote appreciations of Clines\u2019 stories, and interviewed him at length about his craft and his sense of mission and purpose.

One of the stories they discussed also came out of Belfast with the headline:
In Belfast, Death, Too,<\/em>

Is Diminished by Death<\/em><\/blockquote>
Here were the lead paragraphs, in which Clines takes two things that should not belong together and juxtaposes them, creating a narrative tension that carries through the story:
Beyond the coffin, out in the churchyard, red-haired Kathleen Quinn was full of fun and flirting shamelessly for all her eight years of life. \u201cMister, I\u2019m to be on the TV tonight,\u201d she told a stranger, squinting up happy and prim.\u00a0 Kathleen had taken her brother\u2019s bike and skinned her knee bloody, all while people were praying goodbye inside the church to another rebel body in another coffin.

Soon the cameras were watching the coffin being carried out from the windowless fortress of a church, down the curl of the street in the simple hamlet, and on to the ever-filling graveyard patch devoted to republican rebels.

As it turned out, the television ignored Kathleen and missed a classic Irish truth, a sight for sore eyes.\u00a0 She climbed back on the bike and heaved off in a blur, oblivious of a piece of nearby graffiti that seemed about all of life\u2019s withering dangers: \u201cI wonder each night what the monster will do to me tomorrow.’<\/blockquote>

Clines in his own words<\/strong><\/h3>
The conversation between Fry and Clines extends for 23 book pages. The best I can do here is to mine it for gold coins. Here they are:

On where he learned to tell stories:
<\/strong>\u201cI read a lot when I was a very young kid, things that were forbidden, like Mickey Spillane. Those stories heightened things. There was reality, and then there was a story about the reality.\u00a0 I\u2019ve always like that.\u201d<\/em>

On who taught him to be a good reporter:
<\/strong>\u201cAn editor\u2026named Sheldon Binn was on the city desk for all my years in the city, and he was just a very smart, very gentle, very curious man.\u00a0 You would report to him at the end of the day and that really focused what we were doing. You had to tell him a story.<\/em>

\u201cHe would say to you, \u2018And then Rockefeller did what?\u2019 He would always stay on the level that I like. And he\u2019d laugh or not, and say, \u2018You know, that guy\u2019s unbelievable,\u2019 just like in the street. By the time you wrote the story, you were reinforced in what was amusing or important. He was always human.\u201d<\/em>

On what it was like to report as an eyewitness, including being 75 feet from a grenade thrown at a funeral:
<\/strong>\u201cI was kinda watching from behind a tombstone. And I took some notes, and it was just a wild scene.\u00a0 Reporters always want to witness what they write, and when you do witness, then you know that there\u2019s no way the story won\u2019t be interesting. I was wondering whether they had buried bombs and whether the graveside would be nasty. Then I saw the crowd was chasing this guy who did all this, and by standing on top of a tombstone, I could watch as he ran down the hill. He wheeled on them, shot a few of them dead, and they finally caught him on this expressway, and the cops arrested him.\u00a0 Even then, after that, the funeral of the three IRA people resumed.\u201d<\/em>

On writing and organizing a story:
<\/strong>\u201cEverything grows out of the lead, and the only problem in this case was that so much happened.\u00a0 You want everything to be rooted there, and you want to leave yourself options to pop all over the place, just the way the story did.\u00a0 So naturally you have to get the number of people who were killed, but quickly get beyond that to his notion of people in a graveyard.\u00a0 Not a \u2018cemetery\u2019; you wanted \u2018graveyard.\u2019 You start picking words right away: \u2018coming in\u2019 and \u2018throwing grenades\u2019 and \u2018people panicking.\u2019 And that\u2019s quite a circuit of emotion, I thought. So I got all that in the lead. And then once you have the lead to where you\u2019re satisfied, then it\u2019s making sure you hit enough of the different key [elements] quickly enough.\u201d<\/em>

On using a story structure people at Poynter call an \u201chourglass,\u201d where you tell the main news in the top few paragraphs but then pivot back to the beginning for a fuller chronological version:
<\/strong>\u201cSure, it\u2019s perfectly natural. If you talk again with the real people who were at a scene, they begin all over again, and they have to keep telling it.\u00a0 It\u2019s that compelling. The strategic reason is because you have more information to get in, and there is enough energy left in the story to retell it on a different level. So I just did that naturally.\u00a0 And it\u2019s a long story, longer than we\u2019re usually writing, so that naturally invites a retelling with other things in it, with more detail and more color.”<\/em>

On using the detail \u201cThe gunman ran out from under his tweed cap as he fled out onto the motorway.\u201d
<\/strong>\u201cEvery paragraph should have something like that in it, because you\u2019re in this invaluable situation where you\u2019re describing what you have seen.\u00a0 I love small sentences with just bing, bing, like that. It\u2019s hard to premeditate them. But you\u2019re grateful when they come along.\u201d<\/em>

On how he chooses how many characters should be in a story:
<\/strong>\u201cIt\u2019s a simple matter of space. If you\u2019re not careful, you can let too many people into the story, who will more or less make the same point, and eat up the story, so that you haven\u2019t told the story.\u00a0 It is, after all, a story first, and not a catalog of comments.\u00a0 I have to rerun that every time: don\u2019t let a crowd into the story.\u00a0 I always feel guilty when I interview a lot of people and then don\u2019t use many of them.\u00a0 But you\u2019re interviewing them for your telling of the story and not for their telling of the story, unless they were in some unique position.”<\/em>

On what Clines means when he talks about writing \u201cnaturally\u201d:
<\/strong>\u201cYou read, and you know what you like when you read and that rubs off. It\u2019s a give and take, and you\u2019re always self-adjusting. It\u2019s a learning process, but it\u2019s self-taught. I do a lot of revising. I cut a lot of words, and I tighten phrases, a lot of small stuff that\u2019s important to me, that takes out sprawling writing. But I do it quickly as I go along. I don\u2019t write once and then go back over it and over it again and again.\u00a0 I just know that there\u2019s something in a paragraph I don\u2019t like, and I\u2019ll get back to it in a minute.\u00a0 I\u2019ll look at it and say, \u2018Yeah, well, I shouldn\u2019t have done all of that.\u2019 I can take out this and that, and still save the one word that makes it okay.\u00a0 I do it quickly though.”<\/em>

On thinking about the reader:
<\/strong>\u201cYou\u2019re always imagining whether you\u2019re getting in the way of the reader or not. So you picture yourself staying out of the reader\u2019s way, but also conveying what you thought was the most interesting thing, particularly the most interesting feeling.\u00a0 You know when you have an honest reaction.\u00a0 That\u2019s important to get into the story, so the trick is to find an oblique way of doing it. That, to me, is as important as some guy\u2019s name. And that\u2019s the fun of it. That\u2019s the human part of it. That\u2019s the thing that makes it a story. It\u2019s one human being saying, \u2018Look at this.\u2019 And that way you\u2019re talking as an individual to another individual.\u201d<\/em>

Who was Francis X. Clines?<\/strong><\/h3>
Not many New York Times obituaries read like hagiography of a saint\u2019s life, but this one of Frank Clines<\/a> by Robert D. McFadden \u2014 another Times’ great \u2014 comes close.

At the time of his Northern Ireland stories in 1988, Clines had already spent three decades at the Times.\u00a0 He grew up in Brooklyn and finished one year at St. Francis College in New York before a two-year stint in the Army. He talked his way into the Times as a copy boy in 1958. He became a reporter-in-training for six years, covering police and general assignment in all five boroughs. He even wrote copy for the marquee in Times Square, maybe one of the only places where a young reporter could see his own words up in lights.

He worked his way through the following beats: real estate, Eastern Long Island, New York City welfare, and state legislature and the governor.\u00a0 From 1976 to 1979, he wrote the \u201cAbout New York\u201d column, which had been launched by Meyer Berger and given over the years only to some of the best writers at the paper.

He covered the presidential campaign of 1980, and was assigned to the Washington bureau from 1980 to 1986. He served as a correspondent in the Philippines before going to London for two years, where he reported the stories out of Northern Ireland.\u00a0 He then joined the Moscow bureau.

In the final years of his career at the paper, I got to see his byline less often, as he was writing for the editorial pages.

Clines has died the same year as his colleague Jim Dwyer<\/a>. The Times has lost two of their best \u2014 ever. Here\u2019s the good news: new generations of reporters and writers are ready to carry the torch.

***

Roy Peter Clark<\/strong> has taught writing at the Poynter Institute since 1977.\u00a0 He is the author or editor of 19 books on journalism and the writing craft including the foundational book \u201cWriting Tools.\u201d<\/em>

 \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

EDITOR’S NOTE: This tribute is shared with permission from our friends at The Poynter Institute. rank Clines arrived at The New York Times in 1958, one year before the death of that most brilliant Times writer Meyer Berger. It was the greatest replenishment of talent the Big Apple had seen since Mickey Mantle replaced Joe […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9269,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"topics":[],"authors":[38],"issue":[],"class_list":["post-2304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-narrative-news","authors-roy-peter-clark"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nA tribute to the consummate reporter\/writer: Francis X. Clines - Nieman Storyboard<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A tribute to the consummate reporter\/writer: Francis X. Clines - Nieman Storyboard\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"EDITOR’S NOTE: This tribute is shared with permission from our friends at The Poynter Institute. rank Clines arrived at The New York Times in 1958, one year before the death of that most brilliant Times writer Meyer Berger. It was the greatest replenishment of talent the Big Apple had seen since Mickey Mantle replaced Joe […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Nieman Storyboard\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2022-07-14T19:48:16+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2024-03-05T16:58:03+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/app\/uploads\/2024\/03\/FrancisXClines-scaled-e1657826185648.jpeg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"650\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"867\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"commonmedia\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"commonmedia\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"10 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/2022\\\/07\\\/14\\\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/2022\\\/07\\\/14\\\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"commonmedia\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/ad131fac9b2e8136d6171c8575cfc226\"},\"headline\":\"A tribute to the consummate reporter\\\/writer: Francis X. Clines\",\"datePublished\":\"2022-07-14T19:48:16+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-03-05T16:58:03+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/2022\\\/07\\\/14\\\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":2011,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/2022\\\/07\\\/14\\\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/app\\\/uploads\\\/2024\\\/03\\\/FrancisXClines-scaled-e1657826185648.jpeg\",\"articleSection\":[\"Narrative News\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/2022\\\/07\\\/14\\\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\\\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/2022\\\/07\\\/14\\\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/2022\\\/07\\\/14\\\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\\\/\",\"name\":\"A tribute to the consummate reporter\\\/writer: Francis X. Clines - Nieman Storyboard\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/2022\\\/07\\\/14\\\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/2022\\\/07\\\/14\\\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/app\\\/uploads\\\/2024\\\/03\\\/FrancisXClines-scaled-e1657826185648.jpeg\",\"datePublished\":\"2022-07-14T19:48:16+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-03-05T16:58:03+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/2022\\\/07\\\/14\\\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\\\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/2022\\\/07\\\/14\\\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\\\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/2022\\\/07\\\/14\\\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\\\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/app\\\/uploads\\\/2024\\\/03\\\/FrancisXClines-scaled-e1657826185648.jpeg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/app\\\/uploads\\\/2024\\\/03\\\/FrancisXClines-scaled-e1657826185648.jpeg\",\"width\":650,\"height\":867,\"caption\":\"Francis X. Clines in a 1989 photo\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/2022\\\/07\\\/14\\\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\\\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"A tribute to the consummate reporter\\\/writer: Francis X. Clines\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/\",\"name\":\"Nieman Storyboard\",\"description\":\"\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Nieman Storyboard\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/logo\\\/image\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/app\\\/uploads\\\/2024\\\/02\\\/NiemanKOLogo.svg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/app\\\/uploads\\\/2024\\\/02\\\/NiemanKOLogo.svg\",\"width\":1,\"height\":1,\"caption\":\"Nieman Storyboard\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/logo\\\/image\\\/\"}},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/ad131fac9b2e8136d6171c8575cfc226\",\"name\":\"commonmedia\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/7a67dac1d5145031a5e3f8bcb411f86c4aed5a7ebe4244392196080637ed18af?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/7a67dac1d5145031a5e3f8bcb411f86c4aed5a7ebe4244392196080637ed18af?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/7a67dac1d5145031a5e3f8bcb411f86c4aed5a7ebe4244392196080637ed18af?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"commonmedia\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/wp\"],\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/niemanstoryboard.org\\\/author\\\/commonmedia\\\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"A tribute to the consummate reporter\/writer: Francis X. Clines - Nieman Storyboard","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"A tribute to the consummate reporter\/writer: Francis X. Clines - Nieman Storyboard","og_description":"EDITOR’S NOTE: This tribute is shared with permission from our friends at The Poynter Institute. rank Clines arrived at The New York Times in 1958, one year before the death of that most brilliant Times writer Meyer Berger. It was the greatest replenishment of talent the Big Apple had seen since Mickey Mantle replaced Joe […]","og_url":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/","og_site_name":"Nieman Storyboard","article_published_time":"2022-07-14T19:48:16+00:00","article_modified_time":"2024-03-05T16:58:03+00:00","og_image":[{"width":650,"height":867,"url":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/app\/uploads\/2024\/03\/FrancisXClines-scaled-e1657826185648.jpeg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"commonmedia","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"commonmedia","Est. reading time":"10 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/"},"author":{"name":"commonmedia","@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/#\/schema\/person\/ad131fac9b2e8136d6171c8575cfc226"},"headline":"A tribute to the consummate reporter\/writer: Francis X. Clines","datePublished":"2022-07-14T19:48:16+00:00","dateModified":"2024-03-05T16:58:03+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/"},"wordCount":2011,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/app\/uploads\/2024\/03\/FrancisXClines-scaled-e1657826185648.jpeg","articleSection":["Narrative News"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/","url":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/","name":"A tribute to the consummate reporter\/writer: Francis X. Clines - Nieman Storyboard","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/app\/uploads\/2024\/03\/FrancisXClines-scaled-e1657826185648.jpeg","datePublished":"2022-07-14T19:48:16+00:00","dateModified":"2024-03-05T16:58:03+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/app\/uploads\/2024\/03\/FrancisXClines-scaled-e1657826185648.jpeg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/app\/uploads\/2024\/03\/FrancisXClines-scaled-e1657826185648.jpeg","width":650,"height":867,"caption":"Francis X. Clines in a 1989 photo"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2022\/07\/14\/francis-x-clines-obituary-reporting-writing\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"A tribute to the consummate reporter\/writer: Francis X. Clines"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/#website","url":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/","name":"Nieman Storyboard","description":"","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/#organization","name":"Nieman Storyboard","url":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/app\/uploads\/2024\/02\/NiemanKOLogo.svg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/app\/uploads\/2024\/02\/NiemanKOLogo.svg","width":1,"height":1,"caption":"Nieman Storyboard"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/#\/schema\/person\/ad131fac9b2e8136d6171c8575cfc226","name":"commonmedia","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7a67dac1d5145031a5e3f8bcb411f86c4aed5a7ebe4244392196080637ed18af?s=96&d=mm&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7a67dac1d5145031a5e3f8bcb411f86c4aed5a7ebe4244392196080637ed18af?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7a67dac1d5145031a5e3f8bcb411f86c4aed5a7ebe4244392196080637ed18af?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"commonmedia"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp"],"url":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/author\/commonmedia\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2304"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2304\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9268,"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2304\/revisions\/9268"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9269"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2304"},{"taxonomy":"topics","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topics?post=2304"},{"taxonomy":"authors","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/authors?post=2304"},{"taxonomy":"issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/issue?post=2304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}