May 22, 2020 - Issue: Vol. 166, No. 97 — Daily Edition116th Congress (2019 - 2020) - 2nd Session

[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E474-E475]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      HONORING ELIZABETH S. ELLIS

                                  _____
                                 

                          HON. JOHN B. LARSON

                             of connecticut

                    in the house of representatives

                          Friday, May 22, 2020

  Mr. LARSON of Connecticut. Madam Speaker, I would like to include in 
the Record the following article honoring Elizabeth S. Ellis, the 
longtime influential publisher of Connecticut's Journal Inquirer 
newspaper, who passed away on May 4, 2020. Dedicating 53 years of her 
life to the Journal Inquirer, Ellis successfully expanded the small, 
local newspaper from five to eighteen towns. She notably broke gender 
barriers by directing the paper when few women were afforded leadership 
roles in journalism. What impressed me the most was how she was able 
to, in a relatively short period of time, rival the State Paper of 
Record the Hartford Courant. She attracted talented journalists 
including the state's leading sports writer, Randy Smith and editorial 
page editor and writer, Chris Powell. Elizabeth Ellis' dedication to 
her community is commendable, and I believe it deserves recognition.

                      [From the Journal Inquirer]

                       Portrait of a Lady, and Us

                          (By Keith C. Burris)

       Seekers look for teachers. They sit at the feet of those 
     who can teach them something about how to live. My Uncle Tom, 
     at whose feet I sat for a time (actually we sat in deck 
     chairs on a high-rise balcony drinking gin), was an old test 
     and fighter pilot with an eye for character and detail. He 
     called me ``little grasshopper'' when I was in college.
       But I want to tell you about another person who taught me, 
     and did so for 21 years, never once in didactic fashion.
       Her name was Elizabeth Ellis, and she was my boss, mentor, 
     friend, life coach, and master teacher for all those years, 
     at the Journal Inquirer.
       Betty died this week at the age of 92.
       The first thing she taught me was to be independent--to 
     steer my own path and not to be intimidated. I never saw or 
     heard her worry about ``what people might say'' or think.
       She had a worldview. I would call it Roosevelt liberalism, 
     but this worldview was as practical and subject to empirical 
     testing as it was principled. She was an intellect, but she 
     did not live in the world of abstraction. She lived in the 
     world of the possible.
       An early lesson in her independence and pragmatism was the 
     case of two young, inexperienced cops shooting and killing a 
     man who was high and charged at them, threatening to take 
     them out. He had a knife, but was otherwise unarmed.
       I wanted to hammer the cops in an editorial. I wanted to 
     say their lives were never at risk and they should have shot 
     the guy in the foot or leg. And, anyway, their superiors 
     should not have sent two green cops on this call. These were 
     not unreasonable positions.
       Betty quietly asked me some questions: Had I considered the 
     dilemma from the young cops' point of view? How long did they 
     have to think? What information did they have? What did I 
     know about the size, distance, and disposition of the man who 
     came at the cops? And, most devastatingly, had I ever tried 
     to shoot someone in the foot or leg? Had I ever been in a 
     situation remotely similar? Did I know anyone who had?
       This was my lesson in empathy, with side tutorials in 
     balance, skepticism, and judgment.
       I never thought of Betty as a religious person. But she was 
     a deeply sensitive person and a profoundly Jewish person. 
     Hence her innate sense of justice and understanding. I never 
     once saw her get emotional or sentimental, but she walked me 
     though the death of my father, and the long illness and death 
     of my mother, as no one else did--with the blessed assurance 
     of the psalmist. Or maybe just a mom.
       She once told me that a newspaper should be a place where a 
     person could go when he has exhausted all other options--the 
     paper should be the recourse of last resort.
       The third thing I learned from her was a sense of fun.
       Yes, she regarded journalism as a high calling. But there 
     is no sense in owning or producing a daily newspaper, she 
     thought, if you don't have some fun--afflicting the 
     comfortable as well as comforting the afflicted. Every day.
       And we did have fun. We laughed a lot and rattled a lot of 
     cages. And we regularly surprised people. And formed no 
     permanent alliances. (We didn't endorse in political races.)
       We took the work seriously but ourselves not so much. We 
     had a feisty little newspaper. At one time, when such things 
     were possible, the JI was the fastest growing paper in New 
     England. The paper's motto was: ``We tell it like it is, 
     somebody has to.''
       Betty set the tone and tenor. She was rightly called, in 
     her JI obit, ``the soul'' of the paper. She drew the 
     boundaries and let us all roam within. She never stopped 
     being a fan of good journalism or good writing and she was 
     lavish with praise when she thought any one of us reached the 
     top. But occasionally she would intone, always with a wry 
     smile, ``remember, it's my sandbox.''
       She relished being the underdog and she loved a good fight. 
     She adored jazz and theater and she liked cocktails, and 
     sentences, that packed a punch. Her wit was sharp and dry and 
     her composure eclipsed the truth that she was actually tough 
     as nails. But she was also, in every sense of the word--a 
     word in unfortunate retreat these days--a lady.
       And when I say tough, I refer not only to things she 
     endured in life--loss, pain, the ruthlessness of age--but a 
     certain mental toughness about the world. She was an old-
     fashioned progressive, but there was nothing of what we would 
     today call ``woke'' about her. Not one ounce of preciousness 
     or virtue signaling. And when I think about her I wonder if 
     we have lost all rigor, both in our profession and in our 
     society. What would she think about an entire economy shut 
     down; a whole society sheltering in place, ad infinitum?
       Maybe that it is good that we are starting to reopen 
     America; good that we are starting to come out. Maybe she 
     would say that risk is part of life and we take a risk every 
     time we leave the house or turn the key in the car. And who 
     wants to live in a society where you can't shake hands or hug 
     your kid or visit your aging mother or your newborn 
     granddaughter? Life is risk. And either you risk or you live 
     by fear.
       Elizabeth Ellis took risks. It seemed to me she was never 
     afraid.

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