A BEAT COMES OF AGE
One Baby Boomer Turns Fifty Every Seven Seconds.
The Press Is Paying Attention

BY MARY ELLEN SCHOONMAKER

Although all newspapers do stories that bear on aging -- the local senior center, the presidential candidates' positions on Medicare reform, prescription drug benefits -- regular, consistent coverage of aging issues is often minimal. But at about fifty papers around the country, the age beat has become a full-fledged specialty, and a full-time job at fifteen of those.

It's a good beat. Some veteran age-beat reporters have the run of the paper and may see their stories placed anywhere from page one to business, life-style, even sports. They have columns and Web sites and write books based on their reporting. And some have prizes. Michael Vitez of The Philadelphia Inquirer won a Pulitzer Prize in 1997 for his series on death anddying, which grew out of his regular work on the beat.

These reporters are covering not just people of a certain age, but a historic change, as the U.S. population ages as never before. The baby boomers, one of whom turns fifty every seven seconds, will be the largest single generation of older people in history. The age-beat audience is not only older people, but also middle-aged readers who are caring for their parents and starting to think about the last part of their own lives.

"A reporter must delve into economics, psychology, culture, law, education, ethics, politics, and medicine, even real estate development and city planning, to do a proper job," says Maureen West of The Arizona Republic. She is one of a small group of reporters who get together each year at the conventions of the American Society on Aging and the Gerontological Society of America. They are members of the Journalists Exchange on Aging, which publishes a quarterly newsletter, AgeBeat, with a circulation of about 700. "We're a small, friendly network," West says. "Reporters can call us for advice."

The age beat can range from news of medical breakthroughs, Social Security, and Medicare reforms, to the growth of assisted-living communities, to John Glenn going back into space. It can have a big impact on readers. Age-beat reporters say they are often inundated with comments and questions and tips.

They point out, too, that the appeal of the coverage often goes beyond the elderly. When she had the age beat, for example, Denise Gamino of the Austin American-Statesman wrote several articles in 1997 about Lela and Raymond Howard, a couple in their eighties who went for a drive in their car and disappeared. They had been going to a nearby festival but ended up several hundred miles into Arkansas before they drove into a ravine. The bodies were not found for two weeks.

Gamino visited their empty house, retraced their steps as far as she could, and, in one story, wrote that they were on a "roadtrip into thin air." That image caught the attention of the leader of an Austin rock group, Fastball, who used her stories as inspiration for the million-selling hit, "The Way," about a couple who vanish without a trace. Gamino learned about her connection to the hit song from the American-Statesman's rock critic, who had interviewed the band.

Who could have guessed that millions of teenagers would love a song about an old man recovering from brain surgery and a woman with Alzheimer's driving aimlessly around the backroads of Texas and Arkansas?

Another pioneer on the beat is Diane Lade of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. She was recently working on two stories that show the range she brings to the beat: a profile of a ninety-five-year-old ballroom dancing champion and an analysis of campaign contributions by the nursing home industry. She writes a bimonthly business column, "Mature Money." And she is organizing six community forums to discuss three topics chosen by older readers from a list of ten, including Medicare and prescription drug coverage, long-term care, and problems with HMOs. A series of resulting articles will summarize the discussions and the package will be presented to the Florida legislature.

Lade says the legislative package is a great way to give older people a voice and demonstrate that the paper is serious about their interests. "Papers have all kinds of programs to attract young readers," she says. "Older readers are by and large ignored."

It is generally reporters who first propose an age beat at a newspaper, says Paul Kleyman, the editor of Aging Today, a publication of the American Society on Aging, and the founder of the Journalists Exchange on Aging. The beat "has percolated up from the bottom of the newsroom," he says, often "created and driven by reporters who see things happening in their own families and communities that are not being covered."

Warren Wolfe of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune says aging is the "most exciting reporting job" he has had. He echoes other reporters who say the beat can be as broad and deep as you want to make it. A twenty-six part series he wrote in 1992 on all aspects of care-giving for older people, from mental health and Alzheimer's to parents who won't do what you want them to, ran once a week for half a year, then was published as a book. Wolfe says he still gets comments and questions about the series.

At the Orange County Register in southern California, Jane Glenn Haas has discovered numerous ways to reach readers. She covers aging trends for the paper's culture section, writes a nationally syndicated column on aging, "Our Time," has a weekly cable television show, has started a Web site (www.womansage .com), and has published a collection of her columns.

As she sees it, her audience of baby boomers and their parents can span up to four generations. To create a bond with them, she sometimes uses her own experience, writing, for example, about her face lift, complete with before and after photos, and her bout with breast cancer. She also writes about issues in what she calls "social medicine," such as understanding the financial ins and outs of home care and finding the right assisted-living arrangements.

The diversity and depth of the beat, says James Birren, associate director of UCLA's Center on Aging, comes from refusing to simplify. Take the way older people approach the vicissitudes of aging. Some are "explorers," who want to actively add to their life experience; they are fairly flexible and not afraid of trying something new. Others are "conservers," who want to hold on to what they have; they are more cautious and fearful of the unfamiliar and have a much harder time coping with change. An information-rich aging beat can be of great help to them and their families.

"Describing the opportunities and offering new models," Birren says -- "that's what this aging revolution is all about." Like the enthusiastic journalists on the beat, he believes the media have a special role to play in mapping the uncharted territory of our longer lives.  

Mary Ellen Schoonmaker is a member of the editorial board and a columnist at The Record in Hackensack, New Jersey.