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After working for 10 newspapers in
seven states during 25 years in journalism, we made our boldest move to date
in 2010: Leaving the newspaper biz, choosing to stay in Middle Tennessee and
beginning a new career.
The Oppmanns
moved to Murfreesboro, Tenn.,
when Andrew was promoted
in 2007 and joined Gannett Tennessee.
For more than three years, he was an executive for the newspapers in Murfreesboro, Nashville
and Clarksville.
But then, shortly after his 16th anniversary as a Gannett
employee, we opted to get off the merry-go-round and unpack our moving
boxes for good. Lucky for us, a terrific opportunity materialized for us
here, as Andrew is now associate vice president and spokesman for Middle Tennessee State University, serving as
its lead marketing and communication executive.
2010
HEADLINES (Updated December)
- Do
you miss New Orleans?: Elise
and Emily toured to New Orleans in May
for the Nashville
Children’s Choir performance at the New Orleans Jazz Festival.
You can see a video
of their show-stopper song, “Do You Know What it Means to Miss New Orleans” by clicking here
(note: this performance is a recreation later in Nashville). Elise and Emily were
stranded in New Orleans for an extra day
due to the historic floods in Nashville
closing our airport.
- They
are acting! All three Oppmann girls
were in the Murfreesboro
Center for the
Arts’ presentation of Gypsy (all were kid “acts”). It
was only supposed to be just
Emily and Sarah, but Rachel charmed her way onto the cast!
2009
HEADLINES (Updated November)
- Elise grew a garden! And it
was a real success. You can see a picture of it here in its
early stages.
- Elise named Senior Associate:
Hollister Trubow and Associates, the PR firm
run by Elise’s old boss in Cincinnati
(you’ll see him referenced as “Pubba”
on this site), put Elise on the masthead as a senior associate. Read her bio here.
- United Way: Both
Elise and Andrew are volunteering for the United Way of Rutherford and Cannon Counties. Elise is on the
Communications Committee and was co-chair of the Campaign Kickoff Event
that featured Denny
Diamond. Andrew serves on the board as chairman-elect and headed up
the 2009 fund-raising effort.
- Andrew’s last issue of
APME News: Andrew’s
term on the board of Associated Press Managing Editors ended in October.
He was a director for five years and editor of APME News magazine for
the last two years. Here’s
a PDF copy of his last issue.
- Health Care debate hits home: The
DNJ was host to a Congressional Town Hall meeting with U.S. Rep. Bart
Gordon. Andrew served as the moderator. It was spirited, but avoided the
types of behavior that would have made national news. Here’s
one of several videos of the event on YouTube.
- Andrew appointed to Tennessee Press
Association board: Ellen, our dear friend and Andrew’s
boss, retired and TPA asked Andrew to fill Ellen’s seat on the TPA
board. Here’s
the release.
- Andrew is saving another Doughboy
statue:
This one is in Clarksville
and is scheduled to be unveiled by April 15, 2010. You can read about it
at www.SaveOurDoughboy.com.
You may recall that Andrew did something similar in Appleton.
- Elise has been active in the
local PEO chapter: She transferred her membership from Appleton. Read about them here.
- Emily and Sarah in the Jungle
Book:
It’s the chorus, but it still promises to be fun. A production at
the Boro Center for the Arts. Read
about it here.
2008
HEADLINES (Updated December)
- Andrew named publisher of
second paper: In
September 2008, Andrew was named president and publisher of The
Leaf-Chronicle in Clarksville, Tenn., the Gannett daily newspaper and
Web site near his hometown of Hopkinsville, Ky., He’ll serve as
publisher of both the Clarksville and Murfreesboro papers and Web sites,
which means he’ll be traveling up I-24 to see family and friends
quite a bit in the days to come. The family will remain in Murfreesboro (we just
moved there!). Read
about it by clicking here..
- Elise elected to Girl Scouts
board: After
a brief interruption in service due to her move from Wisconsin
to Tennessee,
Elise was elected as a member-at-large to the Board of Directors to the
Girl Scouts of Middle Tennessee. She represents Rutherford
and surrounding counties. Here’s the Web site
for the council and here’s articles from The
Tennessean and The
DNJ.
- Andrew named outstanding
alumnus for 2008: The family went up to Lexington
in November to accept the honor from the University
of Kentucky’s College of Communications and Information
Studies. Here’s
the press release from the university.
2007
HEADLINES (Updated December):
- Emily’s
debut performance with Nashville
Children’s Choir: Emily
is in the Preparatory Choir, one of several tiers within the Belmont
University-affiliated organization. Here’s a shot of Emily
aglow in December after her choir’s Christmas program. No
audio available yet (we’ve ordered a CD), but
here’s more on the choir.
- Alas,
Andrew’s classic Avalon is no more: A 16-year-old lad in a
hurry to get to high school slammed into Andrew’s vintage 1995 Toyota (crumpling
the front, driver’s-side panel and driver’s door one October
morning as he was driving Emily and Sarah to their elementary school.
Aches and pains, along with several bruises and cuts (and a few chipped
teeth), but nothing more serious (if the impact would have been a few
more inches to the right, it would have been a much different, sadder
tale).
- Andrew
at the Ruthies: Andrew
was the emcee at The Daily News Journal’s 13th annual
Ruthies Awards presentation event (the newspaper’s reader’s
choice awards) in October. You
can see a video of the event here.
- Our
sad news: Mimi’s passing Anne
Freeman Peace, Andrew’s mother and Mimi to the girls, died
suddenly on Aug. 20. This was a real blow to us, given one of the joys
of moving to Tennessee
was to be within an easy drive of her house. Frankly, this is the reason
why we waited so long to update the site. Here’s a link to the
eulogy Andrew delivered at her funeral at First United
Methodist Church in Hopkinsville, Ky.
- Emily
and Sarah test their way into the Discovery School!
The day
after Elise drove the kids down to Tennessee to house-hunt in late June,
she dropped them off for enrollment testing for the Discovery School
at Reeves Rogers, a public school in the Murfreesboro City Schools
system designated for high achievers. Perhaps we should drive them for
13 hours in a crowded mini-van on the night before they do any kind of
big testing… ‘cause they did great
and got in the school! Here’s
more about the school, as well as some classroom shots of Emily
(Mrs. McCarthy’s class) and Sarah
(Mrs. Guevart’s class).
·
BACK TO TENNESSEE!:
Here’s some information about the new jobs: 1) Click here to read the Gannett press
release on Andrew’s promotion in Murfreesboro
and Nashville.
2) Click here to read The Tennessean’s
story on the hiring (BlackBerry version). 3) Click here to find out more about The DNJ.
4) Click here to find out more about The
Tennessean.5) Dan Flannery named Executive Editor
of The Post-Crescent, replacing Andrew.
·
ELISE HONORED BY GIRL SCOUTS: The Girl Scouts of the Fox River Area surprised Elise with its
Thanks Badge for her work as board president on the recent council
consolidation efforts. For those unfamiliar with the GSUSA uniform,
it’s more of a medal than a badge. No story, but photo here.
·
P-C WINS 12 AWARDS IN MILWAUKEE PRESS CLUB COMPETITION: Appleton took home the most first-place awards (seven) of any
newspaper. Twelve awards total, for categories ranging from Best Web Site to
Best Local Sports Column, See the list here.
·
P-C DEBUTS STREAMING VIDEO, OTHER INNOVATIONS FOR GANNETT
WISCONSIN EAST GROUP: The
newspapers in February and March produced wall-to-wall coverage of the trial
of Steven Avery, who is charged in the torture and slaying of a 25-year-old
woman. The case has received national attention because Avery was released
from prison after 18 years when DNA tests showed he had been wrongly
convicted in a 1985 rape case. The coverage includes streaming video,
multiple daily video reports, Web updates and more. Andrew,
writing for the Feb. 22 of Gannett's NEWS WATCH, provided details on what is
involved in the coverage and what early Web traffic numbers were showing.
·
POST-CRESCENT
NAMED WISCONSIN NEWSPAPER OF THE YEAR
– AGAIN: This
marks the third year in a row that The P-C has earned top honors from the
Wisconsin Newspaper Association. Appleton
earned 51 WNA awards, including 22 first-place honors, at the February
ceremony. You can read The P-C’s story here
and a report from The Associated Press here.
2006
HEADLINES:
·
P-C
REORGANIZES NEWS OPERATIONS: WARNING! This is an
eight-minute video. A shorter version (90 seconds) is here.
True journo-geeks can read
and see it all here.
·
ANDREW
RE-ELECTED TO APME BOARD: He was tapped in November for a
final three-year term on the Associated Press Managing Editors Board of
Directors during the 2006 Conference in New
Orleans. Click here for an
article on the election, here for a
report from Gannett’s NEWS WATCH on the company’s editors at
the conference, or here
for a column Andrew wrote from the city.
·
ELISE
RE-ELECTED TO TIMBER RATTLERS BOARD: She was tapped in November for a
final three-year term on the board of the not-for-profit, community-owned
Class A minor-league affiliate of the Seattle Mariners. Click here
for a list of board members and here
for more information about the Rattlers.
·
DOUGHBOY
STATUE REDEDICATED:
On Nov. 11, Appleton
rededicated its “Spirit of the American Doughboy” statue in a
Veterans Day ceremony. Loyal readers of Oppmann.Com will recall
this was one of Andrew’s projects. Click here for a
video of Andrew’s speech at the ceremony and here for a
report from CBS-5 WFRV based on an AP article. The text of Andrew’s
speech can
be found here.
·
EMILY AND
SARAH AT THE KIDS RUN: The two oldest daughters made great time and had
a great time at the 2006 Kids Run before the Fox Cities Marathon in
September. You can see them showing off their medals here.
·
RACHEL,
EMILY STAR IN TV SPOT: I can’t figure out a way yet to get it on
the Web site, but the Fox Cities Children’s Museum featured our oldest
and youngest in a TV spot. Click
here for very cool photo of Rachel shot at the same time
·
P-C WINS
FOURTH ESTATE AWARD: Our reporting on the condition of Wisconsin’s war
memorials was recognized in August by the American Legion with its top
journalism honor. Past winners include Dateline NBC, ABC News and the Detroit
News. Read the Legion’s news release here..
·
ELISE TAKES
OVER AS GIRL SCOUT COUNCIL PRESIDENT:
As
the top volunteer of the Girl Scouts of the Fox River Area,
she leads a council organization that extends into six Wisconsin
counties and serves almost 6,500 girls. The president serves as head of the
Board of Directors. You can read her official bio here.
·
DISNEYLAND VACATION: In May, we loaded up the kids
and Mimi into a jet plane and went to California
to help celebrate the 50th anniversary of Disneyland.
The park is in Orange County,
Calif., where Andrew lived 20
years ago while working for The Register. Click here for photos from the
trip, as well as other new family photos.
·
ANDREW WINS GANNETT PRESIDENT’S RING: In April, Gannett named him one of the company’s 10 best top
editors. You
can read the NEWS WATCH article here. Also, The P-C won three first-place
awards in the 2005 Best of Gannett competition, also announced
in NEWS WATCH.
·
P-C GETS NEWS WATCH NOD: The P-C’s coverage of Kimberly-Clark’s decision to close a
plant here got the attention of Gannett’s Corporate News Division. A
note Andrew
sent to his staff was reprinted in NEWS WATCH.
·
SPRING TRAINING 2006: Andrew and Don returned on
March 6 from the 14th annual edition of their baseball adventure.
This year, they went to Florida.
You can read the blog on
their adventures here.
·
P-C NAMED NEWSPAPER OF THE YEAR – AGAIN: On Feb. 4, the Wisconsin Newspaper Association named The Post-Crescent
as its Daily Newspaper of the Year, marking the second year in a row The P-C
has been awarded the honor. The P-C is Wisconsin’s
fourth-largest newspaper.
·
DOYLE TO SUNSHINE STATE:
Known to our daughters as “Mr, Kevin”
and “Miss Jenny,” the Doyles (savvy
insiders will recall they own the house across the street from us) have
accepted Frank Gannett’s invitation to move to Florida, where Kevin will be president and
publisher of the Pensacola News Journal. Happy for them, bummed out for us,
Kevin gave a remarkable interview to his new paper about his life, career
and vision of newspapering. It’s very entertaining. You can hear
an audio selection from the sit-down here.
·
P-C WINS SEVEN WELL DONE AWARDS: Gannett’s quarterly contest, announced
Jan. 27, honored efforts in public
service journalism; investigative reporting; online
video production; opinion pages; moments of life reporting and other
efforts.
2005
HEADLINES
·
RACHEL ON TIMES SQUARE:
At 12:30
a.m. Sunday, Dec. 11, the jumbo electronic billboard on Times Square in New
York City featured this photo of Rachel
(as part of Time Magazine’s Person of the Year interaction). Rachel,
born on Sept. 6, is the newest member of the Oppmann household.
·
THANKSGIVING REFLECTIONS: On Thanksgiving Day, The Post-Crescent published a column
by Andrew on Rachel, Patrick and the journey we’ve taken between
their births.
·
P-C PROJECTS WIN A RECORD
NINE WELL DONES: In
November, Gannett announced its Well Done awards for Third Quarter 2005 and
work by The Post-Crescent garnered nine awards (P-C alone and work coordinated
by The P-C on behalf of Gannett Wisconsin Newspapers). The take includes
seven certificates and two honorable mentions. Also of note: We were the only
paper outside of Louisiana,
Mississippi
and Florida
to be recognized for our coverage
of Hurricane Katrina. Read about the awards here in Gannett’s
weekly News Watch.
·
SAVE THE DOUGHBOY CAMPAIGN A
SUCCESS: A campaign Andrew spearheaded in The P-C to
restore a World War I memorial in Appleton
raised enough money to get the job done. Read
about the milestone here. Another column, on Andrew’s grandfather
who served in WWI, can be found by
clicking here.
·
ANDREW NAMED PROGRAM CHAIR
FOR APME’S 2007 CONFERENCE: You can read about this in the
article in Gannett's weekly News Watch, written by Ann Clark, on
Gannett’s involvement with the Associated Press Managing Editors at the
2005 San Jose
conference.
·
ANDREW ENDS HIS STINT AS THE
BEER MAN: From the
end of the July to the start of October, he took over the nationally
syndicated column while The P-C searched for a new suds scribe. You can read
a selection of his stuff from Web sites in Vineland,
N.J.,; Lafayette,
Ind.; Atlanta;
Reno;
and Asbury
Park, N.J.
·
IT’S A GIRL!: Click here for a special page
devoted to the miracle baby, who joined the family on Sept. 6, 2005
·
ANDREW NAMED GENERAL MANAGER
OF THE P-C: He keeps
his gig as executive editor, but picks up oversight responsibility for The
Post-Crescent’s business operations and community relations. You can
read about it on the Gannett Co.
Web site
·
COLUMNS ON PATRICK WIN BEST
OF GANNETT HONOR: Here’s
the list of 2004 Best
of Gannett winners, which includes news of Andrew’s first-place
award for best columns in Gannett’s Division II. A PDF version of the
Best of Gannett book can be
found here (turn to page 44). The columns themselves can be found here.
·
NEWSPAPER OF THE YEAR: In February 2005, The Post-Crescent was named 2004
Newspaper of the Year by the Wisconsin Newspaper Association in February
after winning a record 49 awards in its Better Newspaper Contest..
2004
HEADLINES
·
CAPTAIN FAVRELOUS: In December 2004, Andrew wrote an article for
Gannett’s NEWS WATCH publication on a special section done by The
Post-Crescent to mark the 200th career start of Green Bay Packers
quarterback Brett Favre. Click here
to read about how a newspaper idea takes shape.
·
ANDREW ELECTED TO APME BOARD:
In October 2004, Andrew was voted to the Board of Directors of the Associated Press Managing Editors at the
group’s annual conference in Louisville.
·
REPORTING FROM THAILAND: In August 2004, The Post-Crescent, on behalf of
Gannett Wisconsin Newspapers, produced a 16-page special report on the Hmong
migration from Thailand
to Wisconsin.
Click here to see a Web site
devoted to the effort and here to see a PDF
version of the special section. The effort got three Well
Done awards in Gannett’s third quarter 2004 contest.
·
OPPMANNS
AT THE PGA CHAMPIONSHIP: Andrew, on assignment for
Gannett Wisconsin Newspapers, spent a week at Whistling Straits (near Sheboygan, Wis.)
in August 2004, coordinating group coverage of the PGA Championship. Elise,
Emily and Sarah got to visit the links as well. Click here for Gannett
tourney photos and here for our
snapshots. The effort got two Well
Done awards in Gannett’s third quarter 2004 contest.
·
SAD NEWS: In
April 2004, two weeks after announcing an expected new arrival to our family
and friends, we went through another heartbreak. For
details, click here.
·
FREEMAN’S FUR SHOP
CLOSES: The family business, which
Andrew’s grandfather, Howard Freeman, opened 68 years ago in Hopkinsville, Ky.,
shut down on April 16,
2004.
·
P-C HONORED: In April 2004, The
Post-Crescent was named Gannett’s Most Improved Newspaper and a
finalist for its Freedom of Information Award. For details, click here.
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