Eliza Gaines named managing editor of Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Eliza Gaines will be the next managing editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, succeeding David Bailey, who is retiring effective March 16.
Publisher Walter Hussman Jr. on Monday announced the changes in back-to-back announcements, about 30 minutes apart, in the newsroom.
Gaines, 32, has been WEHCO Media’s vice president of audience development serving the Democrat-Gazette
and other newspapers operated by the company. She’s the first woman to lead the newspaper, which was founded in 1878.
Gaines has been a fundamental part in the newspaper’s two-year effort to convert from a print edition to a digital replica, Hussman said, calling the idea “a huge risk to save the newspaper.” It has been successful so far, he said.
Gaines said a challenge will be getting new readers, especially younger ones, to subscribe to the newspaper’s digital replica.
She is Hussman’s daughter, and the fourth generation the Hussman family to be in the newspaper business. She is a former editor of the Sentinel Record in Hot Springs. She was a travel reporter for the San Francisco
Chronicle before earning a master’s degree in journalism in 2012 from the University of North Carolina.
“I’m excited to get started,” Gaines said in brief remarks to a newsroom filled with employees of every department.
During the announcement for Bailey, Hussman said, “The best thing that can happen to a publisher is to have a really good editor.”
Hussman said Bailey was one of those, and only the fourth top editor in the 47 years since Hussman has been publisher of the newspaper. “I feel really fortunate,” Hussman said.
Bailey, 70, has been the newsroom’s top editor since the resignation in May 2012 of Griffin Smith Jr. Smith’s position as executive editor was never filled.
“It’s been a blast for 27 years — the most fun I’ve ever had,” Bailey said.
Bailey, managing editor since December 1998, came to the newspaper in 1993 as assistant city editor. He was named city editor in February 1994 and placed in charge of day-today local news coverage.
Bailey said he had intended to stay just one year.
“The journalism was good, and the people I worked with were even better,” he said.
Known throughout the newsroom for his preference for a warmer climate, Bailey said he and his wife, Twyla, eventually will move to the Gulf Coast, where they own a condominium and spend much of their vacation time.
With print advertising dwindling nationwide over the last 15 years, converting to digital was a must-do, Hussman has told numerous civic groups and other gatherings in the 63 counties that the Democrat-Gazette covers.