Originally published by: School of Journalism and Mass Communication, The University of IowaOriginal author: Daisy Hutzell-Rodman (B.A. 1998)
Originally published on: July 19, 2019

Many journalists can tell you the moment the knew they wanted to be a reporter; in my case, that moment was in November 1991--the destruction of the Berlin Wall. I remember watching the news in history class and wondering what it must be like in the Soviet Union.

In the mid-1990s, I enrolled in the University of Iowa’s school of journalism. I enrolled in the UI because it was where I wanted to be—my parents and grandmother went to Iowa and I loved Iowa City. Later I discovered Iowa has one of the strongest journalism programs in the Midwest. The summer after my freshman year, I went back home to Knoxville, Iowa, and interned at the Knoxville Journal-Express.

I wrote for smaller publications and creatively for several years, and I landed a full-time journalism job in the mid-2000s, working on the announcements desk at the Omaha World-Herald. Knowing this could be a great chance to prove myself, I wrote wedding, engagement, and anniversary announcements. I poured myself into my job, even though I essentially wrote the same thing over and over. I desperately wanted to be a hard news or features reporter, but the company determined I was best suited to special sections. Some were fun—Kids Camp was always a joy as I got to talk to youngsters headed toward their passions of theater, the outdoors, or music. Some were not as fun—one section in particular dictated that I speak with exactly two sources about exactly two topics of a company’s choosing. I took each job that came to me with a positive attitude and a smile, even if I did not like it.

At the same time, I joined the Omaha Press Club and poured my time outside of the office into this organization. I coordinated their Excellence in Journalism Awards, helped on the marketing committee, and eventually became a part of their executive board, then the president. This club gave me the chance to meet several long-standing journalists in the area and to prove myself to them as a go-getter.  A few years later, Todd Lemke and I sat down for an interview, and I was offered the position on staff at Omaha Magazine.

Today I am able to write interesting articles such as those of young professionals and artists in the community; I spend hours wordsmithing articles into great writing, and I wake up each day thinking how lucky I am to have a job in journalism—a job that at one point I wanted so badly I could taste.

There have been good days—I recently assigned one writer an article about a rocket scientist. There have been bad days—I know how to spell the word barbecue with a “c” because I once spelled it with a “q” in an article and got in trouble with an editor. There have been funny days—I once saw a photo of a bride and thought “she looks like she’s flipping off the cameraman.” I called the mother to let her know this, and she supplied a different photo, along the way telling me thank you for catching that, yes, indeed, the bride was flipping off the cameraman because she was angry with him and thought it would be funny to send that photo to be immortalized in print. Each day, however, is different, and each day is memorable.