Opening night party at Arnaud’s
By Tracy Jan

The smart women unveiled flip flops from their purses while the rest teetered the 10 blocks from the Hilton New Orleans Riverside through the French Quarter’s cobblestone streets to Arnaud’s, where an opening night party and Hall of Fame induction kicked off AASFE’s 58th annual convention.

Drawn by promises of a bountiful feast – a food orgy only possible in New Orleans – the 100-plus throng of mostly feature editors snaked up flights of stairs and through hallways flanked by celebrity photos, stopping only to catch a whiff of sautéed baby soft-shelled crabs.

Through eight cozy rooms dimly lit by opulent chandeliers – dimly lit perhaps to hide the obscene amount of calories about to be ingested -- editors grazed, occasionally catching a glimpse of themselves in the gold-gilded mirrors. Boats full of fresh oysters and shrimp on ice. Veal in wild mushroom sauce. Alligator snapping turtle soup. Duck in blueberry sauce. Mini crab cakes. Deep-fried trout. Men in tuxedos came with tray after tray of crawfish pie, shrimp wrapped in bacon and smoked pompano from the Gulf. Some revelers dispensed with forks altogether, picking up the delicacies, licking their fingers.

On this humid September evening, amid the gastronomic decadence in the 86-year-old restaurant just off Bourbon Street, a man was honored. Miami Herald columnist Leonard Pitts Jr. became the 18th journalist inducted into AASFE’s Features Hall of Fame. Pitts, who won the 2004 Pulitzer for commentary, began his career in 1976 writing for SOUL, a national black entertainment tabloid. He joined The Herald in 1991 as a pop music critic and since 1994 has written a syndicated column on pop culture, social issues and family life. For his contributions to feature journalism, Pitts earned a glass leaf-shaped trophy.

Addressing the herd of editors, Pitts expounded on his passion for strong editing. “If it goes into the paper and it’s stupid, it’s going to be stupid forever,” he said. He said he appreciates editors who will keep him from looking stupid years from now when readers pull up his columns on the future equivalent of microfiche. Pitts will speak at the convention’s Friday luncheon.

“He’s made a difference in people’s lives,” said Janet Grimley, assistant managing editor at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and a former AASFE president. “He’s pushed people out of their comfort zones. Made people think.”

Pitts is the third columnist to be inducted into the Hall of Fame since the distinction began in 1997 to honor people instrumental in raising the level and visibility of feature journalism, said Michael Smith, a 2000 Hall of Fame inductee and former feature editor of the Detroit Free Press who introduced Pitts. Eppie Lederer and Pauline Phillips – a.k.a. Ann Landers and Dear Abby – won the recognition in 2001.

Smith, the director of media management at Northwestern University, said the organization wants to eventually display the Hall of Fame at a place like the Poynter Institute in St. Petersburg, Fla. or the Newseum in Arlington, Va.

Attention of the editors soon turned back to the task before them – dessert. Mini bites of pecan pie. Dense chocolate squares. Cups of Bananas Foster.

Drinks and conversation flowed from room to room. Colleagues catching up. Meeting for the first time. Then the dim lights brightened. And brightened some more. Until it became clear it was time to go.

Tracy Jan is an education reporter at The Oregonian and a 2004 AASFE fellow.