Dateline: July 20, 2006

Clarendon welcomes WTPA newspapers

By Roger Estlack, Clarendon Enterprise

Clarendon will welcome more than 90 registered attendees during the West Texas Press Association’s 76th annual convention this week.

Convention chairman and WTPA First Vice President Roger Estlack and the staff of The Clarendon Enterprise are hosting the event, which has been designed to showcase Donley County and leave a positive lasting impression on the members of the state’s largest regional group of newspapers.

“We believe we’ve put together a program that puts our community’s best foot forward, that is entertaining and educational, and that most of all is fun,” Estlack said. “Local support for this convention has been terrific, and it will have a positive impact on our local economy.”

The Clarendon convention will bring in newspapers from an area loosely bounded by Perryton in the north, Ft. Davis in the west, and Hondo in the south. Thirty-seven individual papers and associate members are sending representatives.

Co-hosts for the event include the County Star-News in Shamrock, The Valley Tribune, The Wellington Leader, and The Dalhart Texan.

The convention begins Thursday morning with a golf tournament at the Clarendon Country Club and continues that afternoon with registration and a WTPA directors’ meeting at the Bairfield Activity Center on the campus of Clarendon College.

Thursday evening the activities will move downtown where Judge Jack Hall will welcome convention attendees to the 1890 Donley County Courthouse. The Saints’ Roost Band will provide musical entertainment as the crowd enjoys the Chuckwagon cooking of Kevin Romines and the Honey-Do Spoiler wagon. Then former newspaperman and renowned author Mark Twain, as portrayed by James Doores of Amarillo, will address the convention.

Thursday’s activities will close with WTPA Night at the Sandell Drive-In and a special presentation of “The Paper,” starring Michael Keaton, Glenn Close, and Robert Duvall.

Friday morning the convention returns to the Bairfield Activity Center with a page design workshop presented by Tim Harrower of Wilsonville, Oregon, and the beginning of a silent auction to raise money for the WTPA Scholarship Fund.

Texas independent candidate for governor Kinky Friedman will join the association for lunch, and Jasper publisher Willis Webb will help newspapers prepare for disasters that may affect their businesses in an afternoon session. The remainder of the afternoon will be free for convention attendees to shop local stores, visit Lake Greenbelt, or tour the Saints’ Roost Museum.

The convention resumes Friday evening at the Bairfield Activity Center with a banquet featuring Benjamin photographer Wyman Meinzer and his new book, Between Heaven & Texas.

Activities on Saturday morning will include a publishers’ roundtable discussion and a general membership meeting. Democratic US senatorial candidate Barbara Ann Radnofsky will open the annual awards brunch, which will reveal the winners of the 2005 WTPA Better Newspaper Contest, and the convention will close with the announcement of the 2007 convention site.

“This convention is a great opportunity for Clarendon and Donley County,” Estlack said. “We are very pleased to have the WTPA in our hometown, and, by the same token, the WTPA is very pleased with the support Clarendon has shown for the association.”

Local sponsors for the convention include the Clarendon Economic Development Corporation, the City of Clarendon, Clarendon College, Herring Bank, the Donley County State Bank, and Community Bank.

Additional support has come from Donley County, the Clarendon Chamber of Commerce, Greenbelt Water Authority, the Clarendon Country Club, the Sandell Drive-In, Signs Plus, the Clarendon Lions Club, the Best Western Red River Inn, and the Clarendon Outdoor Entertainment Association.