David Mathew
David Nicholson
Monday 03 August 2009
Dave Nicholson was the gentle giant of the World Desk. He was a delight to work with and a great source of knowledge about so many things – all invaluable attributes of the ideal Chief Sub.
I was scanning the Baronial website the other day and came across an old article about Mrs Moon's and George Short (or maybe that's in reverse order). Dave immediately came to mind.
Came 8pm on the World Desk night shift and the desk "heavies" took their "meal" break in Mrs Moon's (which was hardly known for its food).
There, ranged down from the top end of the bar next to the stairs – steps many outsiders failed to complete on receipt of Mrs Moon's traditional cry of "You're barred!" – regularly stood Jack Hartzman, Ron Thomson, Cy Fox, Dave Betts, Ron Sly, "Big Dave" Mathew and other kings of the night including, of course, Dave Nicholson.
Where Jack always had his Scotch, Dave had his pints – quite often two at a time. His imposing frame had an imposing capacity for the ale. The pints flowed smoothly down, with nary a swallow, to no apparent effect other than to add fuel to the warmth of Dave's signature laugh. So much enjoyment was obtained, and so much knowledge and experiences shared, on those night desk breaks that – just occasionally – they may have extended beyond their allotted hour...
Cheers, Dave!
Rodney Pinder
I was scanning the Baronial website the other day and came across an old article about Mrs Moon's and George Short (or maybe that's in reverse order). Dave immediately came to mind.
Came 8pm on the World Desk night shift and the desk "heavies" took their "meal" break in Mrs Moon's (which was hardly known for its food).
There, ranged down from the top end of the bar next to the stairs – steps many outsiders failed to complete on receipt of Mrs Moon's traditional cry of "You're barred!" – regularly stood Jack Hartzman, Ron Thomson, Cy Fox, Dave Betts, Ron Sly, "Big Dave" Mathew and other kings of the night including, of course, Dave Nicholson.
Where Jack always had his Scotch, Dave had his pints – quite often two at a time. His imposing frame had an imposing capacity for the ale. The pints flowed smoothly down, with nary a swallow, to no apparent effect other than to add fuel to the warmth of Dave's signature laugh. So much enjoyment was obtained, and so much knowledge and experiences shared, on those night desk breaks that – just occasionally – they may have extended beyond their allotted hour...
Cheers, Dave!
Rodney Pinder
David Mathew
Tuesday 21 October 2008
Dave Mathew still epitomizes what I most admire about copy editors. He was a human spell-checker and could find any inconsistency in any story. He had a gentle hand with young sub-editors such as myself on the London World Desk, calling quiet attention to the idiotic changes I had made to innocent correspondents’ copy. He was the kind of journalist you want to be like. To this day I tell anyone who will listen about the example he set.
Maggie Fox
Maggie Fox
David Mathew
Thursday 02 October 2008
Allan Barker rightly observes that Dave had an orderly mind. I fondly remember him settling into the evening slot as World Desk filing editor some 30 years ago. One of his first moves would be to check the queue on the slow East Africa wire. (Remember queues?) He would grab the long ribbon of paper, point to the bottom of the list, frown, and exclaim: “Look at this! Forty-seven stories on Eastaf! Some of this stuff won’t get to subscribers before next Christmas!” He was one of the titans and will be sorely missed.
Graham Colville
Graham Colville
David Mathew
Wednesday 01 October 2008
I too met Dave on the World Desk and felt the same as everyone else: what a talented, kind and gentle man he was. In recent years, I and other members of my family have loved getting his emails and jokes and funny and amazing things. My wife, Marianne, protested that I did not always remember to forward them to her computer so she asked if Dave could include her on the mailing list in her own right. He said he would but, typically considerate, offered to cut out the more risque ones sent to her. She told him she didn’t want that, and so we both got them at the same time. Often we would simultaneously burst out laughing, and say “Have you seen the one from Dave Mathew?” We were both very sad to learn Dave had died.
Trevor Goodchild
Trevor Goodchild
David Mathew
Monday 22 September 2008
What wasn’t there to like and respect about Dave Mathew? As a very green journalist fresh from the provinces Dave was one of those pillars of the World Desk who you instinctively turned to for advice, always offered, patiently and with a gentle authority that made you want to get it right. I was always amazed at his depth of knowledge of the arcane system of filing and priorities (a clear out at home recently turned up some yellow, mauve and red tickets full of codes!!).
If ever there was a gentle giant, he was it. Unfailingly friendly, a greeting in the pub was always “Hello, big, what are you drinking?”
I don’t know what they put in journalists’ drinks in Australia, but Dave had it in spades. It was indeed to have worked with such a guy.
Chris Peterson
If ever there was a gentle giant, he was it. Unfailingly friendly, a greeting in the pub was always “Hello, big, what are you drinking?”
I don’t know what they put in journalists’ drinks in Australia, but Dave had it in spades. It was indeed to have worked with such a guy.
Chris Peterson
David Mathew
Monday 22 September 2008
I was lucky enough to work beside Dave on the World Desk for quite a few years. His tenacious drive not only for accuracy but also for the highest standards in agency journalism was matched only by his great generosity of heart and a high sense of humour. He was tough with equals but was always helpful with younger subs still learning the ropes. His is a terrible loss.
Dave Nicholson
Dave Nicholson
David Mathew
Monday 22 September 2008
David Mathew was a good friend and among the very top tier of filing editors in Reuters. Even in retirement in Sarasota, Florida, he implacably tracked factual and grammatical errors in the local newspapers and TV. (Allan Barker summed up his abilities admirably, and I fully agree with Colin McIntyre on what David would have thought about today’s “karaoke filing”.)
David’s memory was unbelievable. We vividly remember him playing trivia (the Canadian version) when he was on a desk assignment in New York – and, of course, he knew all the answers, no matter how obscure.
I, for one, will miss our frequent phone and email exchanges, and occasional dinners, critiquing news reports and the increasing disregard of the need for strong and impartial reporting and editing.
His death was a real shock to us. My wife Barbara and I spent a couple of days with David and Hilda at their Palm Beach holiday retreat a few weeks ago and we had talked and exchanged emails since – the last occasion just a couple of days before he died.
He was in good spirits and there was no indication of any problems. His biggest concern was always and overwhelmingly Hilda’s health.
Friends and colleagues have paid wonderful tribute to David, and I echo their sentiments. We’ll miss him.
Brian Bain
David’s memory was unbelievable. We vividly remember him playing trivia (the Canadian version) when he was on a desk assignment in New York – and, of course, he knew all the answers, no matter how obscure.
I, for one, will miss our frequent phone and email exchanges, and occasional dinners, critiquing news reports and the increasing disregard of the need for strong and impartial reporting and editing.
His death was a real shock to us. My wife Barbara and I spent a couple of days with David and Hilda at their Palm Beach holiday retreat a few weeks ago and we had talked and exchanged emails since – the last occasion just a couple of days before he died.
He was in good spirits and there was no indication of any problems. His biggest concern was always and overwhelmingly Hilda’s health.
Friends and colleagues have paid wonderful tribute to David, and I echo their sentiments. We’ll miss him.
Brian Bain
David Mathew
Sunday 21 September 2008
Very sorry to hear about Dave, who seemed indestructible. I’m sure anyone else of our vintage would regard Dave as the ultimate filing editor, the keeper of the scrolls, who continued to have the highest standards on copy editing in the face of pressure to loosen up in the interests of economy, i.e. profit. It sometimes took time to get a story through Dave – but you knew it would be totally error-free by the time it hit the wires. In the end the company decided that some accuracy could suffer in the interests of speed. I can’t recall whether Dave was around to witness the introduction of “Karaoke Filing”, as described by Jim Flannery, when filing editors were banished, but he would have hated it.
He was a stalwart of the Reuters Golf Society, at his prime a prodigious hitter of the ball until age and ailments cramped his length.
As an Aussie, I will miss his no-nonsense Aussie approach to life.
Colin McIntyre
He was a stalwart of the Reuters Golf Society, at his prime a prodigious hitter of the ball until age and ailments cramped his length.
As an Aussie, I will miss his no-nonsense Aussie approach to life.
Colin McIntyre
David Mathew
Sunday 21 September 2008
Apart from Dave Mathew’s admirable reporting and editing skills, so well detailed by Al Barker (above), another aspect of DM’s larger-than-life personality was his broad sense of humour and insatiable appetite for offbeat stories, tales of the bizarre, human quirkiness jokes (good and bad), groaners, word-play twisters, comic pictures and videos.
Over the last 15 years or so, since we both stopped working for Reuters, Dave had been the Betts family’s major wholesale supplier of comic e-mails, and I know he kept many other former colleagues and their families amused as well. He and I also exchanged a lot of grumpy messages about slopping writing, contorted sentences, errors in grammar or punctuation and so forth. It is hard to believe he will no longer be making deliveries to our inbox. We shall miss him badly.
Dave Betts
Over the last 15 years or so, since we both stopped working for Reuters, Dave had been the Betts family’s major wholesale supplier of comic e-mails, and I know he kept many other former colleagues and their families amused as well. He and I also exchanged a lot of grumpy messages about slopping writing, contorted sentences, errors in grammar or punctuation and so forth. It is hard to believe he will no longer be making deliveries to our inbox. We shall miss him badly.
Dave Betts
David Mathew
Saturday 20 September 2008
“Big Dave” Mathew was a highly accomplished Australian journalist who mastered a variety of reporting and editing jobs in a long career.
Because he was a quiet, unassuming type he may not have got the accolades and recognition he deserved. But those who worked closely with him knew his worth and valued him highly.
I first knew him in the late 1950s and early 1960s when he was one of four reporters in the general news team in Washington led by the legendary Pat Heffernan. In such a small reporting group everyone had to pull their weight and Dave did so, although most of the overseas assignments with the president usually went to Pat or his able deputy Ralph Harris. Dave probably still had a corporate connection at that time with AAP, a Reuters shareholder, and in 1962 or 63 he left Washington to return to his home town of Melbourne to be AAP’s diplomatic correspondent, concentrating on ANZUS links at a time when Kennedyites worried about falling dominoes in South East Asia. But Oz was too small to contain him for more than a few years.
Dave returned to the U.S. capital and Reuters in about 1968 and I can vouch for his excellent work when I had an editing job there in 1969-71. He covered press conferences, kept the bureau file running through weekends when he was often the lone White House man on duty, and could churn out news analyses speedily on any subject. I remember one Saturday during the Nixon presidency when Vietnam was the raging issue and Dickie decided to hold a press conference at short notice. It ran to 20 questions in half an hour. Dave covered it alone for Reuters and didn’t rely much if anything on the transcript that came out several hours later. I got hit with the same problem with LBJ while he was visiting New York a few years earlier and found it an absolute nightmare but Dave had good shorthand and an orderly mind and sailed through with his usual aplomb.
Dave decided to move on in 1971 and transferred to London where he and his family set up home at Epsom, near the famous racecourse and close to Tattenham Corner - but the view of the horses was wasted on him as he had little interest. Dave did sterling work for several years as senior sub (night editor) in the London Bureau, fielding a lot of difficult stories. LB had special pressures in those days with staff thin on the ground at night and the Fleet Street nationals breaking a lot of scandal stories about Harold Wilson, Ted Heath, Lord Lambton, Marcia Williams et al. After a few years Dave moved to the World Desk where he became a strong filer and master of the routing codes, knowing exactly where to send stories around the world. He always had a great eye for incongruous leads - the latter talent he continued in retirement, keeping fellow retirees abreast of the many bad leads he came across in his wide readings of the international press.
In retirement Dave settled in Sarasota, a very attractive part of Florida where he did some offshore fishing in his boat that he often moored at the bottom of his garden. He and Hilda also took a liking to cruising in ocean liner, usually in Pacific and Asian waters.
Allan Barker
Because he was a quiet, unassuming type he may not have got the accolades and recognition he deserved. But those who worked closely with him knew his worth and valued him highly.
I first knew him in the late 1950s and early 1960s when he was one of four reporters in the general news team in Washington led by the legendary Pat Heffernan. In such a small reporting group everyone had to pull their weight and Dave did so, although most of the overseas assignments with the president usually went to Pat or his able deputy Ralph Harris. Dave probably still had a corporate connection at that time with AAP, a Reuters shareholder, and in 1962 or 63 he left Washington to return to his home town of Melbourne to be AAP’s diplomatic correspondent, concentrating on ANZUS links at a time when Kennedyites worried about falling dominoes in South East Asia. But Oz was too small to contain him for more than a few years.
Dave returned to the U.S. capital and Reuters in about 1968 and I can vouch for his excellent work when I had an editing job there in 1969-71. He covered press conferences, kept the bureau file running through weekends when he was often the lone White House man on duty, and could churn out news analyses speedily on any subject. I remember one Saturday during the Nixon presidency when Vietnam was the raging issue and Dickie decided to hold a press conference at short notice. It ran to 20 questions in half an hour. Dave covered it alone for Reuters and didn’t rely much if anything on the transcript that came out several hours later. I got hit with the same problem with LBJ while he was visiting New York a few years earlier and found it an absolute nightmare but Dave had good shorthand and an orderly mind and sailed through with his usual aplomb.
Dave decided to move on in 1971 and transferred to London where he and his family set up home at Epsom, near the famous racecourse and close to Tattenham Corner - but the view of the horses was wasted on him as he had little interest. Dave did sterling work for several years as senior sub (night editor) in the London Bureau, fielding a lot of difficult stories. LB had special pressures in those days with staff thin on the ground at night and the Fleet Street nationals breaking a lot of scandal stories about Harold Wilson, Ted Heath, Lord Lambton, Marcia Williams et al. After a few years Dave moved to the World Desk where he became a strong filer and master of the routing codes, knowing exactly where to send stories around the world. He always had a great eye for incongruous leads - the latter talent he continued in retirement, keeping fellow retirees abreast of the many bad leads he came across in his wide readings of the international press.
In retirement Dave settled in Sarasota, a very attractive part of Florida where he did some offshore fishing in his boat that he often moored at the bottom of his garden. He and Hilda also took a liking to cruising in ocean liner, usually in Pacific and Asian waters.
Allan Barker
David Mathew
Saturday 20 September 2008
In 32 years with the Baron, I met an enormous amount of really nice people (yes, and a few – but very few – total s....) but Dave stands out among them as one of the kindest and most considerate of all – a real gentleman.
Bernard Edinger
Bernard Edinger
