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CAPE FEAR MEMORIAL BRIDGE CLOSURE: UPDATES, RESOURCES, AND CONTEXT

Capital Gazette Hasn't Missed A Day Of Publication Since Deadly Shooting

ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:

The man accused of killing five people at the Capital Gazette last month was formally indicted by a grand jury in Maryland today. The man had a longstanding grievance against the paper dating back years. He could face life in prison.

AILSA CHANG, HOST:

The day of the shooting - just hours after, in fact - reporter Chase Cook tweeted these words - I can tell you this; we are putting out a damn paper tomorrow. And sure enough, the next morning the paper was on newsstands with the photos of the five staffers who were killed in the attack on the front page. They haven't missed a day since thanks in part to an outpouring of help from other journalists around the country.

Andy Green is coordinating the extra help. Green is editorial page editor for The Baltimore Sun, which owns the Capital Gazette. Welcome.

ANDY GREEN: Great to be here.

CHANG: So this week I understand you issued a call-out to journalists to come help publish the daily paper. And I understand just within a couple of days, you had way more offers than you could use.

GREEN: Within 24 hours, we had...

CHANG: Wow.

GREEN: ...Responses from more than 380 journalists all across the country.

CHANG: That's wonderful to hear.

GREEN: Yeah.

CHANG: What kinds of jobs have people been filling in on?

GREEN: Reporting and editing mainly, also some multimedia work - video, photos. You know, we at The Sun have been doing everything we possibly can. They - as you said, they are our sister paper. And, you know, the courage that the reporters have shown there and the determination to keep the mission of the Capital going has been really inspiring to us, and we have been committed from the start to do whatever we can to help. And it's just been great to see so many journalists from across the country feeling exactly the same way we do.

CHANG: Are some of these journalists people who have had former ties with the Capital Gazette or former ties with The Baltimore Sun?

GREEN: Many of them are but not all by any means. One of the first people that came here was an editor from The Virginian-Pilot who had no connection to either, just wrote and said, I'm getting in my car and coming up; put me on double shifts; you know, whatever you need, I'm here for you.

CHANG: And are some of these reporters reporting on beats that are closely related to the beats they cover back home, or is this a chance for some reporters to try something completely new?

GREEN: Certainly. For example, we had a reporter in from The New York Times who used to cover education for us and wound up spending a great part of her week trying to write about the efforts to reconstruct the city dock market in Annapolis, which has...

CHANG: Wow.

GREEN: ...Been vexing people in Annapolis since before The New York Times was established. And so she...

(LAUGHTER)

GREEN: ...Had a tough week trying to wrestle that into shape.

CHANG: (Laughing) Steep learning curve - you know, at a time when the field of journalism seems to get attacked on a regular basis, I'm curious. How has this experience the last few weeks made you feel about what you do for a living?

GREEN: What I think this has demonstrated more than anything else is that from those of us who work at community newspapers like the Capital up through, you know, national and international papers like The Times and The Wall Street Journal and The Post and others - NPR as well, who helped us out...

CHANG: Yeah.

GREEN: ...We all see our role and our mission in very much the same way. We're about seeing what's going on in the world around us, reporting on it fairly and honestly and trying to keep those close to us informed about what they need to know in their world. And so to see that common sense of purpose among so many - literally at this point hundreds of people in our profession - has been, you know, a bright spot in what has otherwise been a very, very terrible situation.

CHANG: Andy Green is the editorial page editor for The Baltimore Sun. Thank you very much.

GREEN: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.