By Elliott Brack
Editor and publisher
OCT. 23, 2018 | Many of us could name one or two key people who have dramatically changed our lives. One such person died recently who set our life on a new path, one we never imagined.
That person was Dr. Wallace B. Eberhard, professor emeritus of journalism at the University of Georgia. He died peacefully surrounded by his family on his 87th birthday, October 7, after a two week illness.
Wally was born in Niles, Michigan, enrolled at the University of Michigan, enlisted in the Army, graduated from Michigan, edited a weekly newspaper, then got interested in teaching. He earned a master’s and Ph. D. at the University of Wisconsin. He taught hundreds of students the craft of journalism, coming to the UGA faculty in 1970. He was a retired colonel in the Army Reserve. He loved libraries, was a master of journalism history, known as a wordsmith of the first order, and believed in old fashioned, hard-nosed journalism.
Those of us not into university affairs may not know this, but most slots on college faculties are filled in February. So, you can see how the Henry W. Grady School of Journalism was in a panic mode in late August, 1973. A faculty member who was head of the news-editorial sequence had a flare up with the school’s dean, and resigned. The school desperately needed to fill that teaching slot for its school year, which was to begin in three weeks.
Eberhard
In those days, the Georgia Press Institute was held each February in Athens, and we attended several times. That’s where we met Wally Eberhard. At some point, I remember telling him my best teachers in graduate school were former newspapermen, and I thought I would enjoy teaching……once I retired.
Several years later, when I was publishing a weekly newspaper in South Georgia, came a call from Wally Eberhard, remembering our previous conversation. Essentially, he asked: “You want to start teaching for the next school year in three weeks?”
I was flabbergasted, with this coming out of left field. To make a long story short, somehow the effort worked out. We moved our family to Athens, and at that late date, even found a furnished rental home, and enjoyed a year’s “reverse sabbatical.” I had planned to return to publishing duties in the town of Jesup.
At the Grady School, I taught five classes in Beginning Reporting, and for third quarter, undertook to develop a course in Newspaper Management. That course had been in the school catalog, but had not been taught in years, with no faculty member having the required experience. The course was fun to set up and teach. Since then, Newspaper Management has become not only a course, but a full major for students.
After taking the newspaper management class to Atlanta to visit the Journal-Constitution, we returned via Lawrenceville, comparing that town’s Gwinnett Daily News with the larger Atlanta newspaper. While there, the late Publisher Bob Fowler took me aside, telling me of his needs to add to his management staff, and offered me the job of vice president and general manager. We had known each other through the Georgia Press Association.
Later I would stay in that position for 13 years, then join the Atlanta Journal Constitution as their associate publisher of the Gwinnett EXTRA for 13 more years, and retire in 2001. I’ve published GwinnettForum on the Internet since.
Wally Eberhard brought me to Athens for a year. My subsequent joining the Gwinnett Daily News changed my life, giving it a distinct turn. If he hadn’t remembered that chance remark……I may still have been in South Georgia.
WALLACE B. EBERHARD: 1931-2018: May you rest in peace.
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