An honest mistake

By Angie Bornemann
Posted: November 14, 2008

In the newspaper business, a good picture is indeed worth the proverbial thousand words.

Unfortunately, a bad photo also draws attention, and once it’s in print, you can’t take it back.

In the Nov. 5 Towson Times, the week of the presidential election, a photo showing students at a mock election pep rally printed much darker than the actual photo.

Bottom line: It was difficult to tell that the female student who was campaigning for and portraying Barack Obama was wearing a costume mask. (And yes, another girl wore a John McCain mask, although she was not in the photo.)

Instead, and here I cringe, it almost looked as if the student was wearing “blackface,” a racist practice once common in minstrel shows.

Two readers contacted me about the photo.

One telephoned to say he was deeply offended and shocked by the photo. Another commented online about how bad the photo looked, but added that when he looked at the Web version of the story, he could see that the student was wearing a mask - there was a run on Obama and McCain masks at costume shops at Halloween.

You can link to the Web story and photo here:

I never got a chance to talk to the man who telephoned because the phone number he left was incorrect.

But his message implied that the Towson Times deliberately printed an offensive photograph of Obama. And that bothers me.

If he had gone to our Web site, he would not only have seen a proper version of the photo in question, but also a handsome portrait of the president-elect in another story that was part of our election coverage.

You may link to the latter story here:

Also, if the caller had studied that issue of the paper, he would have seen that several other photos also were much too dark.

Printing a newspaper on giant presses is part art and part science. Obviously, in this case, the outcome was regrettable. For that, I apologize.

But allow me to reiterate: The mistake was not intentional.

Reactions to the photo, like the election, serve as a reminder of how far this country has come in race relations - and how far it has to go.

Comment on this entry • View 1 response

user stevetowson says...

Printing is indeed a science. Having a brother who is the head of the art department, and quality control at Maryland Cup Company I know the headaches he deals with on a daily basis.
It does amaze me though as to what this paper reacts to, and what it ignores.

Posted 12:45 PM, 11.17.08

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