I’m Charles Apple. And I have a book coming out later this year that collects some of the full-page graphic stories I’ve been producing for the past five-and-a-half years for the Spokesman-Review of Spokane, Washington.
I’ve been writing newspaper stories since 1975 — when I was 13 years old! — and I’ve been working in newspaper graphics in design since 1986. I’ve worked at small papers and at large papers — the largest were the Chicago Tribune and the Houston Chronicle — as a reporter, a designer, an infographics artist and as a manager.
For 12 years, I blogged about newspaper design for the American Press Institute, the Poynter Institute, the American Copy Editors Society and for my own website. I’ve taught workshops and seminars and consulted for newspapers all over the U.S. and throughout the world, including England, the Philippines, Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa.
I’ve spoken at the National College Media Convention four times. And I’ve judged a number of newspaper design contests around the world — including leading the jury for the Newspaper Design contest several times.
Since early 2019, I’ve been building “alternative story form” full-page graphic stories for the Spokesman-Review. I take on all sorts of topics: History, politics, pop culture, science… usually with an “on this date”-type anniversary peg. I try to chop up my stories into smaller, easily-digestible bits and I try to use lots of visuals: Photos, maps, charts, diagrams.
And I try to emphasize aspects of history that aren’t particularly well-known. Sometimes, that means finding obscure historical facts. Sometimes, that means “fact-checking” things we’ve learned in school that aren’t particularly accurate. Sometimes, that means telling readers the story behind the story that they had learned years ago. It’s all quite fascinating, really.
The pages have been very well-received in Spokane and elsewhere: In 2020, we began offering them to other newspapers around the country. Every Friday, I send out an email with links to fresh pages to editors who have asked to join my list. Right now, 251 newspapers across the U.S. have access to my pages. I get emails from readers from cities I’ve never even heard of.
My big project for this year: Compile a collection of my pages to be reprinted in book form. Task one was to select a theme, to keep this collection somewhat organized. I chose history, with an emphasis on U.S. history. Task two was to figure out how to convert very tall, broadsheet newspaper graphics into horizontally-formatted double-page book spreads.
Thinking this would take a long,long time, I began work very early: In late January, as soon as our book publisher, Pediment, gave me precise page dimensions. The work went more quickly than I expected. It turned out that some of my pages actually worked better as horizontals than they did as verticals. I also had the option to let photos and artwork – but not text — bleed off a page or to run across the gutter and onto the facing page.
Most of the work was done by early May. The book will be 208 pages. When you subtract pages for an “about the author” bit, acknowledgements, end notes, contents and whatnot, that left room for 97 of my stories.
Also, I had to do a lot of new photographic research: A couple of years ago, the Spokesman-Review dropped its membership in the Associated Press. But I had been relying on the extensive AP photo library for visuals.
Since I no longer have access to AP photos — nor to I have permission to re-publish them in a book — I had to drop the photos I had used previously and replace them with other images. And I had no budget to work with on this project, which meant I needed public domain images.
I found most of what I needed at the Library of Congress, the National Archives and the National Parks Service. I found other materials at Wikimedia Commons — while I don’t rely on Wikipedia as a source, I do like the depth of their image collection. And here in the U.S., if an image is from 1929 or before, then it’s in the public domain.
I start out my book with the “discovery” of the “New World” by Christopher Columbus in 1492. You’re probably aware that Columbus had no clue where he actually was. He called the natives of the Caribbean islands “Indians” because he thought he was off the coast of India.
But what you might not know: He set about enslaving a bunch of those natives — against the express orders of those who funded his four voyages: The King and Queen of Spain. When they found out, they grew extremely angry and sent someone to arrest Columbus and bring him back to Europe in chains.
That’s an example of “the story behind the story” that’s not often told here in America. And that’s just my opening spread! I go through the creation of the United States, our Civil War in the 1860’s, the technological revolution, the Great Depression, the space race… all the way up to the terrorist attacks of 9/11.
The book went on pre-order this week here in the U.S. It lists for $44.95, but one can save 25% by ordering it by Oct. 10. The book ships in mid-November. Pediment even built a nice web site to advertise it:
www.Apple.PictorialBook.com
I asked Pediment whether or not they shipped overseas. I’m told that international shipping costs were too great, so they no longer do that. But, the president of the company told me, “Best thing to do is wait until after release when the book is on Amazon and order from Amazon.” They should ship anywhere, he said.
Later this fall, we’re talking about my visiting some of the cities where newspapers use my pages and some of the universities where they still teach newspaper design and graphics. I can give presentations about how I do my research and build my pages and then I can sit down and autograph books. We’re just getting started discussing this, so no schedule has yet been developed.
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